This Wednesday, April 26, as has been widely reported, the Second Room of the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation (SCJN) rejected a project for the disappearance of the Investment and Stimulus Fund for Cinema (fidecine), one of the two funds that until 2020 were the source of support for the production and distribution of Mexican cinema and that were disappeared, at least by law, within the package for the dissolution of 109 funds and trusts. However, the formal dissolution of the Fidecine has not been possible, although this trust is at zero, according to information from the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit (SHCP).
The project sought to annul the promotion of a protection promoted by the production house Springall Pictures in 2022 that appealed the unconstitutionality of the 2020 decree for estimating that the disappearance of the fidecine It would be a regressive measure in the guarantees of the right to culture.
For this very reason, this Wednesday, the SCJN resolved to channel the matter to Minister Alberto Pérez Dayán so that he can present a new project on the granting or not of the amparo promoted by Springall Pictures.
In November 2022, within this package of reforms for the disappearance of funds and trusts, the legislature repealed articles 33 to 38 of the Federal Cinematography Law that gave legal support to the fidecine and enabled it not only as a channel for channeling public resources designated from the Federation Expenditure Budget (PEF) but as a fiscal stimulus through which it was possible to receive donations from natural or legal persons whose contributions were tax deductible.
Instead of Fidecine, and Foprocine, at the beginning of 2021, the Mexican Institute of Cinematography (Imcine) launched the program for the granting of public support for the production and distribution of films in the country, named Fomento al Cine Mexicano (Focine), which, however, does not have a legal basis that makes it a legally susceptible program.
The positions of both parties
On April 24, about 500 members of the film community signed a letter addressed to the ministers and ministers of the SCJN to order them to avoid the formal disappearance of the fund, since, they argue:
“Fidecine was a historic triumph for the film community and the result of a fight against censorship and the verticalism of the government authorities in the sector.”
The signatory union added that the fidecine “It is a guarantee of the human rights to freedom of expression and cultural plurality”, and argued that “Article 1 of the Constitution prohibits regression in those rights and their guarantees. The decree that extinguished the Fidecine eliminated this guarantee from the law, and did not replace it with another guarantee that had at least the same level of protection. That’s a setback.”
Finally, the union expressed that Focine right now is a mere budgetary program and is liable to disappear at any time.
On the other hand, this Thursday afternoon, the Imcine He defended the strengthening of resources for cinema, not only in terms of production and distribution, but also in terms of exhibition:
“The annual allocation for the Foprocine and Fidecine trusts, combined, was less than that of Focine (just over 191 million pesos). However, since a third of the projects approved each year were canceled and those resources were released, it gave the impression of a greater allocation, “Imcine said in a statement.
“Now audiovisual training is supported. The EFAI stimulus was created two years ago from the meetings that year after year it holds at Imcine with groups throughout the country, to stimulate the development of non-school audiovisual training initiatives. Until today, 23 groups have been supported in 14 states of the country”.
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