News Center

Two years and counting
Buenos Aires Herald
December 13, 2009

Life in politically-stable nations must come with the reassuring hum of monotony. There is no such luck here where what you mostly hear are the amplified shrieks of instability residents complaining about crime outside a police station, bus drivers angry about a co-worker having a finger chopped off by muggers, a gay couple taking over a civil registry when not allowed to wed beamed over and over again by the private cable television news channels.

Presidents are only gone tomorrow and here today. Argentina has a really bad history of democratically-elected presidents being kicked out before the end of their mandates since 1930. Some governments have collapsed under the weight of an economic meltdown like in 2001. Others have been toppled by the military like in 1976. Hyperinflation crushed one other government in 1989. It seems easy enough to be elected president in Argentina. But staying there for a long time? That's a completely different ball game.

President Cristina Fern ndez de Kirchner on December 10 turned two years in office. She has another two years ahead of her. But at times the President herself, her popularity now no higher than 25 percent according to polls, has accused the opposition, the media and the farmers who oppose the export duties on soy of trying to force a political crisis powerful enough to bring her down.

Only now with 18 days to go to the end of the year, and judging by Fern ndez de Kirchner's own words, is it safe to say that her administration will not collapse in 2009. Unfortunately for the President, who has a legitimate mandate to serve four years, the same questions about her future will be asked day in and day out in 2010.

Things will not be any easier from now on. The 127 deputies elected in the midterm elections earlier this year formally took their seats on Thursday.

The ruling Victory Front lost the elections in all major districts in June, including in Buenos Aires province where former president N stor Kirchner, the President's husband and predecessor, was the candidate. The Victory Front, a centre-left coalition headed by the Kirchnerite faction of the Peronist party, has lost control of the Lower House of Congress. It still has a chance, according to Victory Front Senator Miguel Pichetto, to be in control of the Senate. The splintered opposition, by reaching an agreement to head 25 out of the 45 committees in the Lower House, has sent out the message that it can stand united in Congress.

The farmers certainly thought that this is cause for a celebration. The Liaison Board, which groups the nation's four largest farm lobbies, called a demonstration on Thursday to usher in a new Congress, no longer under the thumb of the Kirchners.

The farmers fiercely opposed a botched bid by Fern ndez de Kirchner to increase soy export duties last years. They can brag that it was their struggle that ultimately finished with the Victory Front's supremacy. Vice-President Julio Cobos, after massive demonstrations headed by the farmers, quashed the export duty bill in the Senate last year.

Now the farmers are taking no chances. Eleven farm lobby leaders were elected to the Lower House of Congress on opposition tickets (seven for the Radical Party, one for the Civic Coalition, one for a provincial party from C rdoba, one for the dissident Peronists and one for a provincial party from Salta). The new head of the Agriculture committee in the Lower House is Ricardo Buryaile (Radical-Formosa), a leader of the Argentine Rural Confederation (CRA).

The farmers, with the backing of the opposition lawmakers next year, could, say, sponsor a bill to lower export duties. The ruling party, and the President, could thus be cornered next year in Congress if the opposition sticks together.

The farmers were certainly in a fighting mood at Thursday's rally in Palermo, which was also attended by executives of the AEA Argentine business leaders association and opposition lawmakers, including Deputy Elisa Carri of the centrist Civic Coalition and Francisco de Narv ez of the centre-right coalition Uni n-PRO. An estimated 20,000 people attended the demonstration, a far cry from the hundreds of thousands that turned out last year in demonstrations in support of the farmers. Yet Thursday's rally was not a flop and spirits were high.

Hugo Biolcati, the head of the conservative Argentine Rural Society (SRA), was one of the speakers at the rally. Biolcati said the demonstration was no longer only about export duties. Crime, Biolcati said, is also a problem, especially in Buenos Aires province.

Buenos Aires Governor Daniel Scioli has been struggling to deal with complaints by the opposition and by residents about crime.

The provincial police meanwhile on Tuesday found the dead bodies of the four members of the Pomar family next to their crashed station wagon on Route 31 near the town of Pergamino. The family had gone missing 24 days before and critics complained that the police had taken too long in finding them. Residents staged angry demonstrations in Pergamino and the provincial government sacked a number of the region's top cops.

Criticizing the police, Biolcati told the crowd on Thursday, is not enough. The governor's office, Biolcati said, must also be "beheaded."

The statement enraged Cabinet Chief An bal Fern ndez who on Friday accused Biolcati of "coup-mongering." Yet Scioli, who has stood solidly by the Kirchners even when their popularity has dropped, is clearly feeling the heat. Jos Scioli, the governor's brother, quit as his chief-of-staff on Friday amid speculation that his advice to sever ties with the Kirchners had fallen on deaf ears.

