La Jornada: Jorge Carrillo Olea*
Translated by Kevin Chao
It takes calm and courage to take a step back, which is justified when it is necessary. Perhaps this is one of those cases. During his campaign, Enrique Peña suggested the creation of a gendarmerie to contain increased crime rates. This suggestion must be taken the way it was originally meant to be: one of the thousands of ideas that are put out in such circumstances and that, considering the serious concerns it raises, nobody would mistake for a serious proposal.
There are many reasons to be extremely cautious if we are going to go forward with it:
1. It is generally thought that there is a lot of misinformation out there about what the gendarmerie’s duty would be. There is no how, what, where, when, or why. The gendarmerie will simply “go where they are needed as a community police force,” Mondragón [Manuel Mondragón y Kalb, Deputy Secretary for Public Security] explained before the Senate.
2. Leaked information suggests that the gendarmerie would carry out complementary or extra tasks for the Federal Police, focusing on non-urban zones, as gendarmeries have historically done in other countries. This ignores the fact that other backup police forces, such as the Italian Carabinieri, the French Gendarmerie Nationale, the Portuguese Republican National Guard, the Dutch Royal Marechaussee, and the Spanish Civil Guard, have ended up merging with the main police forces of those countries. The biggest and most criticized problem with dual police systems is the mixing up of territorial jurisdiction and the constant conflicts resulting from it. The plan also ignores the fact that these forces are even promoting the establishment of a single police force for all of the European Union.
3. The biggest problem is that there is talk of removing the army from law enforcement and at the same time talk of supplying the gendarmerie from its ranks; this presents, at the very least, a serious contradiction. It has been said that the gendarmerie will “retrain” the soldiers, since it is widely acknowledged that they are not currently competent to do the job. It is not clear who would have the materials or technical skills to perform the training.
How dangerous it is to devise military solutions for challenges that are evidently not there. It would be unbelievably difficult to get soldiers to repress their aggressive instincts, since the soldiers were trained to be aggressive. It’s as difficult as creating in the same person the sense of protection, redemption and social commitment required of police. If, according to plan, the gendarmerie only uses soldiers temporarily, nothing has been made clear about the recruitment and training methods, or the legal conditions, particularly those pertaining to labor laws, which would apply to civilian recruits.
4. There is no plan to meet the tremendous expected demand for the training of troops, commanders of various rank, and specialists, for both the Federal Police and the gendarmerie. This topic has been consistently avoided. If there is no way to produce better officers, how can we expect to have them? Until we start discussing how to train quality officers, we cannot expect anything to change.
5. In planning the inclusion of soldiers in the program, their career interests have not been taken into account. What will their legal status be as gendarmes? Will military laws be in effect in a civil institution? Will the authorities simply apply whichever code they feel like at the moment? Will service in the gendarmerie be recognized as military service? Should soldiers plan on eventually returning to the army or permanently remaining in the gendarmerie? If the latter, how would it be done? Would they get double pay and benefits? In short, and out of genuine concern for the soldiers, what will they be earning, what will they be giving up, what will they be risking?
Mexico’s great problems are inertial. Nothing started with Enrique Peña and nothing will end with him. That’s why these problems can only be solved by taking history into account. To come up with solutions, first the problems must be seen and understood. So of course, new solutions must anticipate the problems of tomorrow. There are ample examples of the good that has been done despite occasional bumps along the way.
The recently announced proposal for a gendarmerie has none of these dimensions. The plan, if there ever were one, would have to be thoroughly explained to the public and the entire National Public Security Council, and definitively to the Mexican Congress.
The conclusion is as simple as it is irrefutable: even when faced with an historic decision, for all that we are risking with this solution and all that is at stake in this gamble, we apparently don’t have a plan that is sufficiently structured or one with sufficient public support. What a risk we’re taking! Spanish original
*Jorge Carrillo Olea is a retired general and Mexican politician. A member of the Party of the Institutional Revolution, he was governor of Morelos from 1994-98. He holds a bachelors degree in military administration from the Superior War College. Presently, he is considered a specialist in national security and intelligence services.