Transparency Rapid Response Project (TRRP)

In 2019, RE!NSTITUTE partnered with the USAID-funded TRRP to support the acceleration of state-level anti-corruption efforts and achieve tangible results in the fight against corruption. We delivered a total of three rounds of 100-Day Challenges with 20 frontline teams composed of key system stakeholders such as the Special Anti-Corruption Prosecutor’s Office, Comptroller’s Office, Judicial Council, Administrative Justice Court, civil society, and the private sector. 

The primary focus area for these Challenges was the investigation and sanction (where applicable) of criminal corruption cases and administrative corruption offenses. The first state-wide 100-Day Challenges to tackle corruption were launched in Coahuila and Jalisco back in 2019. Since then, the focus continued to be on tangible results (case resolution). However, during the final round of Challenges, which took place over 2020-2021 and in states and systems that had previously participated in a 100-Day Challenge, new focus areas emerged, including the prevention of corruption in government contracting processes and improving the system's response rate to non-binding recommendations. 

The increase in the resolution of criminal corruption cases and administrative corruption proceedings through the 100-Day Challenge was a significant achievement for all SEAs involved. In addition, as part of the 100-Day Challenge, SEA officials from different states brought numerous indictments in high-profile corruption cases - entire corruption networks were dismantled and brought to justice. See the map below for a breakdown of the results!

Quantitative results only reflect a part of the impact. What we really want to highlight about this remarkable three-year collaboration is the innovation behind the results, as well as the shifts in mindset, culture, and ways of working, which we began to observe and document. 

The misuse of government resources in Mexico is rampant and all too often goes unpunished. Historically, most corruption cases filed before the Court for Administrative Justice (Tribunal de Justicia Administrativa) failed to conclude with a sanction. During the 100DC in Sonora in 2020, a particular case of misuse of resources by a public servant came to attention. The team put a new legal strategy into action to address these offenses. The public servant was found guilty of misusing government resources (a vehicle) and was suspended for 15 days. At first, this may seem like a mere slap on the wrist, but it had a much more significant impact. It was the first time that Sonora's SEA sentenced and applied punishment for a serious administrative offense. This was a complete paradigm shift in the state. Behavior changed - after this sentence was issued, all of the vehicles were parked where they were supposed to be at the time they were supposed to be there.

The 100DC in Coahuila provided a space for innovation to flourish. The administrative proceedings team created an electronic case registry to organize and easily track and monitor all the proceedings brought to the Specialized Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office. It allows monitoring of the stages of each procedure and the results obtained.

The team also started videotaping hearings and presenting evidence orally in cases of alleged administrative corruption rather than having a stenographer transcribe them, significantly reducing hearing times. Prior to the Challenge, a complex hearing involving five or more witnesses would require at least 12 hours to be completed and transcribed. Hearing times have now been cut by 83%, to an average of two hours. During the Challenge, the team also implemented a new process for carrying out hearing notifications directly from the Judicial Council. Previously, notifications had to go through several lower district courts to be delivered, sometimes taking up to two months. Now, they are delivered within a week. 

Jalisco's SEA representatives had never sat down together at the same table prior to the Challenge. The 100DC provided the conditions and tools that were needed to reflect on and consequently shift ways of working that were not producing tangible results. The team exceeded their initial goal of bringing charges in double the amount of cases as compared to baseline by successfully bringing charges in five times the number of cases in 100 days, including the high-profile Trailers de la Muerte and State Pension Services corruption cases through unprecedented collaboration between all systemic actors, including civil society. These achievements would have seemed impossible before the Challenge, as case resolutions and sentencing could take months or even years.

"The 100-Day Methodology is what really got us to go beyond our initial goal of resolving more cases of serious administrative offenses and really led us to deeper conclusions about the way we work."
– José Ramón Jiménez, President of Jalisco’s Court of Administrative Justice

• USAID's Mexico Transparency Rapid Response Project (TRRP), implemented by Dexis Consulting Group