Buenos Aires province is by far the nation's biggest province and voting district. Kirchner was defeated by De Narv ez in June, but won a seat in Congress under the system of proportional representation. Technically Kirchner still has the backing of all the Peronist mayors in Greater Buenos Aires, the sprawling working-class belt that surrounds the capital. But there is growing speculation that at least some of those mayors will eventually turn on Kirchner before 2011 in a bid to save their own political skin. But Scioli, who relies heavily on financial help from the national government to pay salaries, has made no such move.

Kirchner, despite the whispering about dissidents, still controls the Buenos Aires province machine. The province's legislature has approved a political reform law that says that local primaries will be staged on the same day as national presidential and congressional primaries as demanded by Kirchner.

Kirchner had feared that if primaries in Buenos Aires province were held on a different day it would be easier for the Peronist mayors to break away and not be directly committed in the presidential race.

Scioli on Friday also sacked Health Minister Claudio Zin over allegations that his portfolio was involved in the peddling of tampered medicine also purchased by union-controlled healthcare schemes. Zin had also been under fire for his handling of the winter swine flu crisis.

The Kirchners and Scioli could face disaster next year if they lose territorial control of Greater Buenos Aires if, say, discontent about crime gets out of hand.

This has not happened just yet. There are plenty of things to look out for right here and now.

The President is not the only political leader hurting after two years in office. City of Buenos Aires Mayor Mauricio Macri, the head of the centre-right party PRO, is scrambling to control the damage from a court investigation probing allegations that police officers working for his administration's Education Ministry spied on a Jewish community leader and others.

Mariano Narodowski, the city's education minister, was questioned as a suspect in court on Wednesday about Ciro James, the Federal Police agent who worked for his office and has been arrested and charged with fabricating court cases to get warrants to tap telephones.

Narodowski, an academic with little political experience, had spent all day saying that he was "a bit fed up" but that he had not resigned. Yet by Wednesday night Macri administration sources said that Narodowski had stepped down and would be replaced by Abel Posse, a 75 year-old conservative writer and diplomat.

Also on Wednesday Kirchnerite activists headed a demonstration outside City Hall against Macri's administration.

Posse's choice raised questions because recently he has cultivated political ties with former president Eduardo Duhalde, a Peronist who now fiercely opposes the Kirchners. Macri had refused to openly accept an alliance with Duhalde because polls show that he is unpopular in the capital. The mayor said that he was not aware of Posse's ties to Duhalde.

Yet that was only half of the story. Before being named Posse had also penned a column against the Kirchners in which he described them as "Trotskyite-Leninists." In other interviews Posse also likened the many strikes staged by teachers to demand pay hikes to "putting a gun to the heads of children." The city's teachers unions complained loudly and said that Posse should not be sworn in on Friday.

Posse has a right to speak his mind. He was sworn in by an unwavering Macri on Friday. But what is not clear is if his appointment will further harm Macri's reputation. PRO won the midterm elections in June, but only with about 30 percent of the votes. Fernando Solanas, a leftist filmmaker, was second with 24 percent of the votes. At this point in time it is not certain that PRO can win a mayoral election. Macri meanwhile still looks determined to make a bid for the presidency in 2011.

Former deputy Eugenio Burzaco was sworn in as head of the Metropolitan Police on Friday. The Federal Police, that is currently in charge of security in the city, is controlled by the national government. Macri established the Met Police earlier this year to fight crime and to deal with street demonstrations. But it has yet to go on the beat and its first chief, Federal Police veteran Jorge Palacios, was arrested recently accused of masterminding the wire-taps carried out by James.

The Met Police, designed by Macri to deliver on his campaign promise to be tough on crime and street demonstrations that jam the roads of Buenos Aires in the rush hour, has turned into a public relations problem for the mayor if not a complete disaster. There is no way of knowing if the judge probing the espionage scandal, Norberto Oyarbide, will not now summon other city administration ministers possibly Security Minister Guillermo Montenegro and even Macri himself.

The Kirchners and Macri, because they are actually in office and with obligations, are not having an easy time. An appeals court on Thursday told a judge that he must continue to probe allegations that Kirchner, when president in 2005, moved money from a public works trust fund to the Media Secretariat before a crucial midterm election.

Critics have also accused Kirchner of awarding state advertising money to cronies, especially in the media. Media Secretary Jos Albistur, in office since 2003 and a member of Kirchner's inner circle, quit on Thursday (the same day the appeals court issued its ruling). Albistur is facing allegations that he amassed a fortune by granting juicy advertising contracts to friends and relatives.

The cracks are clearly showing in the administrations of Fern ndez de Kirchner and Macri. It's good news for Cobos, the Vice-President who according to polls is the most popular politician in the land and is likely to make a bid for the presidency in 2011 with the backing of the Radical Party.

