VETOES: A MIXED BAG
Ups and downs for the presidential vetoes to defend the fiscal surplus in the midweek Congress session – the 83 deputies voting to uphold the veto of pension improvements sufficed to deny the 160 voting against it a two-thirds majority but the veto of the bill declaring a state of emergency for assistance to the disabled was overturned by a 172-73 vote with even dimmer prospects in the Senate. The latter vote, coupled with suspicions of corruption aired by leaked confessions by the director of Andis agency for the handicapped, Diego Spagnuolo (who resigned late Wednesday), triggered an exit from the La Libertad Avanza (LLA) caucus by three deputies – Marcela Pagano (Buenos Aires Province), Carlos D’Alessandro (San Luis) and Gerardo González (Formosa) – to form a new caucus Coherencia with maverick Lourdes Arrieta (who quit a year ago), thus reducing LLA to 36 deputies. The deputies voting against the vetoes received reprimands at Thursday’s annual Council of the Americas symposium from President Javier Milei, who complained: “We have a Congress kidnapped by Kirchnerism,” and from Chamber of Commerce president Mario Grinman, who called them an “asquito” (disgusting).
FENTANYL ARRESTS
Federal judge Ernesto Kreplak last Wednesday ordered the arrests of Ariel García Furfaro, the head of HLB Pharma and Ramallo labs, his brothers Damián and Diego and his mother Nilda (vice-president of HLB Pharma) for grave irregularities in the production and distribution of contaminated fentanyl under investigation for causing at least 96 deaths. Four other arrest warrants were also issued. The arrests proceeded on the basis of a forensic report submitted last Tuesday by the Supreme Court’s medical corps showing the batches containing the bacteria Klebsiella pneumoniae and Ralstonia mannitolilytica to have contributed significantly to the deaths without being the direct cause in 20 clinical histories.
CANDIDATES DEFINED
President Javier Milei’s La Libertad Avanza (LLA) bandwagon will be opposed by Unión por la Patria (UxP) Itai Hagman heading Fuerza Patria’s lower house list in this City for the October midterms while his Buenos Aires Province counterpart is ex-minister Jorge Taiana, chosen by consensus between Governor Axel Kicillof, outgoing deputy Máximo Kirchner and 2023 presidential candidate Sergio Massa (with neither of the latter duo running against many expectations) to compete against the LLA ticket headed by deputy José Luis Espert. High-profile social activist Juan Grabois will represent Frente Patria Grande and popular movements in third place in a ticket with four trade unionists favourably placed while Hagman will be seconded by former Labour minister Kelly Olmos. At senatorial level in the City Security Minister Patricia Bullrich (accompanied by economist Agustín Monteverde) will face off against incumbent Peronist Senator Mariano Recalde. Bullrich’s ministerial departure along with the lower house candidacy of Defence Minister Luis Petri (her 2023 running-mate) in Mendoza will entail a Cabinet shuffle after the election. The 95 deputies not up for re-election include 2015-2019 Buenos Aires Province governor María Eugenia Vidal (a conscientious objector to the LLA-PRO alliance), who will be entering the private sector (she is apparently seeking work with the help of LinkedIn).
YPF: DOUBLE REPRIEVE
An Irish court last Monday rejected implementation within their country of Manhattan judge Loretta Preska’s ruling sentencing Argentina to pay US$16.1 billion plus interest to the hedge funds Burford and Eton Park while the case remains under appeal although their decision has no effect in New York. Before last weekend the Second Circuit Court of Appeal had suspended Preska’s order giving Argentina a fortnight to transfer 51 percent of YPF shares to a New York bank, also authorising the participation of Washington’s Justice Department as an amicus curiae in support of the Argentine position.
RIGI INVESTMENT
Economy Minister Luis Caputo last Monday announced that the Swiss-based mining multinational Glencore has presented two investment projects to the tune of US$13.3 billion to develop deposits in Agua Rica and El Pachón in the provinces of San Juan and Catamarca respectively under the RIGI (Régimen de Incentivos para Grandes Inversiones) incentive scheme for major investments. In his X social network account, Caputo pointed out that this brought the RIGI total up to 20 projects in different sectors worth over US$33.6 billion, of which seven worth US$9.25 billion have been approved. The copper and molybdenum of El Pachón account for almost US$9.5 billion of the proposal and the copper, gold, silver and molybdenum of Agua Rica (near the Alumbrera gold mine) for nearly US$4 billion. The combined projects are estimated to create over 10,000 jobs in the construction phase while employing over 2,500 miners afterwards in what Caputo described as an “attractive long-term investment with better investor protection.” Glencore CEO Gary Nagle praised the Javier Milei administration for its introduction of RIGI, helping to “consolidate Argentina’s position as one of the world’s leading miners.”
