Politics: Reopening plan - more doubts than points of clarity
The plan for reopening social and economic activities the federal government announced last Wednesday was so vague, confusing and contradictory that it left most observers baffled, and most state governors looking to plans of their own.
A few general aspects are clear. The strategy consists of reopening activities in three stages, the first being a full reopening effective May 18 in the fewer than 300 municipalities in which no Covid-19 cases have been reported, and none have been registered in any contiguous municipalities. From that same day until the end of the month, a Stage 2 begins, in which all preparations are to be made, under Ministry of Health guidelines, for reopening other parts of the country. Then starting June 1 other regions will begin reopening specific activities depending on where they register on a four-color alert level, with the exception of the construction and mining industries and the production of transportation equipment, which as of June 1 will be deemed essential activities nationwide, no matter how the epidemic is evolving in any given region.
The whole plan was devised by a small group of government officials with no input from anyone from the state level or the private sector, an approach that helps explain why during a meeting in which officials presented all 32 governors with the strategy, only eight expressed their support. Opposition was so broad that when President Andrés Manuel López Obrador formally announced the reopening strategy he said it was entirely voluntary, that governors were free to abstain from it, and that he would not impose anything on anyone. And many state governors have made it clear they will follow their own plans, instead.
Making matters worse, there are serious doubts about timing, with the president insisting that the epidemic is under control, and Covid-19 Czar López Gatell now saying that the peak case count, which was supposed to have occurred last May 8, is now expected to come at some point in the coming week. Many state governors don’t believe that the worst of the epidemic will be behind us even in the coming weeks.
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