Calderón's money laundering initiative could be hugely important, but why now?

President Felipe Calderón's recent initiative to counter money laundering, which includes a ban on using cash for real estate transaction or  spending more than 100,000 pesos in other transactions, if passed, may be hugely important. Given the support of both governor Enrique Peña Nieto of the PRI and Mexico City chief of government Marcelo Ebrard of the PRD, it does stand a great chance of being made into law by congress.

Yet I cannot help but wonder: Why on earth did it take Calderón more than three years to come up with this initiative? Anyone who has lived or visited Mexico will know that cash remains king; indeed, according to Washington Post, 3/4 of all commercial transactions are done with cash in Mexico, compared with only 20 percent in the United States. As such, as measures to counter money-smuggling from the United States to Mexico are of little value - the WP article expands on the  subject of money smuggling, and  reports that only about an estimated 1 percent of southbound cash is actually detected -  this may be one of the most important legislative initiatives taken in Calderón's "war on drugs."

Yet why so long in coming? Put differently, what interests have been blocking this fairly obvious initiative for such a long time? PRD senators Tomás Torres and Minerva Hernández, while supporting the initiative, pointedly noted that one similarly important money laundering initiate has long been in the works in the senate, but that PRI blocked it in the last minute. Why? One is entitled to one's own conclusions.