Judicial election: The buck stops with the Treasury and Finance Department

It is up to the local Administration and Finance Secretariat or even the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit to determine whether to grant a budget increase to the Electoral Institute of Mexico City (IECM) to address the judicial election.

This is how Morena and opposition deputies considered them after the National Electoral Institute (INE) informed its local counterpart that it is responsible for paying 45 million pesos in salaries for around five thousand electoral assistant trainers (CAE), since the federal entity does not have the resources, which Excelsior announced last Thursday.

In real terms, it is not up to the local institute, nor would a budget increase be justified, because according to the law, the local institute does not have powers in terms of training, but rather the INE does," said yesterday Deputy Diego Garrido (PAN), member of the Political-Electoral Affairs Commission.

For this reason, he said, it would be the INE that would have to request a budget increase from the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit (SHCP).

Deputy Paulo García (Morena), consulted on Sunday at the La Chilanguera press conference, considered that the city's Finance Secretariat could make this budget adjustment.

We have not received a notification from the IECM requesting a budget increase, which, given the times we are in, would have to be sent to the Secretary of Administration and Finance more than us (...) Our colleagues from Finance will have to analyze it, they are the ones who are in charge of the issue," he said.

The Mexico City Budget and Efficient Spending Law establishes that once the local Congress approves the budget and the year begins to run, Finance is the department in charge of evaluating requests for budget expansion.

The reason for the IECM to pay (the salary of the CAE) would have to be seen because it cannot divert resources to something for which it has no authority," considered Royfid Torres, coordinator of the Movimiento Ciudadano bench and also a member of the Political-Electoral Affairs Commission.

Last Thursday, this newspaper reported that the IECM will have to pay 45 million pesos to pay the salaries of around five thousand CAEs and supervisors, resources that were not planned for this year.

Two weeks ago, the INE informed the IECM that it did not have the resources to assume the expenditure it incurred in the last elections.

In other years, the INE (National Electoral Institute) was in charge of paying the CAEs and supervisors, but this time, given the budget cuts that the INE has and the pressure, it is transferring that to the entities," explained the electoral counselor and president of the Provisional Monitoring Commission for the Organization and Celebration of the Debate Forums for the Electoral Process of the Judicial Branch, Erika Estrada.

IECM sources confirmed that the institute has already sent a letter to the Secretariat of Administration and Finance requesting a budget increase of 45 million pesos.

The agency was therefore asked for a position, but at the time of going to press there was still no response.

We have not received a notification from the IECM requesting a budget increase, which, in addition, given the times we are in, would have to reach the Secretariat of Administration and Finance more than us," Paulo García , deputy (Morena).

We would have to see the basis for the Electoral Institute of Mexico City (the salary of the approximately five thousand CAE), because it cannot divert resources to something for which it has no authority," Royfid Torres, deputy (Citizen Movement).

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