Rocha Moya shuns questions about the NAFTA case

He shuns the Nafta case. The governor of the state, Rubén Rocha Moya, shied away yesterday in the face of questions made by some journalists about the Nafta case. He was questioned about the reasons why he kept former mayor Alejandro Higuera Osuna as private secretary, when he was initially responsible for the lawsuit that cost the treasury the payment of compensation for 141 million pesos. The governor dismissed the question and with a pat on the back encouraged the reporter to enter the Angela Peralta theater to be at the presentation of Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas’ new book. The governor’s attitude was very symptomatic of the discretion with which the Nafta case has been handled. It was in February 2002, during the administration of Higuera Osuna, when the City Council granted permission to the company Nafta to build a gas station near the boardwalk. This would later be closed and a legal lawsuit would be prolonged by several administrations until concluding in a verdict of the judge so that the City Council paid 141.8 million pesos to the company. For the case, the municipal president, Luis Guillermo Benítez Torres, announced that he would initiate a process against the former municipal officials responsible for what he describes as embezzlement of the treasury. More public debt. Just on March 14, the City of Mazatlan would presume the conclusion of the Nafta case with the payment of 141.8 million pesos. For this, millionaire cash payments were given and the transfer of several properties of the municipal property. A little more than a month later, the City Council seeks the contracting of a debt for 60 million pesos. The resources, according to the municipal treasurer, Javier Alarcón, will be destined to the purchase of 10 patrols, 10 garbage collection trucks and machinery. The controversial thing about the case is that the same councilors were not aware of this proposal. At least that’s what the mayor Roberto Rodríguez said yesterday. But this is nothing strange in the administration of Morenoite Luis Guillermo Benítez Torres. Proposals arrive at the council without prior reading, without analysis, much less review, and yet they are majorityed by the Moreno fraction. The expectation. There is a wide expectation to know the procedures to regularize the auto “chocolate”, as announced by the state government. But neither in roads do they know how it will be done or where the modules will be located. Drought, the threat. The municipal president of Concordia, Raúl Díaz Bernal, seems to have found a political flag in the cyclical problem of drinking water that the municipality suffers. It presumes that the Picachos-Concordia aqueduct project is in the critical stage. Also that the work will be completed by 2023, but in the meantime is the extreme drought announced by Conagua for next summer. Will the municipality already have a preventive plan and assistance to citizens?



Original source in Spanish