The Mexican Supreme Court ruled that the country’s prohibition on personal possession and cultivation of cannabis was unconstitutional. Lawmakers were then required to approve the policy change, but have consistently been unable to reach an agreement on legislation to implement updated, fair cannabis laws. That was nearly three years ago.
President of the Mexican Senate, Olga Sánchez Cordero, stated that a model for cannabis regulation is being developed in Mexico. Cordero believes that legalizing and regulating cannabis will end the prohibitionist perception and framework that has resulted in greater violence in the country. A regulatory system would help to ensure the safety and governance of cannabis use.
About The Model
Recreational use is but one of the many avenues of potential cannabis regulation and it is critical to consider international experiences in order to boost the cannabis social economy and value chain.
Cordero agrees with this and has stated that we need to take steps to control and enforce consumption measures for habits that have been followed for a long time, as well as develop new economic marketplaces that will allow our country to grow.
“We will continue to raise awareness in our population, where there is no room for prohibitionist policies. We are the Mexico of freedoms and the people are aware of it,” she affirmed.
About Olga Sánchez Cordero
While Cordero is working for radical change in the cannabis industry, legally, she is much more than a cannabis advocate. Olga Sánchez Cordero, aged 74, is a lawyer, civil servant, and a member of the Morena political party, which is now in power in Mexico.
Between 1995 and 2015, Sánchez Cordero was the first female notary public in Mexico and the eighth woman appointed to the country’s highest court, the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation, as well as introducing legislation in the Mexican Senate to regulate cannabis’s usage.
She was also the first woman to fill the office of Secretary of the Interior under President Andrés Manuel López Obrador in 2018. Cordero resigned from this position in 2021 to join Morena’s legislative group in the Senate, where she would support the government’s essential adjustments.
Additionally, in 2021, Cordero stated that she is opposed to the imprisonement of women for the act of having an abortion. “You don’t know why she makes that decision, and you are nobody to judge why she makes that decision,” she added in an interview, “I will continue to defend, until death, that women should not go to jail for this.”
Greater Impact Of Cannabis Regulation
The Drug War in Mexico is a war that the people never asked for and do not deserve. While legalizing cannabis and allowing the slow reform and regulation that it would require is good for the cannabis market and industry on the surface level, it would also have a much larger impact on the Drug War as well as how it affects Mexican citizens.
Sanchez stated that in ten years, there have been 240,000 deaths, 40,000 disappearances, and thousands of boys and girls, young people, and women who have been threatened by organized crime and turned into cannon fodder when filing the bill to legalize cannabis in 2018.
“These numbers are unacceptable and justify rethinking drug policy in our country. It’s time to change. We do not want more deaths, regardless of whether they are police, military, drug traffickers, we do not want more collateral victims, we do not want families in mourning, we do not want more blood in our homeland, it is a war that continues killing us.”
By legalizing and controlling the use of cannabis in Mexico, a market for economic growth will be opened in Mexico. It will also make the illicit market smaller and take away some of its control, which will be largely beneficial in the fight against the drug war. Additionally, it will minimize the prohibitionist mindset that only adds to the conflict to this day. Cordero is aiming to undo some of the damage the war has done and begin rebuilding the city in a way that’s safe, as well as having the best interest of the people in mind.
Legalizing and regulating cannabis will stop the prohibitionist mindset and framework that has resulted in increased violence in the country. “We will continue to raise awareness in our population, where there is no room for prohibitionist policies. We are the Mexico of freedoms and the people are aware of it,” Cordero concluded.
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