Vice-President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner let rip at government critics on Monday, telling the opposition and hostile media outlet to “leave vaccination and the pandemic out of political disputes.”
At an event inaugurating a new building at the Sor María Ludovica children’s hospital in her birthplace of La Plata, the former president deplored doubts raised about the government’s vaccination campaign.
Flanked by Buenos Aires Province Governor Axel Kicillof as she spoke, she then directed her fire against the media rather than opposition parties and against Grupo Clarín in particular.
"There’s nothing like [Grupo] Clarín anywhere in the world with its degree of concentration and the chorus of repetition it commands," she said, reviving her old battles with the conglomerate and criticising those who “inoculate hate.”
"True liberty is when you sacrifice your own freedom out of solidarity," said the Frente de Todos leader in a dig at libertarian critiques, also praising Buenos Aires Province’s vaccination campaign as “model.”
Kicillof preferred to aim his fire more in the direction of the political opposition, saying: “If they want to act as a responsible opposition, they should help out in some way, instead of trooping off to the television studios and filling people with hatred,” while adding that the new building has “nothing to envy private hospitals, which charge impossible prices.”
Continuing his critical line, Kicillof maintained that since he became governor, 125 public works projects abandoned by his predecessor María Eugenia Vidal under the Mauricio Macri presidency had been revived.
Work on the hospital building began in 2017 under the Macri presidency but was discontinued the following year amid a drive to eliminate the fiscal deficit after a mega-loan from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The work was resumed last year within the context of the plan to reinforce the public health system against the Covid-19 pandemic. The new building is also designed to assist children with psychological problems.
The inauguration of the new building – a project with an official budget of
148,605,766 pesos – was also attended by Lieutenant-Governor Verónica Magario, Buenos Aires Province Health Minister Daniel Gollán and Sor María Ludovica Hospital director Eduardo Puzzi.
In her lawsuit against Google for a search engine entry that described her as the “Thief of the Nation” last August, Fernández de Kirchner said that she would donate the damages to the hospital.
– TIMES/NA
Comments