Bank accounts of 2,000 officials under surveillance

It is a financial big brother. The participants are the President of the Republic, senators, deputies, the head of Mexico City government, representatives, ministers, directors of autonomous agencies, political party leaders, mayors, members of the judiciary and senior military officers.

All their financial transactions are monitored in Mexico and around the world; however, the Ministry of Finance (SHCP) does not have specific reports on the so-called “Politically Exposed Persons”, neither on the number of people prosecuted by the Attorney General's Office for embezzlement.

In response to a request of information submitted by EL UNIVERSAL, the Ministry of Finance said that the database of the reports filed by the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) before the Attorney General's Office (PGR) "does not include a column or section to identify how many of those reports are about Politically Exposed Persons."

Guillermo Cejudo, researcher at the Center for Economic Research and Teaching (CIDE) and expert on the evaluation of public policies and accountability, said that the mechanism would be more effective if there was a list of Politically Exposed Persons who have been punished for embezzlement.

In Mexico the list of people under scrutiny includes more than 2,000 public servants whose financial activities are monitored inside and outside the country, as well as those of their spouses and children, including those made at banks, brokerage houses, currency exchange brokers and real estate transactions.

In 2014, the Financial Intelligence Unit received 113,925 reports of "unusual transactions"; 174 of "worrying transactions" and 6.6 million of "relevant transactions". However, it only filed 87 complaints before the PGR for embezzlement.

From January to September 2015, the Financial Intelligence Unit received 98,641 reports of "unusual transactions"; 174 "worrying" and 4.7 million "relevant". However, it has only filed 72 complaints before the PGR.

In its latest report, the Ministry of Finance reported that from 2006 to September 2015, the Financial Intelligence Unitd has filed 528 complaints before the PGR, but did not specify how many of those cases ended up in prosecution.