González Saravia proposes a closer Commission, with a focus on restorative justice and social fabric; He ruled out that his candidacy was partisan, but rather emerged from society and organizations.
Mexico City, November 4 (However).- The Human Rights Commission of Mexico City has a new owner: this Thursday, he took over María Dolores González Saravia Calderónafter the capital congress the will designate for him period 2025-2029 Took possession Immediately and in front of her are challenges that she has already faced from other trenches.
The plenary session of the CdMx Congress voted with 60 votes. Next, before noon this Thursday, González Saravia took oath before the capital legislators. The new official, whose candidacy was born from a collective and citizen project, had pointed out in an interview with Blanca Juárez and Romina Gándara for A las Dos, a news program that is broadcast on However On Air that the organization will function as a “bridge” between society and institutions.
On Monday, the Human Rights Commission of the Mexico City Congress approved a ruling establishing that María Dolores González Saravia “has the most suitable profile to lead” the human rights defense body in the capital. From today, she is the capital’s ombudsperson.
#BreakingMinute 🔴 | With 60 votes in favor, the #CongresoCDMX appointed María Dolores González Saravia Calderón as president of the @CDHCMX for the period 2025–2029.
🏛️ The new owner protested before the Plenary. pic.twitter.com/X4iGPHLXlT
— Congress of Mexico City (@Congreso_CdMex) November 6, 2025
González Saravia’s candidacy has been supported by organizations with very diverse causes. But all, in the search for recognition of the rights of those who have historically experienced exclusion and discrimination. Her application, she says in an interview for Howeveris “a collective project that comes from civil society; from defenders, from groups, from organizations.”
In the ruling session, Representative Jannete Guerrero, the president of the Human Rights Commission of the City Congresssaid: “The profile of María Dolores González Saravia Calderón stood out for its high score and widespread recognition, not only from this Commission, but from a broad spectrum of society that expressed its support for her.”
“With more than 40 years of experience in the defense of human rights, mediation and peacebuilding, González Sarabia has participated in historical processes such as the San Andrés dialogues and accompaniment to victims in emblematic cases,” he added.
The new leader of the CDH-CdMx is the sister of the Morenoist Governor of Morelos, Margarita González Saravia. This is how he responded about his ties:
—Autonomy is essential and necessary for the Human Rights Commissions. That is why the head of the National Human Rights Commission has been criticized for her partisanship and you have a family relationship with the Governor of Morelos. How to guarantee this demarcation of both the party and the influence of the Governor, and that autonomy is guaranteed?
—I have never been part of any political-party organization, I have not been part of any public institution. My entire career has been in civil society, first in social movements and then in civil organizations, to date.
María Dolores González Saravia has directed Services and Consultancy for Peace (Serapaz), one of the most relevant civil organizations in the country in dialogue, mediation and peacebuilding processes, especially in social, political and human rights conflicts since the 1990s. She participated in the Peace Dialogues in Chiapas and in high-profile mediations such as the conflicts in Oaxaca, Atenco and Ayotzinapa.
“I collaborate in a social and solidarity economy center at the Universidad Iberoamericana with a civil project called Eutopía y Economía”, a platform for peace building. “My entire career is out there. I have this privilege,” he argued.
The economist from UNAM, and a specialist in mediation and conflict transformation from Ibero, highlighted that her candidacy did not come from any political proposal: “It is supported by a process of civil, social, and defender organizations. I think that is what guarantees autonomy.”
From civil society to ombudsperson
When González Saravia Calderón talks about her application and her work plan with a focus on peacebuilding, restorative justice and closeness to citizens, she says it in plural.
“That was a bit of our assessment to take a bet that is very different from all of our trajectories. At least in this group we have not been involved before nor are we, in fact, with any political or public institution,” he indicated. It refers to the organizations and activists that accompany it. And it also refers to the fact that they believed that at this time “civil society needs these spaces and bridges.”
—There are several human rights defense organizations that supported your candidacy and that, for a long time, wanted to be outside the institutions. Why have you decided to participate this time?
—We value it as a situation that had favorable conditions to expand and strengthen frameworks and conditions of rights in the city. We said ‘there is a framework that is very guaranteeing, which is the Political Constitution. Practically the Constitution gives you the right to almost paradise.’ It is a very interesting constitution, it is really a bill of rights. We have a vision of the city also from an interesting institutional perspective, which is expressed in the Development Plan that is currently being put out for consultation by citizens, which also proposes a deepening of access to rights.
For María Dolores González Saravia, in the country’s capital there is “a very important social organizational fabric.” It is woven by “the social movements, the civil organizations that for years have accompanied these processes of demanding rights. Also by the indigenous and rural communities in the south. And, in general, the community networks of solidarity.”
That fabric is even made up of universities, non-governmental organizations and churches, he says. And the local Human Rights Commission will be a “more open, systematic space for participation to address problems in a more articulated way.”
The city, due to its magnitude, he adds, “because of its economic importance, because it is a capital, a metropolis, even a megalopolis with neighboring states, is of tremendous complexity.” For example, in recent years, gentrification has become one of the most challenging phenomena in Mexico City. The “growth under the logic of the real estate market and the need to recover its social function and guarantee, as the Constitution currently says, the right to the city for all” has been a true resistance.
The earrings for González Saravia
🏛️📜 The Human Rights Commission of the #CongresoCDMX presented to the Plenary the opinion for the appointment of who will preside over the @CDHCMX for the period 2025–2029. pic.twitter.com/t6DxFY5oKI
— Congress of Mexico City (@Congreso_CdMex) November 6, 2025
In addition to that, in the local Human Rights Commission “there are a very important number of complaints and recommendations regarding the right to due process, to access to justice. But we think it is important that the population also understands that they have their rights to the city itself. Sometimes it is not something that we are very aware of when we talk about human rights.”
María Dolores González Saravia Calderón recognizes that the outgoing management of the Commission, which was headed by Nashieli Ramírez Hernández, “has done a very important job of creating a technical and legal capacity, which has a very good level of receiving complaints and processing them, up to specific and general recommendations.”
Now, he points out, “it is very important to take one more step towards the presence that exists today in the Mayor’s Offices. Turn the Commission into a much stronger anchor, which strengthens the social fabric, which generates a broader process of culture of human rights and peace among the population to not only generate greater social ties, but also an awareness of these rights and their conditions of enforceability.”