Mexico’s Supreme Court on Wednesday ruled that changes in the country’s electricity market regulations that prioritize the state-owned company over private power generators are unconstitutional.
The ruling is a setback to President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s plans to restore the dominance of state-owned energy companies and bodes badly for a bill he sent to Congress this week that would give state-owned CFE an impressive position of power. . market.
It could also spark a showdown between the court and the president, a nationalist who played key parts of a historic energy sector overhaul carried out under his predecessor that ended Mexico’s state monopoly on the oil and electricity markets for more. private investment.
According to analysts, Mexican courts are an obstacle to Mr. Lopez Obrador’s drive to centralize power. In the energy sector, a number of lower court rulings have gone against the government and the Supreme Court has prevented the government from lowering the salaries of senior officials at autonomous institutions such as the central bank.
Wednesday’s ruling 4-1 echoes important aspects of a policy published last year by the Department of Energy that required the national grid operator to purchase electricity generated by CFE instead of cheaper options from private producers that cost billions of dollars in have invested the country, especially in wind and solar stations. The ministry stated that the change was necessary to ensure network reliability.