Many broken promises have emerged from the rubble left behind by the September 19 tremor that shook Mexico city and the state of Puebla and Morelos to the ground. Jerry-built constructions, official negligence of urban codes, corruption and the overall failure of the Mexican government to protect its people, contributed to the disaster being way worse than it should have been.
Mexico City’s mayor Miguel Angel Mancera and Education Minister Aurelio Nuño, are going at each-others throats, in order to unravel any blame for the collapse of the Enrique Rebsamen school, where 28 people died, including 19 children.
All the while, Tlalpan district official Claudia Sheinbaum pressed charges against Monica Garcia who is the owner of the building and also against former district officials Alejandro Zepeda and Miguel Angel Guerrero, who worked the district between 2010 through 2014, for allegedly turning a blind eye on major construction irregularities going on at the school. Sheibaum explained that it was the enlargement works at the school that caused the structural damage, that would lead to its collapse during the earthquake.
The earthquake heavily damaged 1,800 buildings across the capital, including a number of brand new buildings, that did not conform to the earthquake-resistant building codes, causing millions of dollars in damage, not to mention all the casualties.
“Thousands of people have been left out on the street because someone didn’t adequately supervise construction or accepted money to look the other way,” said Max Kaiser, head of the anti-corruption program at IMCO (The Mexican Institute for Competitiveness) and author of “The Fight Against Corruption, The Great Task Pending In Mexico”
“The sight of modern-looking buildings collapsing like houses of cards lays bare the rot in the construction and building permit processes,” also said Mariana Campos the Coordinator of Public Spending and Accountability Program at the public policy research center Mexico Evalua, when referring to the collapse of a seven-story office in the Roma neighborhood, where up to 60 people are believed to be dead.
“Looking at it, it didn’t seem like a building that would collapse the next day. It was beautiful and well-maintained,” Mariana Campos said to AFP “But the (defect) wasn’t visible. That’s how corruption works.”
The country is now entering its recovery phase, but people fear that with the current administration managing the relief efforts, Mexico will fall on the same vicious circle that caused the problem in the first place. And how could they not be suspicious of their government? With new accusations of corruption emerging every day, including that of the governor of Morelos, who has been accused of hoarding food aid for his proselytism campaign.
With everything going on watchdog groups are now calling for an independent review of where the $500 million that President Enrique Peña Nieto pledged as the emergency relief fund, goes.