When a politician loses power the first symptom is that his phone starts ringing less. Alberto Fernández is a strange case. They stopped calling him while he was president. The judicial investigations that revealed his busy secret life, the accumulation of disappointments, the electoral defeats and the destruction of the ruling coalition with Cristina Kirchner were marginalizing him prematurely towards political solitude, although not so much in other areas.
It seemed like the final blow would befall them in many ways when they left the Olivos residence, but on Sunday, August 4, it got a whole lot worse. bugle He published that he had committed physical and psychological violence against his partner, Fabiola Yánez, on several occasions. Now not only is his phone not ringing, but he’s the one calling.He complains about what was said, that no one defends him and even dares to talk about the betrayal. How can you trust Clarins?Ask. A well-worn resource, from another era, which even Cristina does not believe in. To that question, in recent days Alberto added another: Did you read Verbitsky on Sunday?
The list of friends who came to meet him after the complaint – first the media and then the judicial – which was already small, decreased by more than half in recent days, when photos and videos of him sexually harassing the same chair emerged. This circle became the smallest when the justices raided his house and confiscated his cell phone. Fernandez handed over the iPhone with the password so that it could be read without wasting time. Unlocking the iPhone is always a nightmare. This time it will not be needed, it will open automatically. Has it deleted the most offensive messages? But officials fear it won’t.Not just them: journalists, judges, businessmen and famous men and women from the entertainment world, too, with whom he wrote on WhatsApp and organised meetings.
With many of them, Fernandez had long conversations, sometimes after hours. “Are?”, Surprised in the middle of the morning. This is how half a dozen sources describe it in this newspaper. When you consult people who were his interlocutors between 2019 and 2023, you begin to uncover that until his departure from power was mere speculation: that he interacted with celebrities and anonymous people on Twitter, that he used his Instagram like a teenager and that on many afternoons I left the Casa Rosada for adventures in Puerto Madero.
One of those heroes says that he was once in Olivos at 1 in the morning and was told that Litto Nebbia had attended the Nordelta, hired by a businessman for a private celebration. Fernandez went to his car and returned around six o’clock. This, as you can see, is just the beginning. There are many videos, if not removed, that attribute these types of scenes. And some worse. Fernandez loved to show his friends what he recorded on his phone. Again: within their circle they know many things. There are about ten people who are scared. The most committed, perhaps: his secretary, María Cantero; the mayor of Quinta de Olivos, Daniel Rodríguez; and the head of the Presidential Medical Unit, Federico Saavedra. The latter may have prescribed arnica globules to Fabiola after the president beat her up.
-But… sons of bitches! How can they condemn me before even listening to me? -He reprimanded one of his supporters when he found out that he was one of the people who pushed for public compensation and his resignation from the PJ.
Fernández also became angry when he learned that the representatives of the Unión por la Patria were about to issue a statement of rejection to him and he contacted several of them. However he links it to a movement of Christian faith, from which – logically – he expects nothing but cruelty. For your head Sometimes a feeling of revenge appears, As someone who no longer has much to lose: will he dare to tell her about his painful relationship with Cristina?
-It’s just Alberto… It’s already so hard to trust you. You lied to us so many times -The former President heard it from one of his confidants.
Fernández denies everything. “Fabiola is taking revenge, she only wanted money. They even criticize me for the calabaza and I can explain it to them,” he said a few days ago about Fabiola’s dog. The former first lady would have said that her pet, a Pomeranian breed, would have to be handed over to the care of a friend because Fernández told her that it was “a bitch dog.” The law professor called several friends to tell their truth about the issue, which made him particularly concerned.
“He called me and started talking about pumpkins, what do you want me to tell you?”said a former officer. What did Alberto say? “Dylan wanted to eat Pumpkin, he barked at him and Pumpkin was afraid of him. The little dog was hiding under the bed. Then one day I said to Fabiola: ‘This dog is a quilombo, why don’t you take him?’
The former ministers listen to her and rarely respond to her. “Her personality was always one of denial, but we never knew how much,” says one of them. There are few who try to defend her. One is Victoria Tolosa Paz, who even said in informal conversations in the deputies that she had seen bad reactions from Fabiola. Another is Enrique “Pepe” Albistur, her husband, who today advises Fernández on communications issues. Albistur has the apartment in which Fernández has lived for more than a decade under his name.
Albertista-era officials are having a tough time With your own link. More than one person receives inconvenient questions. Didn’t you know? Haven’t you ever noticed anything? The same thing happens with the insurance scam, a series of million-dollar contracts directed by the State in favor of the broker Héctor Martínez Sosa, Cantero’s husband, a close associate of Fernández. The questions begin to come again and again. A former minister, one of the most powerful people, had to go through a very difficult time last week before a soccer match at the GEBA club and in front of all his teammates. “Are you coming to play with us?”He asked her. The social atmosphere is thick.
To incite this dissatisfaction with traditional politics, Javier Meili uses his favorite communication weapon, the X network. He chastises Fernández, Kirchnerism, the left, feminism, non-K progressivism and “well-intentioned centrism”, as he puts it. As if everything is the same. He stands, alone, on the other side. This is part of the official strategy. Inside the Casa Rosada it was agreed that no one except the head of state could come out to make a statement on the subject. In recent days they claimed to have closed the Ministry of Women, Gender and Diversity.
He got air from scam in the government. They need it. A good part of the strategy during 2024 consisted of just that: buying time until the economy’s radical adjustments ease. The upside to Albertism is enormous.
There are indicators of the economy that are moving forward, as predicted by the ruling party, and others that are suffering setbacks. Miley and his team rely on inflation data to say that things are going well. Price growth in July was recorded at 4%, the lowest since January 2022, and the annual index will be around 120 and 130 percent. This is a much lower figure than the announcement made by independent economists who estimated, when the new administration took office, that prices would rise by 100 percent in the first three months of this year.
However, markets remain uneasy. Reserves fell by $1.5 billion in April and about $6 billion of debt will mature between now and January. The country’s risk is slightly below 1,500 points. And activity continues to slow. Consumption plummeted in July: sales in supermarkets and local businesses recorded the worst drop not only this year, but in the last three years, with a negative variation of 16.1% compared to the same month of 2023. Miley stressed that the economic recovery is a matter of timing. “Everyone sees miracles except the Argentines,” he said during his presentation at the Council of the Americas.
The focus on the economy and the scandal that sank the popularity of Alberto Fernández and also constituted a good portion of Peronism Differences within the government. A new resignation came this week, that of Worship Secretary Francisco Sánchez. There are about fifty important officials who have left the government in eight months of administration. This figure constitutes a record.
Miley once again tightened the cord with Victoria Villaruel. The vice president was sidelined from the Armed Forces cordiality dinner, where the president gave a speech. Villaruel waited until the last minute for an invitation. At the event, soldiers who were friends of her father were promoted. The vice president had a photographer and a driver ready to go immediately when told to. At 5:15 p.m. Friday, tired of waiting, she told her team: “That’s it, let’s postpone everything”.As it is easy to imagine, he was not in the best of moods.