SOUTHERN COMMAND COMES SOUTH
President Javier Milei received Admiral Alvin Holsey, who heads the Southern Command of the United States and was in town to attend a regional conference on security co-sponsored with Argentina. Further motives of his visit were to reinforce the military cooperation between both nations and hence regional security with a special focus on “vigilance” of the seas and organised crime, including drug-trafficking with the Donald Trump administration ultra-sensitive about fentanyl. Holsey, who also met Joint Chiefs-of-Staff head Air Commodore Xavier Isaac and other local authorities, had previously visited Argentina in April with Washington keeping a close eye on Chinese influence in the South Atlantic. Recent defence co-operation also includes the purchase of F-16 fighters. Holsey’s predecessor General Laura Richardson had expressed interest in the Southern Cone’s “lithium triangle” in her visits.
COURT SHUNS AUTISTIC IAN
La Plata federal judge Alberto Osvaldo Recondo last Monday rejected the injunction presented by the family of autistic child Ian Moche, 12, against President Javier Milei’s X social network publication last June blasting the boy’s presence with leading Peronists Cristina Fernández de Kirchner and Sergio Massa, also ordering the boy’s mother Marlene Florencia Spesso to pay the costs. In his 32-page ruling the judge agreed with Milei that he was “speaking with his own voice,” as well as protected by the freedom of expression. Recondo also accepted Milei’s argument that his post was directed against the journalist Paulino Rodrigues rather than the child. The family’s lawyers slammed the ruling as “arbitrary and a judicial scandal – militant justice,” arguing that Milei was president 24/7.
RELEASE IN CFK MAGNICIDE CASE
Nicolás Gabriel Carrizo, the leader of the so-called ‘Los Copitos’ candy floss gang accused of attempting to assassinate ex-president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, was released on Thursday with even the prosecution refraining from pressing charges against him after spending almost three years jailed in Marcos Paz prison. But alleged perpetrators Fernando Sabag Montiel and Brenda Uliarte remain on trial for “attempted murder doubly aggravated by use of a firearm and gender violence” with the prosecution requesting 19 years (including four years for selling child porn videos) for the former and 174 months for the latter.
ANOTHER KORRUPTION TRIAL
The City Federal Appeals Court last Monday confirmed that Carolina and Alejandrina Pochetti, the widow and sister-in-law of late ex-president Néstor Kirchner’s also deceased private secretary Daniel Muñoz, and 14 other defendants would go on trial for money-laundering for whitewashing the proceeds of corruption, also slapping liens of up to 15 billion pesos on the assets of the defendants.
BOLIVIA ALSO VOTES HERE
Over 60,000 of an overseas vote of 369,931 out of a total electorate of 7,937,128 in last weekend’s Bolivian general elections were eligible to vote in this city alone with a further 100,000 or so elsewhere in Argentina. Centre-right tycoon Samuel Doria Medina was the frontrunner in the last opinión polls but ended up third with Christian Democrat Senator Rodrigo Paz Pereira and liberal ex-president Jorge Quiroga through to the runoff amid Bolivia’s worst economic crisis in the last four decades. But the leading candidate among Bolivian voters here was believed to be Andrónico Rodríguez of the Popular Alliance (a MAS socialist backing neither outgoing President Luis Arce nor the abstentionism urged by former three-term president Evo Morales).
DOCTOR CHARLY GARCÍA
Iconic singer Carlos Alberto ‘Charly’ García, 73, was awarded a doctorate Honoris Causa by the University of Buenos Aires (UBA) last Tuesday afternoon, promptly flashing a “V” sign and announcing: “From now on I’ll be calling myself ‘Doctor Charly García’.” The doctorate was awarded not only for his musical qualities but also for “the political sense of his songs at different points of Argentine history,” informed UBA Faculty of Philosophy and Letter dean Ricardo Maneti.
NOT AN IDEAL CANDIDATE
Federico Bojanovich, a La Libertad Avanza (LLA) candidate running for the provincial legislature in next month’s Buenos Aires Province elections, has been sent to trial for gender violence in La Plata after his ex-partner accused him of physical aggression and destroying her mobile telephone back in mid-2022, leading her to request a restraining order.
FAKE NEWS WATCH
Television hostess Pamela David last Monday offered her “sincere apologies” in public and without excuse for saying that presidential chief- of-staff Karina Milei had a Rolex watch worth US$35,000. The latter corrected the “fake news” by saying her watch was worth less than US$1,000, demanding an apology “with the same enthusiasm” used to make the original report and threatening legal action. “You should also say sorry for all the times you have defamed the President with lies in the last two years,” wrote Karina Milei on her X social network account.
CONICET’S STAR PERFORMER
A survey has revealed that the “Estrella Culona" (big-bottomed starfish) filmed during an underwater exploration of CONICET scientific research council, has a positive image of 68.6 percent, more than any politician. Over 93 percent of respondents followed the CONICET transmission live. These percentages contrast with half or more of Argentines disapproving of the Javier Milei government and Kirchnerism.
TANGO FESTIVAL
The Tango BA Festival and the 2025 Tango World Cup, the world’s biggest tango encounter organised by City Hall’s Culture Ministry, kicked off last Wednesday evening with the presence of City Mayor Jorge Macri and will run for the next fortnight until September 2 with over 500 activities and 2000 artists in 50 different venues.
Comments