Mexican president seeks inquiry into judge who halted power sector reform

MEXICO CITY: Mexico's president has requested an inquiry into a judge who last week ordered the suspension of a government-backed electricity reform that privileges the dispatch of power from state-run Comision Federal de Electricidad, he said on Monday.

President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador told reporters at a government news conference that he has sent a letter to the head of the Supreme Court in which he outlined his complaint against the federal judge's temporary freeze of the controversial reform.

The leftist energy nationalist singled out the judge by name, and suggested that he may have acted improperly in an order issued just days after the new law had been enacted by Lopez Obrador's congressional allies.

The order by Judge Juan Pablo Gomez Fierro argued that the legislation may violate constitutional provisions that ensure the right to free competition, and ordered it suspended for the duration of the trial.

Lopez Obrador's letter requested that the country's top court determine whether or not the judge was authorized to order the suspension, while he also suggesting that nefarious private-sector actors were also behind the suspension.

"There are people, organizations and companies related to the old regime who act based on their well-known economic and political interests, who use corruption and influence peddling as their modus operandi," he said, singling out Spanish power company Iberdrola but without providing evidence of wrong doing.

Lopez Obrador added that he nonetheless respected the judicial process and did not seek to interfere but rather ensure transparency in its decision making.

The president has argued that the new law would guard against price gouging, however the new law upended a previous reform enacted under his predecessor that mandated that the lowest-cost power be dispatched to the grid first.