Mexico: Police reforms include “trust test”

The Mexican government will require all its police officers to undergo a “trust test” designed to combat corruption. It is one of several reforms to law enforcement including a complete redesign of training for all law enforcement officials.

Depending on who you speak to this is either an ingenuous idea or a cheap P.R. stunt:

“"They are sending a signal that they are trying to clean house," says Ana Maria Salazar, a national-security expert in Mexico City who was the former deputy assistant secretary of defense for drug enforcement policy and support in the Clinton administration.”I think you have to make these dramatic decisions to combat corruption. What they have done is send a message to the rest below that nobody is immune; if they can cut off the heads, they can easily go after all the others."

For some experts, the judgment to cast a wide net is misguided. "They are following the same logic as the military strategy, to suspect everyone," says Irma Sandoval, head of the Laboratory of Documentation and Analysis of Corruption and Transparency at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. "There is a culture of suspicion generated.... They go after everyone when what they should be doing is going after the guilty ones."

Mexico’s government is attempting to institute a myriad of reforms from law enforcement to fiscal reform, though they are facing staunch opposition.

Sources- CNN, Christian Science Monitor, Council on Foreign Relations

Image- BBC News