The Superior Auditor of the Federation (, ASF) is the

supreme audit institution A supreme audit institution is an independent national-level institution which conducts audits of government activities. Most supreme audit institutions are established in their country's constitution, and their mandate is further refined in natio ...

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

. A technical agency of the

Chamber of Deputies The chamber of deputies is the lower house in many bicameral legislatures and the sole house in some unicameral legislatures. Description Historically, French Chamber of Deputies was the lower house of the French Parliament during the Bourb ...

, it is empowered to conduct external audits of federal, state and local governments and agencies. The ASF is a member of the

International Organization of Supreme Audit Institutions The International Organization of Supreme Audit Institutions (INTOSAI) is an intergovernmental organization whose members are supreme audit institutions. Nearly every supreme audit institution in the world is a member of INTOSAI. Depending on th ...

. The director of the ASF is David Colmenares Páramo.

History

Predecessor agencies

The power of auditing the public finances was awarded to Congress in the

Constitution of 1824 A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organization or other type of entity, and commonly determines how that entity is to be governed. When these princ ...

. On November 16 of that year, Congress passed the (Decree of the Law of Organization of the Administration of the Public Treasury), which created the (Accounting Office of the Treasury), an agency of the Chamber of Deputies charged with the "examination and review of public accounts". Between the 1830s and 1860s, the existence of the Contaduría Mayor de Hacienda alternated with that of a Court of Accounts. The Tribunal for the Review of Accounts existed from 1838 to 1846; another Court of Accounts existed between 1853 and 1857, and such a court was also in place from 1865 to 1867 during the

Second Mexican Empire The Second Mexican Empire (; ), officially known as the Mexican Empire (), was a constitutional monarchy established in Mexico by Mexican monarchists with the support of the Second French Empire. This period is often referred to as the Second ...

. The Contaduría Mayor de Hacienda was restored in 1867 and operated under that name until 2000, though it was reformed several times in 1896, 1904, 1937 and 1978.

Formation of the ASF

In 1999, Congress passed constitutional reforms that paved the way for the replacement of the Contaduría Mayor de Hacienda. On December 30, the (Law of Superior Auditing of the Federation) came into effect. The new law increased the technical and management autonomy of the agency; expanded its remit to include the legislative and judicial branches, autonomous constitutional agencies, and federal resources transferred to state and municipal governments; and permitted the new Superior Auditor of the Federation to issue monetary fines, a function that previously belonged to an executive branch agency. The ASF began functioning on December 30, 2000; its first director was the former Accountant of the Treasury, , who remained in the post for the first year of the new agency's life. In 2005, a revision to the organic law explicitly allowed the ASF to audit public trusts. Further constitutional reforms in 2008 led to the passage of a new organic law for the agency, the (Law of Auditing and Evaluation of the Federation), in 2009. Three updates were passed to this law, in 2010, 2016 and 2021; the second established the , of which the ASF became a part. These successive changes have further expanded the scope of the ASF's functions; in its series of audits of the 2016 public account, the ASF conducted 9 percent more audits as a result of its new remit. In 2017, the ASF moved into a new headquarters building in southern Mexico City, consolidating its 2,500 employees into one facility.

Audits

In 2013, the ASF audited the Line 12 of the

Mexico City Metro The Mexico City Metro () is a rapid transit system that serves Greater Mexico City, the metropolitan area of Mexico City, including some municipalities in the State of Mexico. Operated by the Sistema de Transporte Colectivo (STC), it is the Lis ...

. The institution found 11 anomalies, concluding that "in general terms, the Government of the Federal District did not comply with the applicable legal and regulatory provisions". After the

2017 Puebla earthquake The 2017 Puebla earthquake, also known as 19S, struck at 13:14 CDT (18:14 UTC) on 19 September 2017 with an estimated magnitude of 7.1 and strong shaking for about 20 seconds. Its epicenter was about south of the city of Puebla, Mexico. ...

, the ASF made observations of damage to an elevated section of track between the Olivos and Tezonco stations, which collapsed in May 2021. In 2017, the ASF detected the embezzlement of 110 million pesos from the Secretariat of Agrarian, Land, and Urban Development (SEDATU) while

Rosario Robles María del Rosario Robles Berlanga (; born 17 February 1956) is a Mexican politician who served as the Secretary of Social Development in the cabinet of President Enrique Peña Nieto. She also was substitute Head of Government of the Federal ...

ran the agency. As of February 2021, the ASF had promoted 39 criminal charges covering the misuse of 6 billion pesos against Robles, who ran SEDATU and the

Secretariat of Social Development The Secretariat of Welfare (Spanish Language, Spanish: ''Secretaría de Bienestar'') is the Ministry (government department), government department in charge of social development efforts in Mexico. The Secretary of Welfare is a member of the Mex ...

(SEDESOL) during

Enrique Peña Nieto Enrique Peña Nieto (; born 20 July 1966), commonly referred to by his initials EPN, is a Mexican former politician and lawyer who was the 64th president of Mexico from 2012 to 2018. A member of the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI), he p ...

's presidency, in what is called ("The Master Scam"). The ASF noted that the

National Guard National guard is the name used by a wide variety of current and historical uniformed organizations in different countries. The original National Guard was formed during the French Revolution around a cadre of defectors from the French Guards. ...

had overpaid by 480 million pesos for software acquired from Israeli company Cybergloves Ltd. in 2018, which led to the commissioner taking an indefinite leave of absence in March 2020.

Criticism

In the context of severe attacks to its independence by the executive power, the ASF was criticized in 2021 for admitting the presence of errors in its analysis of the costs incurred in cancelling the

Mexico City Texcoco Airport Mexico City Texcoco Airport was a planned airport in Mexico City that was meant to become Mexico's New International Airport (Spanish: ''Nuevo Aeropuerto Internacional de México''—NAICM or NAIM). The project was announced in September 2014 bu ...

project, many saw this as a forced retraction; President

Andrés Manuel López Obrador Andrés Manuel López Obrador (; born 13 November 1953), also known by his initials AMLO, is a Mexican former politician, political scientist, public administrator and writer who served as the 65th president of Mexico from 2018 to 2024. He se ...

claimed the auditors had acted "in bad faith". The auditor responsible was placed on administrative leave.

References

External links

*{{official website, https://www.asf.gob.mx 2000 establishments in Mexico Supreme audit institutions Government agencies of Mexico Government agencies established in 2000