A New FOVISSSTE

ByMartí Batres

This editorial by Martí Batres originally appeared in the March 2, 2026 edition of El Heraldo de México. The views expressed in this article are the authors’ own and do not necessarily reflect those of Mexico Solidarity Media or the Mexico Solidarity Project.

The purpose of public security and social assistance institutions was seriously distorted during the neoliberal period.

There is the case of the State Workers’ Housing Fund, FOVISSSTE. This institution was created to provide housing for state employees, given that housing is a social right and market housing costs are very high. It was legally established in Section B of Article 123 of the Constitution in 1960.

However, FOVISSSTE stopped building in the early 1990s, and in 2007 that power was completely removed from the Law.

Since then, FOVISSSTE has focused solely on issuing loans in the real estate market. And what’s worse, these loans were stripped of their social purpose and given a privatized financial structure based on maximizing interest and profit.

Over the years, the result was the accumulation of thousands of problematic or even unpayable loans. By the beginning of 2025, of the more than 800,000 outstanding loans granted by FOVISSSTE, nearly half were experiencing some degree of difficulties.

Many retirees had substantial debts; others had already paid two or three times the original loan amount and still owed the same amount or more. Some saw on their accounts that the more they paid, the more they owed.

In certain situations, the problems intensified. For example, with changes in income, the transition from active worker to retiree, or for those who ceased to be state employees and were no longer on a payroll from which their payment was deducted monthly.

For all types of situations, the government of the Republic designed a program to benefit debtors with problems (both from FOVISSSTE and INFONAVIT).

Thanks to this program of freezes, write-offs and forgiveness, FOVISSSTE has already helped more than 250,000 borrowers and plans to support another 150,000.

Last week I witnessed the distribution of severance packages to over 100 employees. Here are a few emblematic examples:

Mr. José Giovanny Hernández Camargo obtained an original loan of 748,000 pesos. He had already paid 2,477,000, but still owed 1,733,000. Another case of great injustice was that of Mr. Julio César Martínez Hernández, who received a loan of 728,000 pesos, had paid 2,460,000, but still owed 1,766,000. And there is the incredible case of Yolanda García Domínguez, whose original loan was 840,000 pesos. She had paid 2,877,000, but still owed 2,305,000. Absurd, irrational, unjust.

These debts, like many others, have already been forgiven.