Stories that caught our eye: December 6 to 13

 

KUEIDER SHOWN THE DOOR

Senator Edgardo Kueider (Peronist-Entre Ríos), currently under house arrest in Paraguay on charges of currency contraband and money-laundering, was expelled from the Upper House as “morally unfit” by an overwhelming 60-6 votes last Thursday. On Monday Kueider had formally requested a leave of absence from Vice-President Victoria Villarruel last Monday but his former colleagues of the Unión por la Patria caucus electing him under the Frente de Todos label back in 2019 had already presented the bill for his expulsion while on Thursday morning federal judge Sandra Arroyo Salgado had requested that he be stripped of his parliamentary immunity so that she could order his arrest.

 

MILEI: HAPPY DAYS ARRIVING

President Javier Milei gave a nationwide broadcast to commemorate the first anniversary of his administration on the day last Tuesday, thanking Argentines for their “sacrifice which will not be in vain” and forecasting the advent of happy days with “the recession over and the country beginning to grow.” Flanked by his entire Cabinet with Cabinet Chief Guillermo Francos and presidential chief-of-staff Karina Milei seated by his side, Milei said: “Every day we draw closer to inflation becoming a bad memory” before detailing the “fiscal degeneracy” of his inheritance from Frente de Todos with uncontrolled money-printing. He then highlighted the work of the Deregulation Ministry created only half a year ago, assuring that his administration had produced eightfold the structural reforms of the 1989-99 Carlos Menem presidency with just “15 percent of the deputies and 10 percent of the senators.” For the future he pledged a “deep chainsaw” to streamline the state, along with tax, pension, labour and other reforms. His administration would slash the number of national taxes by 90 percent, he announced, as well introduce a free competition of currencies so that “every Argentine may use the currency they want in their daily transactions.” Finally, he confirmed that he would be seeking a free trade agreement with the United States, as well as pushing reforms in the Mercosur trade bloc, reducing its common external tariff. Milei concluded by saying that “the hour of the common man has arrived.” 

 

INFLATION KEEPS FALLING

Last month’s inflation of 2.4 percent was the lowest since mid-2020 when the economy was paralysed by a coronavirus pandemic lockdown, falling well below all expectations which still forecast a figure below three percent but much closer to it. Inflation up to the final month of this year thus reaches 112 percent with an annual rate of 166 percent, according to the data posted by the INDEC national statistics bureau in midweek. The key item of food and beverages registered the lowest increases of all at 0.9 percent while the main deviations from the trend were education (5.1 percent) and water, electricity, gas and fuels (4.5 percent). A core inflation (excluding regulated and seasonal prices) of 2.7 percent indicates that the downward streak of four months running is unlikely to be sustained this month.

 

PREPAID UNDER FIRE

The CNDC (Comisión Nacional de Defensa de la Competencia) anti-monopoly watchdog will initiate summary proceedings against seven prepaid health care schemes (Galeno, the British and German Hospitals, Medifé, Swiss Medical, Omint and OSDE) as well as the chamber grouping them and its then-president Claudio Belocopitt for presumed cartel practices between last December and April, presidential spokesman Manuel Adorni said on Thursday.

 

TRUMP NAMES HIS MAN IN BA

United States president-elect Donald Trump on Thursday announced his choice to head the US Embassy here, a Cuban-born South Florida doctor who already knows President Javier Milei. In Trump’s words, “I am pleased to announce that Dr. Peter Lamelas, MD, MBA, will serve as our United States Ambassador to Argentina. Peter is a physician, philanthropist and an incredible businessman, best known for founding the largest Urgent Care healthcare company in Florida. As a child, Peter and his family fled Communist Cuba and LEGALLY immigrated to the USA, starting with nothing and achieving the American dream,”receiving the rapid “Make America Great Again” thanks of the envoy-to-be.

