Reality has shattered the government’s indifference to the facts: it sent one of the discreet leaders of the an omnibus law, which soon transforms into a modest combi.
Regulatory expert and now Energy Minister, lawyer Eduardo Rodríguez Chirillo, sat down at nap time in Martín Menem’s office on Thursday, just as lawmakers argued in the Annex over the integration of commissions.
He went to listen to the arguments of Miguel Pichetto and some members of the key bloc of the Chamber Let’s Make the Federal Coalition, including Emilio Monzó, Juan Manuel López and Carlos Gutiérrez.
From that meeting was born the commitment that this Tuesday the round of appearances by Executive officials will begin to explain the form and substance of the project. Pichetto and his comrades repeated the same statement in other meetings with the ruling party.
The first, that the government makes a distinction between necessary and urgent projects, which involve substantial reforms that can be discussed in advance in extraordinary sessions. One of the meeting participants said in surprise: Those who made this soap opera law seem not to know that it requires a vote of Congress to be implemented. With this visit the government seems to wake up from the dogmatic dream of a politics without politics.
The power is not in La Rosada
In politics as in life, We already know who the Three Wise Men are. On the map of this situation, the Three Wise Men are found in Congress, which has the power to approve or dismantle the executive’s praetorian impulses to make a revolution by decree.
The Milei administration enters its fourth week without having managed to forge a legislative alliance that will make its initiatives thrive. A miniclub of fisheries governors has played down announcements of reform of the current regime, which allows Argentina to export more fish than beef.
In the Senate, the test of mutual affection that should have promoted the electoral reform to impose the single ballot failed. The Casa Rosada imagined that the alliance of 39 senators that ousted Peronism from control of the Chamber served to wait for Twelfth Night to celebrate some triumph.
A big problem because on Friday, Kings Day, that House received the text of DNU 70, the mother of all controversies. It was the last day the Executive had to send it. In the next 10 days the commission, not yet appointed, will have to examine it.
Since it does not have the necessary agreements for a healthy trial, the DNU arrives with the body scratched, in the process of being scrapped and protected by justice. Furthermore, there was no commission, because the agreement with Peronism and the PRO on the division of commissions into blocks and with the d’Hont system was also watered down by the governing Deputies party.
If the ruling party had respected the agreement reached in the preparatory session, the commission would have been dominated by the Peronist opposition, which has already warned that it will never vote for anything for this government.
awkward speed
Pichetto’s central bloc, which concentrates a political density that other larger groups lack, understands that financial and fiscal reforms are the priority. These do not, of course, include reforms of the electoral system.
“- The elimination of PASO – Monzó told the visitor – can happen, but the others don’t even dream of it. After all – he asked Chirillo – Can you explain to me what advantage there is in electing deputies in the single-member constituency? I may like it, but is it good for you?” Silence on the other end.
The table had no response even when it was reproached for seeking speed in the legislative process, when speed should be a function of the efficiency with which projects are sanctioned. Otherwise speed is clumsiness.
The main complaint of these friends of the government, who are not willing to boycott some of the reforms that Cambiemos has also been pursuing since 2015, is that the package does not contain the two elements necessary to advance: 1) it does not separate the important from the trivial; 2) does not seek unity to obtain the votes necessary for approval. The government acts as if the sanction were something secondary and the purpose was only to build muscle to generate a majority it does not have.
Friend of friends
Chirillo was an official of the Ministry of Energy during the government of Carlos Menem, under the command of Carlos Bastos. He has fluid relationships with Roberto Dromi, who is the author of two books, with Pichetto, on state reform.
He only met the deputy at that meeting organized by Martín Menem, but they understood each other as if they had always known each other. Chirillo came to government thanks to the chief of staff, Nicolás Posse, for an airport report.
Before joining the government, this administrator lived in Marbella. He had to review the list of deregulations proposed by Federico Sturzenegger for Patricia Bullrich and which, due to the electoral clash on October 22nd, found their way into Milei’s pockets.
Macrista recipes
Monzó conveyed lessons that the visitors noted: “- You must obtain, from a minority, the majority for the projects. I have gathered the majority, being a minority, for Macri’s projects. You must do this task now.”
The hosts warned that the search for conciliation with friends is fundamental, because the Christian Peronism which today controls the 101 votes of Union por la Patria will exercise a blocking strategy like the one it had with the Macri government.
