The attitude of the legislators PRO from backing out of the enclosure on March 1 while Alberto Fernández delivered his speech before the Legislative Assembly deepened this week the differences between the partners of the opposition coalition Together for Change (JXC), divergent positions that will also be exposed during the imminent debate in Congress of the agreement with the IMF.
The first sparks in this new stage of JxC emerged as soon as the lights went out in Congress, after the President’s speech before the Legislative Assembly on March 1, when PRO legislators they left the premises at the time that Fernández spoke about the need for there to be progress in the judicial investigation into the origin of the debt with the IMFtaken during the government of Mauricio Macri.
At the origin of this strong parliamentary gesture of the PRO, we must seek precisely the hand of the former president, who days before the Legislative Assembly had met with economists, and had been convinced that the agreement with the IMF is insufficient to repair the economy. local and it will be impossible to pay it without sound policies.
In that meeting the idea arose of withdrawing from the premises if Fernández targeted his predecessor in office and his management, responsible for taking the $45 billion debt.
The withdrawal of the PRO from the venue aroused crosses with its coalition partners, the Radical Civic Union and the Civic Coalition: the main one targeted the radical deputy Facundo Manes, whose photo -sitting alone between the benches with ukrainian flags left empty by legislators responding to Macri- went viral.
“They ask me why I stayed. We already tried not to listen to each other and that’s how we are. I don’t agree with many things in the speech, but if I don’t listen to it, I can’t comment,” Manes posted and began to receive questions from the PRO.
The senator of that space Ignacio Torres said that the neurosurgeon “talks a lot about the brain but uses it little” and the governor of Jujuy, the radical Gerardo Morales, crossed it to defend the doctor: “The construction of a better Argentina is part of the tolerance and dialogue“, said the head of the UCR.
At a summit of radicalism, whose referents met on Friday and Saturday in Mendoza for the Grape Harvest Festival, it was once again questioned that “it wasn’t smart“that the PRO legislators withdrew from the Congressional compound while the President delivered his speech.
The debate that will begin on Monday in the Chamber of Deputies on the agreement reached by the national government with the International Monetary Fund it also generates doubts and differences within the opposition coalition.
The text of 137 pages -which is divided into four documents: the bill with four articles, the message from the Executive Power and two attached annexes- entered the Deputies on Friday afternoon, and was immediately distributed in printed and digital format to all legislators.
With the “fine print” of deal in handthe JxC national table will meet this Sunday afternoon virtually -through the Zoom platform- to exchange ideas about the project and try to agree on a common position.
At the moment, the chances are slim that the opposition coalition will unify a discourse, entangled in their own internal disputes.
Argentina is no longer going from one half against the other, trying to annul the other. We already tried the crack and almost half of Argentines live in poverty. Let’s start, at least, by listening to the other if we really intend to build the course to get ahead. pic.twitter.com/MTj7rXFSi9
– Facundo Manes (@ManesF) March 2, 2022
On the one hand, there fissures in radicalism with the leadership fight between Governor Morales -more likely to help the national government- and Senator Martín Lousteau, always looking for a change of direction that will make him stand out from his peers.
At PROwhile Macri he hardened his line -which several abide by-, the sector of the ‘pigeons’ of Horacio Rodríguez Larreta and the civic coalition insist on Not abandon to the Government on this point.
On the other hand, the main referents of the opposition space this week maintained a deaf competition for “ukrainize” foreign policy, regarding the Russian invasion of Ukrainian territory.
On the one hand, Macri met this week with the new US ambassador, Marc Stanleyto discuss the world situation regarding Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
That same day, Rodríguez Larreta received at the headquarters of the Buenos Aires Government the Chargé d’Affaires of the Embassy of Ukraine in Argentina, Sergiy Nebrat, and members of the Ukrainian community, with whom promised to collaborate in the midst of the Russian onslaught on the country.
The mayor of Buenos Aires offered shelter to refugees and illuminated different monuments with the blue and yellow colors of the Ukrainian flag, as did the great metropolises of the world.
Less symbolic, the president of the PRO, Patricia Bullrich, joined a worldwide campaign to “put the body to the paz”, and proposed via Twitter that leaders from around the world travel to Ukraine to force a truce.
The Civic Coalition, led by Elisa Carrió, was not far behind: it convened for Sunday a march through downtown Buenos Aires in support of Ukraine and “against war crimes”. It will be at 5:30 p.m. from the Plaza de Mayo to the Obelisk, and national and provincial deputies and leaders of the party led by Carrió will participate.
