Politics: Two tragic examples of government incompetence in the capital’s airspace and Metro
Since the very first months of López Obrador’s time as president it has been apparent that his administration would display grave defects in daily governing tasks, a deficiency that translates not only into an inability to address the multiple problems society faces but also into an incapacity to avoid a further exacerbation of such woes. Last week delivered news of grave events that testify to this obvious modus operandi.
One news item involves AMLO’s first major error upon assuming office in cancelling construction on a new international airport for Mexico City at Texcoco and replacing it by building a civil aviation terminal at the Felipe Ángeles in Santa Lucía (AIFA) airport north of the city. The consequences of that decision have proven to be very serious not only for Mexican aeronautics and public finance, but also for the economy as a whole. Mismanagement and problems with redesigning the airspace to accommodate the capital’s two functioning airports have now given way to multiple aviation problems, including greatly depleted numbers of experienced air traffic controllers, a rise in safety incidents and close calls between aircraft that pose risks to passenger safety. Such issues prompted a May 4 bulletin from the IFAPA warning pilots “...of several incidents involving aircraft arriving at Mexico City with low fuel states due to unplanned holding, diversions for excessive delays, and significant alerts where one crew almost had a Controlled Flight into Terrain.”
Another involves the head of the Mexico City government and potential Morena presidential nominee’s response to the report from Norwegian firm DNV that her government hired to investigate the causes of the May 2021 collapse of an overpass on Line 12 of Mexico City’s Metro that left 26 people dead and around 100 wounded, and to determine who was responsible for that tragedy. While Claudia Sheinbaum had praised the first two installments of that report last year, she took a page from AMLO’s playbook when she saw that the third and final report assigned blame to her as well as her predecessors in office. She decided not to publish it and announced plans to file a civil suit against the firm for issuing a report riddled with allegedly technical contradictions.
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