This recipe from Monzó evokes the tool that Macri had between 2015 and 2019: Peronism was divided into two blocks in the Senate and three benches in the Deputation. This schism, led by Pichetto, Massa, Urtubey, Bossio and the Peronist governors of the interior, allowed the interbloc chaired by Mario Negri to approve 292 laws for Macri.
Pichetto warns him that suspending the pension update formula risks creating further discredit. Chirillo argued: “– That cost is paid by the president.” Pichetto replied: “- Costs are always paid here in Congress. “People come here to complain and ask.” Chirillo scored.
Disconcertions
The confusion in Congress is illustrated by the outcome of Guillermo Francos’ meeting with senators from the “I 39” group when they complained about the president’s insult by calling them “coimeros.” Victoria Villarruel organized that meeting with the Minister of the Interior to hear complaints and explanations.
Francos listened and proposed: “- The matter will be resolved with a meeting between you and the president…” Luis Juez, who has a joke for every crisis, joked: “- It is better that it is not this week but the next, so that “People think it was bullshit last year.”
Milei celebrated Fátima Florez’s debut in Mar del Plata with another insult to the “criminal caste” of Congress. The president is a man of scenarios and also contributes his jokes, such as when he says he wants to turn Argentina into Ireland in 45 years. It’s like the advice on how to make a small fortune in the film industry: invest a large fortune.
Wild crayfish react
Pichetto and Monzó came from a fishing summit in the Chubut house, with governor “Nacho” Torres and other deputies of the bloc, including Maxi Ferraro. At that meeting the rejection of the reform of the fishing regime was preparedrequired by all political and economic sectors of this activity.
The strength of the complaint culminated in the meeting of Torres and the other governors with the government leaders. This is the first formal capitulation of the ruling party in a reform that the sector considers to liquidate the activity, with the argument that the country can harvest more if it puts fishing resources to tender. According to industry experts, there are 46 thousand jobs in danger due to a project considered a bad copy of a law applied in Chile.
In the reports read in the Chaco house, where the Macrist mayor of Mar del Plata, Guillermo Montenegro, was located, it was highlighted that the proposal that they wanted to impose in the omnibus law was an attack on fishing resources unique in the world, such as the so-called ” wild shrimp”.
The mention caused a shudder in those present. But one explained that all over the world the shrimp consumed are farmed, while in Argentina a species is fished that does not depend on marine farming. The chainsaw couldn’t handle the wild shrimp.
A ghost government
They complained about the fiscal objective of the project of a government that has not yet appointed the undersecretary for Fisheries. It turns out there is a hand that makes decisions without having formal responsibility. A sort of ghost administration that manages the government from the outside.
That morning, Governor Torres discussed the issue with Sturzenegger via zoom. Macri’s former BCRA does not so far have a formal designation with an authorized signature, although the economist publicly acknowledges this He is the inspirer of the decisions that the government approves and which affect interests.
The case has precedents. Under the government of Eduardo Duhalde, Hugo Toledo was a councilor in charge of making decisions on public works, but he was not the minister of the area. Chiche Duhalde had the same status to decide on social assistance, without being its minister. But this government cannot be asked to have leaders with a signature if there is a lack of officials in dozens of departments. And some of those appointed are fired before taking office.
Others raise their voices claiming precedence over their peers, such as Patricia Bullrich, already candidate for head of the cabinet of ministers. Mileism is the empire of the ephemeral – very much in tune with the society described, for other purposes, by the Frenchman Gilles Lipovetsky (“L’Empire de l’éphémère”, book of 1987).
Gift from the Kings that looks like a loan
Another one that brings and brings without functions is “Lule” Menem –Martín’s cousin-, who was recorded in a cabinet meeting and who organized the visit of the Milesian deputies on Wednesday, who came to listen to the president’s tantrums over the slowness in developing the projects. Milei wants the omnibus law to be passed on January 31st.
For approval to take place, let’s say, on January 25th, a decision will have to be made in the commission on the 18th. The Executive’s round of explanations to ministers begins on Tuesday. The opinion was due to be approved the following week. Chimeric: Half of Libertad Avanza’s deputies attended that meeting with Milei. And none of those who make up the bloc have legislative experience.
They are all debutants. What the ruling party asks of them will depend on the friends they have in Congress. The 39 members of the Senate already have reservations. And the presidencies of the Commissions of Deputies were a gift from King that the PRO blocks of the UCR gave to the LLA, and the 23 of Pichetto, which is more like a fixed-term loan. The reasons are precarious: they distance themselves from the Peronism of the 101. Such a position cannot last over time.
Source: Clarin
