Confused and dirty: Claudia Sheinbaum’s energy plan

Yet despite her background Ms Sheinbaum, who is Mr López Obrador’s protegée, looks set to squander Mexico’s clean-energy potential. She talks up the green transition but insists that state-owned companies, such as the ailing oil firm Pemex, will steer it. Worse, she is a staunch supporter of a constitutional reform her mentor is pushing. The revision would undermine the judiciary and dismantle the energy regulator, antitrust body and a raft of other independent agencies which Mr López Obrador, who is known as AMLO, claims “serve no purpose”. Instead, permits and the like would be approved by the energy ministry. Investors fear they will be forced to partner with state firms. The new legislature, which convenes on September 1st, and in which AMLO’s party has a large majority, looks set to approve the reform.