The departure of Martín Guzmán accentuates the weakness of the president, mired in a fight with Vice President Cristina Kirchner
The conflict occurs at a time marked by the lack of dollars and the specter of a devaluation
Argentina trembles again. The Minister of Economy, Martín Guzmán, decided to leave the Peronist government and leaves it to the president Alberto Fernandez, his main support, much more weakened. Fernández, who during the first months of the pandemic reached 80% popularity and is currently a shadow of that fleeting success, was seeking this weekend to rebuild his economic team. Guzmán’s resignation was breathed in the political environment. The man who forged the agreements with private creditors and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) had several frictions with Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner. The vice president had blamed him for carrying out an adjustment program at odds with Peronist ideology that, she has maintained, not only took four million votes from Peronism in the 2021 legislative elections, to the point of having lost the parliamentary majority, but also predicts a defeat in the 2023 presidential elections. Guzmán announced his departure from the Government this Saturday afternoon at a special moment: while Fernández de Kirchner was speaking to his followers in the framework of a massive act in tribute to Juan Domingo Perondeceased 48 years ago.
Guzmán’s resignation does not surprise analysts. Various media reported that the minister told Fernández that under the current conditions he could not continue leading the economy, among other reasons because, in addition to being systematically questioned by sectors of Peronism, some Secretaries of State did not respond to him politically.
The president has lost two key ministers in a month: first, Matías Kulfas, in charge of the Production portfolio, systematically pointed out by the vice president. And now, Guzman. immersed in one increasingly intense rhetorical dispute with Fernandez de Kirchner, Fernandez It appears in the eyes of Argentines as more isolated and powerless in the face of the most immediate challenges: contain the price of the dollar, which continues to corrode the national currency and drives inflationary escalation. The cost of living is estimated to increase by 70% by the end of the year.
With the deep conviction and confidence in my vision of the path that Argentina should follow, I will continue working and acting for a fairer, freer and more sovereign Homeland. pic.twitter.com/rJQ5w0argQ
– Martin Guzman (@Martin_M_Guzman) July 2, 2022
The message of the former minister
In his resignation letter, Guzmán did not ignore the tensions that are running through the ruling party and the political consequences that this provokes. For this reason, he asked the president to “work in a political agreement within the ruling coalition so that whoever replaces me, who will have this high responsibility ahead of him, has centralized management of the macroeconomic policy instruments necessary to consolidate the progress described and face the challenges ahead”.
The former minister vindicated his understanding with the IMF, the mother of discord between the Fernandezes. “If the risk that things do not go well materializes, a major problem of distribution and productive efficiency appears. When those who govern do so for the well-being of their people, they must do everything possible so that they do not end up paying for that risk.” the people themselves in the form of draconian adjustments that generate exclusionunemployment, disinvestment in health, education, infrastructure, science, and thus a country with a worse future, at the expense of maintaining unsustainable financial returns for those who partly took a bet,” he recalled about the negotiation that began in 2020.
Argentina has a 40% poor. 50% of children are in this situation. Although the economy is growing (an annual rise of close to four points is expected), and unemployment is also falling, the country faces an unprecedented situation: people who work but cannot make ends meet because wages, which are already low , they are devoured by inflation. It is not the only storm front that limits the president. Despite being a hydrocarbon exporting country, the Argentine economy needs energy, especially in winter. You import it and spend dollars you don’t have.
Beautiful act in Ensenada together with thousands of colleagues, honoring Perón. The best tribute we can pay him is to see what he did and try, every day, to bring the pin a little closer. pic.twitter.com/w8K37CWXAf
– Cristina Kirchner (@CFKArgentina) July 2, 2022
The word of Fernandez de Kirchner
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An increasingly active and eloquent Fernández de Kirchner spoke to her audience when the news of Guzmán’s resignation exploded on social networks. “When you see how the income has been distributed, when we finished the Government was 51% of the workers, and 49% of the capital, today we are 42% of the workers and 58%. The union leaders are always the same and the businessmen too What has changed? State policies have changed. It is time, in the name of what we believe, to call on the rest of society to do something different, to do the same thing, that no one disputes, that everything be annulled, no goes further,” he said.
She called for promoting a universal basic salary for all citizens and seeking an agreement with the business community to solve a structural problem in the economy: dependence on the dollar. “I’m going to meet whoever I have to meet, as long as it is to explain our foundations, and try to persuade the other as well. I never deny or renounce convincing”.