A row over funding pitting President Javier Milei’s government against a number of provincial leaders is bleeding into a leadership battle for the PRO party founded by former president Mauricio Macri.
From the distance of Washington DC, Security Minister Patricia Bullrich intervened forcefully last weekend in the spat that had previously erupted between Milei and Chubut PRO Governor Ignacio Torres.
Bullrich firmly backed her new political boss while accusing her supposed party ally of “blackmail.”
Drafting a statement entitled “a call to sanity,” the PRO chair – currently on leave while serving as a minister in Milei’s government (and up for replacement next month) – started collecting signatures of party members.
There was a conspicuous silence from Macri, the frontrunner to be the next party chairman.
Against Bullrich’s firm stance, governors nationwide (including all belonging to the Juntos por el Cambio coalition) backed their Chubut colleague, who threatened to cut off oil and gas supplies in his confrontation with the Casa Rosada over the deduction of federal revenue-sharing funds.
Torres says his region is owed 13.8 billion pesos to pay off debts incurred by the previous Peronist provincial government.
Worried by the ramifications of the conflict and the erosion of support for Milei within PRO ranks (including even Buenos Aires City Mayor Jorge Macri), Bullrich made her move ahead of returning home from Washington, where she had attended the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) aimed at returning Donald Trump to the White House.
While Mauricio Macri reportedly backs Torres and the other Juntos por el Cambio governors on the quiet, Bullrich has placed herself at the head of the pro-government wing of the PRO party. She even met Torres on February 23 in a bid to dissuade him from his defiant gesture.
‘Obscene’ threats
Claiming to represent a PRO majority against Macri, Bullrich defined her stance as follows on her X account: “No member of PRO can be in agreement with a threat to confiscate private property. Not only are such threats obscene but they are affirmations which scare off investments, job creation and the progress of our country. The dilemma is simple – either everything stays the same or we embrace liberty and change.”
"We the undersigned, leaders and militants of PRO, share in various ways the experience of the 2015-2019 government. The public statements of our main leaders confirm a diagnosis – the advance was too slow and with exaggerated prudence, for which we paid with a crisis preventing the continuity of change. Should we return to government, greater courage and decision would be necessary,” read a joint statement of the PRO leadership drafted by Bullrich.
“The parliamentary defeat of the Ley de Bases was a heavy blow to our aspirations, rapidly showing the difficulties which must be faced by any reform plan and depriving the national government of the necessary tools to confront the disastrous situation inherited. Our caucus remained compact, voting in favour of all articles while at the same time suggesting amendments. That is why we are consternated by the resistance of many governors to sharing the fiscal effort necessary to prevent a hyperinflation whose main victim would not be the government but the Argentines in every province.”
“It is necessary to discuss a new framework for federal-revenue-sharing, as established by our Constitution and never put into effect. Meanwhile we must all combine our efforts so that this country can move past this critical cycle. Aware of our responsibility to support the change demanded by our voters and a majority of Argentines, we appeal to the sanity of all who share our vision of a federal country in which each province generates its own funding and where banknotes are no longer printed to finance privilege at the expense of the welfare of Argentines and in which continuity and respect for the Constitution and the laws, not blackmail, would be the starting-point for the resolution of disputes."
Divide and rule?
Meanwhile, Milei escalated his indiscriminate critique of the provincial governors lined up against him on social media, eroding his agreement with PRO.
Torres was singled out for criticism with a stream of insults while Argentina’s youngest governor was supported by all five of his Patagonian colleagues, all nine Juntos por el Cambio governors (who wrote a separate text) and indeed every governor except for the Peronist Osvaldo Jaldo of Tucumán.
Interior Minister Guillermo Francos called the talk of paralysing oil and gas “illicit” and “a threat worthy of [late Venezuelan strongman Hugo] Chávez” while Bullrich, strongly aligned with the libertarians, fulminated against "an oil rebellion.”
While both Bullrich and Macri are keen to team up with the new government, the minister – who seems more worried by the protagonism of Macri than of Milei – is seeking a fusion. Macri’s aim is not to dilute the PRO identity within government and boost its foundational characteristics, an aim shared by the PRO governors Rogelio Frigerio (Entre Ríos Province) and Torres.
While the libertarian administration insists on the excellent relationship between Macri and Milei, the former’s advice is consistently rejected by the latter, according to the ex-president’s entourage.
Although the libertarians value the wealth of Macri’s experience, they insist that all actions are decided by Milei and his inner circle (Santiago Caputo and Karina Milei).
Debt documents
On Monday a new chapter to the conflict between Torres and the national government was added when Chubut provincial Economy Minister Facundo Ball hit back against Francos for making public documentation of the Patagonian province’s debt to the national government.
This involved the leaking of a WhatsApp conversation in which a government official admits to “a direct order” from Milei to hold back the FFDP (Fondo Fiduciario para el Desarrollo Provincial) for political motives. “It seems they were annoyed by what your governor said. They sent me this from the Economy Ministry so I guess you’ll know all about it,” concludes the captured chat.
Via X (ex-Twitter), Ball stated: “Mr minister, I want to add to your emails to expose the lies and bad faith of your government in these messages I have in my telephone. And deny it if you can if what is communicated here is not exactly the same as the governor telling me that this is political and a personal decision of Milei.”
These statements come after Francos revealed by the same channel that on February 22 the Chubut Economy minister had requested a new debt rollover by issuing a bond to cancel the debt owed by the province to the FFDP.
“Contrary to what the lieutenant-governor said, we replied with an email on February 23 asking for the documentation necessary to advance with the requested bond in conformity with the valid norms. We are awaiting the response,” chipped in the Interior minister, after the warning of Torres about holding back the oil and gas if the national government did not release the funds.
Along the same lines of accusing the governor of not having replied to the government request, presidential spokesman Manuel Adorni, ironically commented on the social networks: "A good start to the week, everybody, and read your emails because they do not get read by themselves."
Speaking on television, Milei added a new insult: “Nachito is a poor kid who cannot read a contract. What a precarious intellect!"
– TIMES with agencies
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