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Stenographic version. Press conference by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador on March 11, 2022
Act led by President Andrés Manuel López Obrador from Tapachula, Chiapas



PRESIDENT ANDRÉS MANUEL LÓPEZ OBRADOR: Good morning.

We are very happy to be here in Tapachula, our southern border, here where our homeland begins. Chiapas is an important state, fundamental in the development of our country, with a good, hardworking people, full of traditions, customs, with a great culture.

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PRESIDENT ANDRÉS MANUEL LÓPEZ OBRADOR: Who's next?

QUESTION: Good morning, Mr. President.

Iván Navarro Robles, from Informative Table.

A very important issue for all Chiapas is the existence of a gas pipeline project from Salina Cruz, Oaxaca to Chiapas. This could be added to the projects that will boost the development of our southern border.

PRESIDENT ANDRÉS MANUEL LÓPEZ OBRADOR: Yes, first, the gas pipeline is being rehabilitated, that is the plan, from the gulf to Salina Cruz, and there is a project to bring gas from the isthmus to the border, we are working on it.

There is enough gas, we have gas, the Federal Electricity Commission has contracts with companies that extract gas in Texas, enough, it is a matter of putting in the infrastructure, building the gas pipelines, but it is contemplated in the project.

INTERLOCUTOR: Mr. President, what other projects are expected for this southern border, which is very important for Mexico?

PRESIDENT ANDRÉS MANUEL LÓPEZ OBRADOR: Well, I already said it, the thing about trains is very important, we are talking only about trains about an investment for Chiapas of around 30 billion pesos, for freight trains and passenger trains, and the same goes for the modernization of Puerto Chiapas. And we are going to continue helping in infrastructure and in everything that allows Chiapas to continue developing, which in recent times has already registered an economic growth that has not happened before.

So, Chiapas is moving forward and we are going to continue taking care of this border.

Here we made a decision that I think has not been forgotten: this entire border has a special tax treatment, just like the northern border, here half of the Income Tax and half of the VAT are paid in the entire border strip. The same in the case of fuels.

And we are going to continue helping, we are going to continue supporting. What is being done on the northern border is the same as on the southern border, we are going to continue investing.

INTERLOCUTOR: Thank you very much, Mr. President.

PRESIDENT ANDRÉS MANUEL LÓPEZ OBRADOR: Who's next?

QUESTION: Cristian Camacho, for Fáctico, Digital Journalism.

The interoceanic passage between the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific Ocean has been sought since the colonial period, Agustín de Iturbide tried it at some point, Antonio López de Santa Anna, the first governor of the state of Chiapas, José de Rojas, also I try.

However, it was not until the Porfiriato that these trains began to function, but the highways and later the (inaudible) train of Ernesto Zedillo Ponce de León brought down the railway project.

Do you think you will be the first Mexican politician to be able to successfully establish the interoceanic trade corridor between the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific Ocean? And because?

PRESIDENT ANDRÉS MANUEL LÓPEZ OBRADOR: Well, we have already started this program and we have made progress, we are already working on the modernization of the two ports, Coatzacoalcos and Salina Cruz.

In the case of Salina Cruz, a breakwater about two kilometers offshore is being built to expand the port, we are at the same time modernizing the highway from Salina Cruz to Acayucan, we are already about 65 percent advanced in modernizing the Tren del Istmo, we have five sections open there and progress is being made, already in one or two sections we are already more than 90 percent complete.

And the most important thing is that the budget has already been achieved with the customs trust to modernize the two roads, from Coatzacoalcos to Palenque, which we were running out of, and from Ixtepec to Hidalgo, here on the border. That will help a lot and it is an investment.

So, yes, we are going to make that old project a reality because it is a strategic corridor, there are 300 kilometers to join the Pacific with the Atlantic, and above all to open up the East Coast of the United States to trade, because we do not have much commercial economic relationship with the East Coast of the United States, our entire commercial relationship, which by the way is favorable to Mexico, we have with California.

So, if we resolve the issue of the corridor, we will be able to unite Asian countries with the East Coast of the United States, and the products of Mexico, because this corridor of the isthmus implies, and we already have the land for 10 industrial parks throughout the corridor, this is going to mean jobs, also with the same purpose that people have options and that they don't have to walk north, they are like development curtains. So this is going to help a lot.

I have just been relatively recently in Coatzacoalcos and there are already some ships, two so far, very large ones that move railway wagons, board the ship, from the railways, board 70 wagons, and from Coatzacoalcos they take them to Alabama, United States, and there they get off the train. That will help a lot, guaranteeing transportation.

The only limitation we have as far as I'm concerned is time. That's why I have to continue working 16 hours a day, because we don't want anything to be left in progress, for the modernization of the Ixtepec-Tapachula railway to be finished by the end of next year, this means repairing all the tracks, all the bridges, it means the purchase of trains and leave the railway operating; and the same goes for the ports, so that it does not remain in process and then not be done.

I also inform you that this entire plan for the isthmus, which includes Chiapas, in ports and in railways, industrial development, everything will be in charge of the Secretary of the Navy. As well as the Mayan Train and the new airport that is going to be inaugurated, 'Felipe Ángeles', and the Tulum airport, and the Palenque airport and the Chetumal airport, they are going to be managed by a company linked to the Secretariat of the Defense, the entire Isthmus and Chiapas project will be managed by a company depending on the Secretary of the Navy. The company is also going to be built, they are already working on it, because all this must also be accompanied by security.

And above all, what we want is that all these works are not privatized over time, that it was a miracle that the lines of the Southeast Railway were not privatized. From the isthmus to the north they left nothing, more than 20 thousand kilometers of railways. When I found out that the Ferrocarril del Istmo and the one from the southeast had not been awarded a concession, I was very happy.

Because what did these do?

As you rightly point out, during the Zedillo government they privatized the railroads. It was so shameful that they handed over all the railways, the railways, the passenger trains, were finished, only the cargo trains remained, they handed them over to two companies, more than 20 thousand kilometers and one of those companies took Zedillo to work. A shame.

So, as these lines were not granted a concession because they did not care, I have said it many times, the southeast, not even to steal they turned to look at us to the southeast, everything was to the center and to the north, so now it's different, it's time, it's the southeast time, it is for Chiapas, it is for Veracruz, for Oaxaca, Tabasco, Campeche, Yucatán, Quintana Roo, which have contributed a lot to national development and have received very little.

So that's what I can tell you.

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