WHEN Enrique Peña Nieto won Mexico’s presidential election last year, the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), which had run the country for 70 years, was restored to power after a 12-year gap. Many of those, including this newspaper, who liked the telegenic 46-year-old’s reformist rhetoric were worried that once the PRI was back in power it would revert to its old, authoritarian ways.


So Mr Peña deserves praise for his first four months in office. Having signed a pact with the two main opposition parties to overcome the gridlock that has prevented reforms, especially to the monopolies that hold Mexico back, the new president has targeted the monopolists. An education reform is aimed at seizing control of schools from the teachers’ union, whose longtime leader, Elba Esther Gordillo, was promptly arrested on charges of embezzlement (which she denies). Then came a potentially far-reaching measure to force more competition on the telecoms firms that have made Carlos Slim the world’s richest man, and on Televisa, a mighty television network which his critics claim did Mr Peña favours during the campaign. This week the president signed a new law restricting injunctions, abused by the rich and powerful to block regulatory or legislative measures.
Mr Peña is not the only one who deserves credit. So does the opposition. It has recognised that Mexicans want change, and is behaving better than the PRI did when out of office.
A new optimism surrounds Mexico’s prospects. The peso has risen by 16% against the dollar since last June. But if Mr Peña is to keep his promise to raise his country’s rate of economic growth to 5-6% a year, the president will need to take some harder decisions still.
First, passing a law to make telecoms more competitive is only a first step: it must be implemented effectively. Second, a lot rests on a proposed energy reform (see article). Mexico could be an energy superpower, but oil production has slumped since 2004, and the country imports petrol and natural gas from the United States. For that blame Pemex, the state monopoly. Sadly, the president has resiled from the idea of part-privatising Pemex, but he should at the very least allow it both to offer risk-sharing contracts to private investors for deepwater exploration, shale gas and refining, and to invest more of its profits, rather than handing them over to the state in taxes. So energy reform must go with fiscal changes, which would also finance a social-security reform designed to reduce the incentives for Mexicans to work in the informal economy, as one in two now does.
Another big test for Mr Peña is security. His predecessor, Felipe Calderón, declared a “war” on drug traffickers which saw 70,000 people die in six years, 30,000 “disappear” and extortion and kidnapping become commonplace. Mr Peña needs to spend fewer resources on sending soldiers to fight drug barons and more on strengthening the police and the court system. He seems to understand that. He has proposed a new paramilitary gendarmerie, but has not been clear about its role or financing and has yet to set out a plan to get the army off the streets, despite its mounting abuses.
Firm government, but not a political monopoly
The PRI likes to claim that its long experience of government means it knows how to run the country. Mr Peña does indeed seem more adept in the exercise of presidential power than his two immediate predecessors. His sure touch could serve his countrymen well, but if he uses it to resurrect his party’s former political monopoly, he will lose his glowing new reputation as a trustbuster.