#8M: Activists take to the streets for women’s rights

Tens of thousands of people are expected to take to the streets of Buenos Aires later today to mark International Women’s Day.

March 8, the annual day of struggle for women’s rights, will see large crowds of campaigners and activists demonstrate in front of the National Congress building.

Campaigners will rally for their rights, defend Argentina's historic abortion law and demand policies to protect women and the poor in the face of harsh austerity measures from President Javier Milei’s government.

The social consequences of the severe economic adjustment carried out by the Milei administration is a strong theme of this year’s march.

Inflation in Argentina is running at more than 250 percent year-on-year and poverty affects over half of the population, with women and young children particularly affected.

Activists and collectives called on protesters to gather downtown before marching to the Plaza de Congreso. Once outside the national legislature, organisers of the rally will read a document detailing the demands and aspirations of campaigners.

Under the slogan ‘#ParoInternacionalFeminista,’ a number of women will walk off the job, refusing to work. Various feminist collectives, including Ni Una Menos, Inquilinas Agrupadas and Mamá Cultiva are supporting this call.

“We are still being killed out of hatred, we are paid less for the same tasks, we are the ones who bear the burden of care and who suffer most from the consequences of job insecurity, hunger, the plundering of public resources and the capture of the state by private companies," reads an extract from the document released in advance by Ni Una Menos.

Milei attacks and cuts

Milei has embarked upon a mission to slash state spending, deregulate the economy and shut down government-funded organisations since his inauguration on December 10.

He based his presidential campaign on attacks on Argentina’s “political caste” and took a chainsaw on campaign rallies to symbolise the budget cuts he would undertake if he won the election

As part of his cost-cutting “chainsaw” plan, the right-wing leader has eliminated the Women, Gender & Diversity Ministry and recently announced the closure of the National Institute against Discrimination, Xenophobia and Racism (INADI).

He has also moved to prohibit the use of inclusive language in the Armed Forces and throughout the national public administration.

In a flagship speech in Davos at the World Economic Forum in January, he called feminism a "ridiculous and unnatural fight between men and women" and said the movement only serves to "give jobs to bureaucrats who have contributed nothing to society.”

Abortion remarks

Milei has also outed himself as a vocal opponent of abortion, which was legalised in Argentina in late 2020.

Demonstrators on Friday vowed not to allow its reversal. Members of Milei’s party filed a bill last month seeking to repeal the law and replace it, though the Executive said it had no intention of seeking to overturn the bill in the coming months.

Nevertheless, the president returned to the topic this week – at a somewhat inappropriate setting. When giving a speech in front of students on Wednesday, two days before Women’s Day, he characterised pro-choice supporters as "murderers” and described abortion as "aggravated murder" due to the "familial bond" between mother and foetus.

"For me, abortion is an aggravated murder by the familial bond… and I can prove it to you from a mathematical, philosophical and liberal perspective," said the far-right president before an audience of schoolchildren at the Cardenal Copella Institute, a Catholic educational establishment in Buenos Aires that the President once attended.

Milei described those who supported the abortion law as "murderers of the green scarves,” in reference to the emblem that characterises feminist struggle and that became the flag of activism for legal abortion in Argentina.

‘Step backwards’

Left-wing politician and MAS leader Manuela Castañeira, criticised the remarks: "Milei wants to impose a step backwards in terms of our rights. He is attacking and provoking against legal abortion, as he did at an event in a high school when he spoke of 'murderers in green scarves,' and against inclusive language."

"He is carrying out a policy of cutting programmes to eradicate gender violence after having closed the Women, Gender & Diversity Ministry. And all these actions are part of its global war plan that includes wage misery and the deepening of hunger and poverty," she concluded.

Mobilisations will take place across Argentina on Friday, with commemorative activities and events were planned in hundreds of cities.

The day also included the ‘Feminist Strike’ – a walkout in which women draw attention to their struggle and battle for equality.

Presidential Spokesman Manuel Adorni said this week that the government would deduct a day's pay from the salaries of public employees who do not show up for work on Friday.

"Those who do not go to work will be docked [pay for] the day. But this is not because of [International] Women's Day, it has always been like that. Since the first strike we announced that employees who do not work will have their day deducted," said Adorni.