- A new investigation by PODER analyzes contracts and discloses information about the benefited entrepreneurs from the flagship mega-project of the government of Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
- ICA, owned by Bernardo Quintana and one of the main contractors for the NAICM, is the most favored supplier with nearly 26 billion pesos in contracts. According to the research, the financial giant BlackRock is another major winner of the project.
- The rights of communities have become a ‘currency of exchange’: a transactional space for the acceptance of the Tren Maya, concludes the research team.
The Tren Maya, the flagship mega-project of the Fourth Transformation government, prioritizes corporate interests over the protection and guarantee of the rights of communities and the environment. The project, which will turn the train route into a center to promote extractive industries and tourism, disregards the needs of the population, accelerates deforestation in the jungle, and jeopardizes the water sustainability of the region.
These are the main conclusions of ‘El Negocio del Tren Maya’ (The Business of the Tren Maya), a special feature of data, research, and journalism by PODER whose goal is ‘to provide information, from a critical perspective, that helps communities make decisions about a project that could affect their future,’ says Julieta Lamberti, director of research at PODER.
In a microsite that combines contract visualizations, research documents, reports, infographics, and maps, the PODER team highlights how the project is a clear example of state capture, a phenomenon that occurs when an economic elite influences decisions on public policy for private benefit, above the common good. In the case of the Tren Maya, ‘the main beneficiaries continue to be business elites active in various sectors of the Mexican economy and participants in other major projects driven by the government: Carlos Slim, Bernardo Quintana, and Manuel Muñozcano own the companies that will build the Tren Maya and were also among the main contractors for the New International Airport of Mexico City (NAICM),’ Lamberti mentions. In addition, several of the companies most benefited by contracts have a history of corruption, fraud, and opacity.
BlackRock, the giant asset manager, also emerges as the big winner of the project. While it did not win the bid for the construction of Tren Maya’s segment 5, according to the investigation, Larry Fink’s company has investments in 12 energy projects on the peninsula, which will benefit from the Tren Maya reducing costs of mobility, logistics, and transportation of people and raw materials for the industry. This is in addition to its relationship with Pemex and its shares in China Communications Construction Company, Ltd., which won the bid for segment 1 of the Tren Maya.
“Let’s remember that the Tren Maya is not merely a ‘touristic’ project, as it is marketed. The project is part of the basic infrastructure for the energy industry in the southeast. One-third of the train’s cargo transport will be allocated to the transportation of fossil fuels. This means that public transportation infrastructure will be used for the benefit, once again, of private companies and projects that have had serious environmental, social, and human rights impacts,” says Lamberti.
Another noteworthy detail from ‘El Negocio del Tren Maya’ is that between 2019 and 2020, almost 67,000 million pesos were spent on 150 contracts for the planning, preparation, construction, community management, dissemination, or disclosure of the Tren Maya, according to information from Compranet on the QuiénEsQuién.wiki platform. Of these, 105 contracts (70%) were awarded through direct allocation; 23 (15.33%) through invitation to at least 3 companies; 14 (9.33%) through contracts between public entities; and only 8 (5.33%) through public bidding.
There are also questions about the transparency of the contracting process. ‘The project lacks clarity regarding all the contracts involved. Just as contracts were made before it was given to Fonatur Tren Maya, S.A. de C.V., there is no specific category on Compranet to find them. Additionally, in the names of suppliers, when it comes to consortia, not all participants are listed,’ adds Claudia Ocaranza, coordinator of journalism at PODER.
‘El Negocio del Tren Maya’ scrutinizes the mechanisms of supposed participation of affected peoples and communities and the environmental impact that the project will have in southeastern Mexico. ‘We found that the indigenous consultation process was not an exercise of effective participation but a transactional space, a currency of exchange: I grant you rights, such as health, education, housing, and work, but you guarantee me acceptance of the project,’ asserts Daniel Castrejón, a researcher at PODER. ‘From the beginning, the Tren Maya lacked a mechanism for the legitimate integration of peoples. The approval process ended up being similar to any mega-project from past administrations.’
The special feature also includes several reports, such as the one on the Cuxtal reserve in Yucatán, where real estate speculation adds to tourist and hotel mega-projects to create a scenario of ecological destruction and social fabric disruption in the communities.