BILLS APPROVED
Congress on Wednesday approved two government bills to reform the Central Bank charter and expand the fiscal innocence régime by a 144-102 vote. The former bans the Central Bank from financing the Treasury and requires a two-thirds majority in both houses of Congress to remove its governor and directors – the latter eases the entry of money outside the system with a presumption of innocence from the tax authorities.
CRISTINA’S NEW NEIGHBOUR
UOM metal workers union leader María Soledad Calle, linked to the La Cámpora Kirchnerite militant grouping, became the news of the day in midweek when it was disclosed that she had purchased the flat just below Cristina Fernández de Kirchner at the San José 1111 address where the ex-president is serving her house arrest for a corruption conviction. The transaction had been concluded on August 20 with the payment of US$189,000. The purchase raised questions whether this could be a possible misuse of trade union funds and whether this might not be a Plan B for the ex-president whose second-floor flat is included among the assets impounded by the courts. Calle’s own explanation was that the flat would be the headquarters of a foundation. Last August Calle purchased half a BMW car valued at around US$70,000 and created a company offering financial services.
CAPUTO OFFERS MORTGAGES
Economy Minister Luis Caputo has placed on the table a mortgage promotion programme going out to tender in the next week as “great news for all Argentine families.” The scheme will access money from the Sustainability Guarantee Fund of the ANSES social security administration, which may only be used for loans for housing purchases. The first tender will be for 200 billion pesos with the programme set to total two trillion (US$1.5 billion). Caputo described the instalments as very similar to current rent payments at 865,000 pesos per credit of US$100,000. In order to qualify, a family would need a net monthly income of over 3.4 million pesos.
MASSA HAS TONGUES WAGGING
Peronist leader Sergio Massa returned from a week in Barbados ending August 19 to celebrate the 30th anniversary of his marriage to Malena Galmarini, only to find his trip the target of a media and political storm in the following week. The Caribbean jaunt was explained as an anniversary present from businessman Francisco De Narváez, who reportedly supplied his private jet for the couple and five friends at a total cost of some US$400,000. Opinions were divided as to whether the political origins of the criticisms were anti-Peronism or friendly fire, given that Massa’s possible presidential candidacy (repeating 2023) clashes with Buenos Aires Province Governor Axel Kicillof while the Frente Renovador Peronist leader also resists the repeal of the law denying that province’s mayors indefinite re- election.
TANKER CONTROVERSY
The Tierra del Fuego provincial government last Tuesday denounced a tanker flying the Union Jack casting anchor in the port of Ushuaia in violation of provincial norms banning any British vessels in its ports part of Argentina’s Malvinas sovereignty claims. The oil tanker VS Promise was moored in the port of Ushuaia, which has been under national trusteeship since last January. The Tierra del Fuego provincial government issued a communiqué expressing its “energetic repudiation” of the British tanker’s presence, which had been authorised by the trusteeship, and called upon President Javier Milei to explain his criteria. But Presidential Spokesman Adrián Ravier said at a press conference that day that the oil tanker did not represent any loss of sovereignty for Argentina or violate any law, arguing that only vessels coming from the Malvinas basin could be banned.
ESKENAZIS IN SPOTLIGHT
The Milei administration is pushing the United States to open up a criminal investigation of the entry, management and exit of the Eskenazi family in YPF state oil company, thus seeking to put a final lid on all related lawsuits against Argentina in New York. The argument is that the Eskenazi acquisition of 25 percent of YPF shares against future dividends during the Kirchnerite presidencies without putting any money down was fraudulent. Washington is perceived as sympathetic after the US Department of Justice issued a memorandum calling for an investigation of the presumed irregularities committed in the purchase of YPF shares.
ROGUE AGENT ‘EXTRADITED’
Former SIDE intelligence agent Raúl Martins landed at Ezeiza last weekend to face trial on charges of money-laundering and white slavery among other accusations. The trial was ordered in mid-2019 but Martins had spent the last 82 months in Mexico resisting his return. Martins, 77, used his stint in SIDE between 1974 and 1987 to open up at least 10 brothels in Buenos Aires where he filmed the visits of judges, prosecutors and businessmen among the clients, presumably for the purposes of blackmail. The case against him languished until revived by the late prosecutor Federico Delgado in 2016. He will be tried by the same TOF (Tribunal Oral Federal) 7 court in charge of the ‘Cuadernos’ (copybooks) corruption trial of ex-president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner among others. His return to Buenos Aires was not an extradition, strictly speaking, but a swap for Mexican Fernando Farías Laguna, the head of the ‘Los Primos’ fuel contraband ring who was arrested by Interpol in Palermo last April and flown home by a Mexican naval aircraft on August 20.