 

MISRAHI BOUNCED FROM ARCA

The weekend announcement by presidential spokesman Manuel Adorni that Florencia Misrahi had been removed from the helm of ARCA  (Agencia de Recaudación y Control Aduanero) tax bureau was confirmed by Decree 1078/2024, published in the Official Gazette last Monday and confirming newly appointed Foreign Ministry official Juan Pazo as her successor. Adorni had attributed her ouster to her plans to tax streamers and influencers but the decree explained it as “deviation … from the simplification of the tax system.” Effective control of the agency is expected to continue under DGI internal revenue chief Andrés Vázquez and Customs head José Andrés Velis, as it has done in the seven weeks since ARCA was born as a relaunch and a rebranding of the previous AFIP tax bureau.

 

PERONIST SUMMIT

Despite tensions and infighting, the big guns of the Peronist movement – ex-president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner (formally taking over the party chair two days later), Buenos Aires Province Governor Axel Kicillof, last year’s presidential candidate Sergio Massa and La Cámpora leader Máximo Kirchner – all managed to hold a summit in Moreno last Monday with calm on the surface but not too much resolved beyond Kicillof’s plans to separate national and provincial elections being temporarily blocked. Party militants were not admitted to the conclave but had to congregate outside. Perhaps the most interesting note of the day was not anything at the summit but Kicillof’s statement that his province “will not permit” the privatisation of Aerolíneas Argentinas. Kicillof denied that the airline was a loss-making company which would burden provincial tax-payers if the La Plata government bought up shares, assuring that Aerolíneas had received no financial assistance from the national government in the course of this year.

 

A SUPREME WARNING

Supreme Court justice Juan Carlos Maqueda, who retires at the end of this month, last Monday pronounced himself as “seriously worried” about the future of democracy and the institutions with “clouds on the horizon” for constitutional democracy globally in a “disorganised world” where the Chinese model separating capitalism from democracy is admired. His comments were made at a Buenos Aires City Bar Association tribute to his legal career, including 22 years at the Supreme Court now ended by his reaching the statutory retirement age of 75 later this month. His Supreme Court colleagues Horacio Rosatti and Carlos Rosenkrantz were in the audience but not the third, Ricardo Lorenzetti.

 

AN ARMED WING?

The age for legal firearm possession has been reduced from 21 to 18 years by Decree 1081/2024, published last Tuesday in the Official Gazette, although “psychic or physical abnormalities” also bar the ownership of guns at the younger age and weapons must be certified at the local police station to ensure no criminal record. Last May the government presented a bill to regularise firearm possession and simplify the paperwork.

 

ELDER RECALDE DIES

The veteran labour lawyer and former deputy Héctor Recalde died last Monday at the age of 86. Máximo Kirchner brought the news to the Peronist summit that same day in Moreno where a tribute was paid. Recalde was for many years the chief lawyer of the CGT union umbrella.

 

IMAGE BAN

President Javier Milei last Tuesday issued a decree forbidding the display of images on public buildings, as well as naming them after political personalities until 10 years after their death. The initiative is viewed as heading off any repetition of the gigantic images of Eva Perón on the former Social Development Ministry and the widespread use of the late Néstor Kirchner’s name both before and shortly after his death.

 

FABIOLA BASHES ALBERTO (VERBALLY)

Former first lady Fabiola Yáñez last week resumed her offensive against ex-president Alberto Fernández, reproaching him for never having apologised for all the times he bashed her, further accusing him of infidelity with up to 20 women and insisting: “No money can heal those wounds.” Pointing out the contradiction between the ex-president’s feminist discourse and gender violence, the former first lady also complained of the loneliness of life at the top.

 

FOOTBALL MAKES STRANGE BEDFOLLOWS

Despite tension with the government due to his adamant resistance to the entry of private capital into football clubs, AFA Argentine Football Association president Claudio 'Chiqui' Tapia not only invited presidential chief-of-staff Karina Milei and presidential spokesman Manuel Adorni to join him last Wednesday at a CONMEBOL event in Luque, Paraguay, but also shared a cordial photo with the former. The event was to confirm South American participation as a minor partner in hosting the centennial 2030 World Cup, even if all but three of the 104 matches will be played in Spain, Portugal and Morocco with Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay hosting at least one each. Tapia further confirmed last Wednesday that Argentina’s single match would be played at the River Plate stadium.