“We ate a lot,” said Pablo Mieres
The minister affirmed that the past authorities did not report the crises and that the current ones had to assume a “very abrupt” exit.
The state of the situation of the Caja Bancaria and the Caja de Profesionales is an issue that has been repeatedly on the public opinion agenda. It is known that both are in a fragile moment and that decisions must be made to rescue them.
For this, the Executive Branch is preparing two bills (one for each savings bank), initiatives that will generate different types of objections from July, especially from the Banking Fund, because the Uruguayan Bankers Association has already declared itself in conflict over this issue.
But why two different projects? Why this urgent situation? How long has it been known that there is a problem? Why was it not acted on earlier? These and other questions were raised to the Minister of Labor and Social Security, Pablo Mieres, in the program In perspective.
The Secretary of State explained that two different projects will be carried out because, although they are two “extreme” contexts, they are two different cases. For example, said Mieres, that of the Caja de Profesionales was discovered before, while that of the Caja Bancaria is more recent, but more urgent.
“They are in such a situation that the general norm, which seeks a convergence of parameters in 20 years, does not allow for an account of the situation of these two savings banks because in that 20-year transition period specific changes must be made and it seemed to us that the general discussion of the change was one and then there were two specific issues that were being discussed in parallel,” he indicated, adding that in truth, while the law was being discussed in general, work was already being done and dialogue was being sought, seeking agreements in particular situations.
Asked about the state of seriousness of the boxes, Mieres replied that “very important” because they have a short-term perspective of “not being able to meet the obligations”, in other words: not being able to pay retirement.
Regarding when it can happen, in that hypothetical case, the minister said that “it depends”. In the case of the Caja Bancaria, he assured, “it is very close, before the end of the year.” In the case of University Professionals, it has a slightly longer period of time, but “not much more”.
“In reality, when we took office, we did not have in the record nor in what we received from the previous government that we were in such an extreme situation. We began to realize this when, during the pandemic, at a certain moment there was a proposal from the Bar Association (when the judicial proceedings were suspended) requesting that the contributions of the lawyers be suspended for a couple of months and the response of the board of directors at that time was that if that happened they would have a balance and payment problem,” said Mieres.
“There we said: ‘Well, stop, then we have a very serious problem.’ From there it was found that we were indeed in an extreme situation,” he said, acknowledging that three years had passed since the situation in the Caja de Profesionales, but added that in the meantime there was a change in management which allowed a “better dialog” because the old directory “was not conducive to a search dialog for an exit”.
“The new board of directors has had a very courageous position, to face a very complicated reality and to advance in the dialogue with the Executive and they presented us with a preliminary project that we began to work on. We are already in the final stage, surely in the next few weeks we will be able to send to Parliament a specific bill to solve the problem of the Professional Fund, ”he reported.
With respect to Caja Bancaria, the situation was different, and the recognition of its poor financial state came at the end of last year. In fact, Mieres said that he met with the president of the box at the beginning of last year because they had detected a “very delicate patrimonial situation”, but at that time the hierarchs responded that “that was not the case.”
“Only after they hired an outside consultancy that said, ‘Look guys, this is imminent.’ So at the end of the year we had a new meeting with the consultancy done and there was an acknowledgment that there was a very serious and urgent situation. These crises do not come from a year or two, these crises come from before ”, he assured.
Finally, when asked about what the authorities of the Executive Power did in the past period, he replied that it was a “very good question” that would have to be asked.
“The truth is that we inherited two serious situations, where the previous government did not give us any news and, the truth is, as is commonly said, we ate a lot. We have to assume a very abrupt exit situation when these processes surely came from a previous time ”, he concluded. (Radiomundo-In Perspective)