NO GRAVEYARD CUPPAS
City Hall last Tuesday cancelled the tender for a project to install a gift shop and café in Recoleta Cemetery already blocked by a judicial conflict. The initiative had proposed to combine souvenirs, takeaway drinks and snacks and night tours of the mausoleums for tourists but it ended up stuck in a family dispute over the ownership of a vault alongside a debt topping 37 million pesos. The plot had been acquired by the Girado family back in 1880 but City Hall considered the lease to have expired and moved to convert its use to commercial exploitation, only to be challenged by family descendants with the support of a ruling by the magistrate Roberto Gallardo suspending any commercial exploitation for the next five years.
PENGUINS FOR SALE
Four Magellan penguins were put up for sale last Tuesday by the receivers of the Mar del Plata Aquarium (which went broke 17 months ago) in order to pay off debts as well as maintenance costs and severance. The four penguins were valued at US$10,000 each. A further 55 penguins remaining on the premises of the former Aquarium will be donated or relocated. Late last year 10 dolphins were sold to Egypt for US$800,000 with the sum earmarked for the care of the remaining fish and the payment of salaries. Five sea lions went to the Dominican Republic while the others were transferred to Mundo Marino in San Clemente del Tuyú on the Atlantic coast north of Mar del Plata.
SCALONETA SANCTIONS
Just before last weekend FIFA’s Disciplinary Committee slapped severe sanctions on Argentine Football Association (AFA) for the perceived misconduct of some of its players after both the semi-final and final of last month’s World Cup – in the former case for unfurling a banner reading: “Las Malvinas son Argentinas,” in defiance of the FIFA ban on any political expressions and in the latter for clashes with the Spanish victors. FIFA also held AFA responsible for discriminatory chants, security lapses and fan misconduct, slapping a total fine of US$321,000 on the association headed by Claudio 'Chiqui' Tapia and sentencing the Argentine team to playing its next two local matches in stadiums filled only to half of capacity (one suspended). The harshest individual punishment fell on midfielder Leandro Paredes, suspended for 10 matches and fined US$90,000, the same fine levied on wing back Nahuel Molina who will however receive a lighter suspension of seven matches. Both midfielder Thiago Almada and Spain’s Gavi will miss one match and pay out US$30,000, the same fine imposed on Argentine assistant coach Roberto ‘Ratón’ Ayala, barred for three matches. All these sanctions may be appealed. FIFA was implacable despite Argentine support for the re-election of its president Gianni Infantino.
GOLDEN BOY STRIKES AGAIN
Chess prodigy Faustino Oro (aged just 12) has defeated Norwegian Magnus Carlsen (world champion for the last nine years) in the fifth clash of an eight-match blitz chess series organised by the digital platform Chess.com, also clinching three draws with each player only permitted three minutes per match. Following a world team championship in Hong Kong last June, Carlsen had expressed his admiration of the precocious talent by saying: “Faustino is much better than [Lionel] Messi was at the age of 12. He’s on the right path and should enjoy it. One day, Messi will be lucky to be compared with him.”
BA HOSTS NEW WORLD RECORD
Argentina became the venue for a new world record last weekend when Ethiopian Yomif Kejelcha (age 29) won the Buenos Aires half-marathon in an official time of 56 minutes and 51 seconds, smashing the previous record of 57 minutes and 20 seconds set by Uganda’s Jacob Kiplimo in Lisbon last March. Both the runners-up – Tadese Worku and Bereket Nega (with times 40 seconds under the hour and 20 seconds over, respectively) – were also Ethiopian while the fastest local runner was Ignacio Erario, who finished sixth with a time of one hour and 59 seconds. Some 30,000 people participated in the 21-kilometre downtown race held in freezing winter temperatures.
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