We are told that the appointments in the energy sector are being made directly by the president-elect Claudia Sheinbaum. A decision that makes all the sense in the world if we start from an undeniable fact: for years Pemex and the CFE were her Core Business.
She puts on the table the profiles that best suit her. For example, the appointment of the new head of Sener, Luz Elena González Escobar; the general director of Pemex, Víctor Rodríguez Padilla -a UNAM academic and a reference since the 90s- and the one who will be the director of CFE, Emilia Esther Calleja, who literally overtook the current head, Manuel Bartlett, who wanted to impose Miguel Reyes.
The idea behind all these appointments is to put the energy sector in order and from the Legislative Branch we see Alfonso Ramírez Cuéllar operating in broad terms what would be the new skeleton of the energy industry.
But for Pemex, about three weeks ago, an interesting decision was made: to put the company in order, bring it under control, make observations and assessments and make the presidential hand felt in difficult areas and that is why Marcela Villegas, current head of the Central de Abastos (CEDA) in Mexico City and responsible for the Ciudad Solar, biodigester, and production of vegetable oils for the Metrobús programs, was invited as Corporate Director of Administration and Services or DCAS.
And things are getting interesting because so far the transition throughout the government has been, let’s say, smooth. But it hasn’t started at Pemex. We are told that Marcela Villegas has already visited the Executive Tower, but in fact the process of change of command has not yet begun, that is, Marco Herrerías will serve until the end as DCAS on instructions from Octavio Romero, according to what we are told.
But, we are told, the transition must have already begun no later than next week, or Friday, for example. It is true that Villegas’ legal responsibility with the CEDA does not end until the first minute of October, when he will put everything in order; but Pemex does not seem to want to begin transferring power.
Octavio Romero continues his farewell tour and the preferred contractors receive preferential treatment. For example, Cotemar received a platform maintenance contract in direct award for 15,743 million pesos, plus another 469.9 million dollars, of course, the contract comes from Marco Herrerías’ DCAS. By the way, it is a contract that begins to operate on October 1, just when the new head arrives.
Imagine, you arrive at the office and the first news you receive is that, out of nowhere, you have a single contract for more than 25 billion pesos for a single company called Cotemar, involved in at least four serious accidents during this six-year term.
Divers
1.- Tabasco continues to promise to be the cornerstone of Pemex. Octavio Romero believes that it was during this six-year term and in recent weeks he held meetings with the elected governor, Javier May, to talk about investments and social, economic and environmental synergy. They already have plans for a joint program: they will reforest 100 thousand hectares of trees and 60 thousand farmers and another 10 thousand fishermen will participate. These actions are part of the debt that the oil company has in ecological matters, for which 6 thousand million pesos will be allocated annually. It will not be Romero’s turn to inaugurate it, but, if there is no change of direction in the strategy, the southeastern entity will maintain its leading role.