Cobos was kicked out of the Radical Party for siding with Fern ndez de Kirchner in 2011. But when he killed the export duty bill in the Senate Cobos effectively broke ties with the President and sided with the opposition.

Cobos is expected to be welcomed back by the Radical Party before the presidential elections. But at least one Radical Party ally, Carri , is having to bite her tongue to prevent a major rift over Cobos' potential candidacy.

Senator Ernesto Sanz, the newly-appointed chairman of the Radical Party, publicly reacted to Carri 's statement that she did not find Cobos acceptable as a presidential candidate because he had a Kirchnerite past.

Carri , Sanz has said, should settle her contest with Cobos in a presidential primary, which according to a recently-approved law will be held in August 2001. Technically the Radical Party and Carri 's Civic Coalition are still part of an alliance called the Social and Civic Accord (ACyS), which also includes the centre-left Socialist Party. This means that Cobos could face Carri in a primary. But Carri has not confirmed that her party is still a member of the Accord.

Carri on Tuesday said that she did not want to argue with Sanz. She said that opposition leaders should stop arguing and get down to business together in Congress to "approve good laws." But Carri made it clear that her ties with the Radical Party "are at an impasse" and that she will only make a final decision about her party's political future and alliances "in March 2011."

So what will the years ahead be like? Unpredictable as always even for the emboldened opposition. Congress will also be unpredictable because the balance of power in the Lower House appears to be held by a handful of centre-left lawmakers who have in the past backed government-sponsored bills.

The ruling party meanwhile on Wednesday used its old majority in Congress to appoint Deputy Agust n Rossi, the Victory Front caucus leader in the Lower House, as head of the bicameral committee that will monitor the enforcement of the recently-approved Media Law. But the opposition has challenged Rossi's appointment arguing that he was backed by eight of the 16 members of the bicameral committee. Rossi in turn accused the opposition of deliberately wasting time to boycott the committee and that his party had a right to work with 15 members because the dissident Peronists had not named a representative.

The opposition meanwhile is trying to control a bicameral committee that will regulate presidential decrees. The opposition has expressed fears that the President will veto most laws approved by the opposition majority next year and rule by decree.

The ruling party will head 20 out of 45 Lower House committees next year (including the key Budget and Impeachment committees), but it will not enjoy a majority in any of them. The Victory Front, with Kirchner sitting in the House, will thus have to work to seek consensus with potential allies to avoid being cornered on thorny issues like the inflation rate as reported by the INDEC state-run statistics bureau, export duties, trade union laws and the Council of Magistrates.

INDEC reported on Friday an inflation rate of 0.8 percent for November. But opposition leaders left, right and centre say that the inflation rate has been blatantly manipulated since INDEC was overhauled by Kirchner early in 2007.

The opposition could unite to, say, reform INDEC and also reform labour laws as demanded by breakway unions demanding legal status.

The Supreme Court on Wednesday ruled as unconstitutional an article of a law only granting protection to shop stewards who belong to unions with legal status. The law currently allows one union with legal status per sector. The court said a representative that belongs to a union with no status has a right to legal protection.

The Supreme Court last year also ruled that a worker does not have to belong to a union to be elected as a representative.

The rulings have been criticized by the General Labour Confederation (CGT), the nation's largest union umbrella group and the only one with full legal status. The CGT, which has traditionally behaved like the trade union wing of the Peronist party, is loyal to the Kirchners. The left-leaning CTA, the second largest union umbrella group, has accused the government of not granting it legal status as demanded not to get on the wrong side of the CGT.

The CTA has scored symbolic wins in court. But victory will be sweeter for the CTA if Congress, against the wishes of the CGT and the ruling party, next year tables a trade union pluralism bill.

Still the Victory Front technically has the clout to quash bills it does not like in the Senate. Pichetto has said he is confident that the Victory Front and allies hold 37 out of 72 seats in Congress (32 Victory Front, two ARI Tierra del Fuego, one from Neuqu n and two independent Peronists from La Pampa province).

But ruling party Senator Jos Pampuro, the provisional head of the Senate, has said that many votes in the Upper House could end in a 36-36 tie next year.

The tie-breaking, like in the momentous late night session last year on soy export duties, will be up to Cobos.

U.S. Government
Takes Action

Click here to view letters by the Administration and Members of Congress on Argentina's debt and economic policies.

The Debt and Europe

Click Here To Read More

ATFA Member Spotlight

National Taxpayer's Union

Open Letter to the U.S. House of Representatives: Protect Taxpayers from Judgment-Evading Nations

Click here to view other ATFA member activity

Join Us
Show your support for ATFA and our work regarding debt default by joining our growing list of supporters.

Tell Your Friends
Do you have friends or colleagues who would be interested in supporting ATFA? Send them an invitation to this site by clicking here.