We know that our community is definitely built at both sides of the border: we have relatives, clients, suppliers, and friends at both sides of the border. Next June 6th, Mexico is having midterm elections: there will be elected 15 governors (15 of 32 -including four border states: Baja California, Chihuahua, Sonora, and Nuevo León); 500 Federal Congressmen; 30 state congresses and almost 2,000 municipalities (https://lukev.mx/lukev/una-eleccion-importante/).
As a community we are always looking for happiness; and in public terms, that may be a combination of “development” and “freedom”. We need development: economic, health, cultural, technologic and education development. And to reach happiness we require to feel free: ideology freedom, freedom of speech, a free press, free enterprises.
Worldwide, we have not found a perfect political and social system. We may think that Democracy propels freedom in a society; the problem is that Democracy alone doesn´t warranty development, specifically when a populist government wins elections. In this scenario, the majority of the voters may have freely expressed their will by choosing what they thought was the best option, although once in power doesn´t provide development.
On the opposite side, sometimes a Dictatorship as a political system, had impacted positively the economic development of a nation, but it definitely oppresses public freedom, in different ways. And in the middle, we have a wide variety of political systems, all of them with pros and cons. Let´s take Democracy as our best option. So, in order to protect a society from a populist government democratically elected, we need strong institutions that help balance this kind of governments.
Currently, Mexico has a populist government that is halting the nation´s development, and the Federal Congress has a majority of the same political party. So that is why this election is important for people at both sides of the border; because it is an opportunity to strengthen the Federal Congress as a democratic institution that would help balance the populist government, changing its composition, in order to reach a majority different to the ruling party (https://www.economist.com/leaders/2021/05/27/voters-should-curb-mexicos-power-hungry-president). But this is tricky, because the ruling party has other four or five political parties as allies, so when people vote for any of these parties, they are really voting for the ruling party in the executive power.
So, midterm elections are coming, we hope people get out to express their vote, peacefully, and we hope the Mexican Federal Government stick to the democratic rules, agreed by all; and we hope Mexico comes out of this process as a stronger nation.
