Alberto Fernandez had to wait for midnight Friday, once the Aerolineas Argentinas charter that was bringing him back from Paris landed in Ezeiza, to find out that Máximo Kirchner had attacked again to Martín Guzmán at a PJ meeting in Lanús, while the plane was flying over northern Brazil.
Hours later, very early on Saturday morning, President had breakfast in Olivos with his finance minister.
Despite the reports of an alleged offer to Roberto Lavagna that altered internal mood in the Casa Rosada, Fernandez is determined to hold to Guzman in front of the fierce onslaught of Kirchnerism that in the last two weeks became stark.
Emmanuel Macron and Alberto Fernández, in Paris. Photo REUTERS.
“They went over the whole week, the tariff issue and the internal short circuits”explained a source familiar with the breakfast in Olivos between the President and the minister, which lasted throughout the morning.
This Sunday, Fernández planned to dedicate it almost exclusively to the semi-final between Argentinos Juniors and Tigre for which Chicanas crossed via WhatsApp with Sergio Massa.
For the head of state and Guzmán, the strategy is that of the “marathon”: betting on the long term since the economic program agreed with the Monetary Fund yields results while Cristina Kirchner and her son Máximo, and the K leadership, stone the President and the head of the Treasury Palace.
A similar tactic uses Horacio Rodriguez Larreta for his presidential project, and in the midst of a fierce internship with the toughest sector of the PRO. Like Fernández, part of the environment also asks the head of the Buenos Aires Government for a show of leadership.
“I heard Guzmán say that he has no political support. But he has the support of the IMF, Kristalina (Georgieva), the President, the workers’ unions and Clarín. What more support do you want?” Máximo Kirchner asked himself on Friday, in Lanús, in an ironic key against the Minister of Economy.
Fernández was only informed of the speech when he arrived in the country, at midnight on Friday: he did not have Wi-Fi service on the Aerolineas plane in which he traveled throughout the week through Madrid, Berlin and Paris.
But on Monday, before boarding, had endorsed the media raid that Guzmán would undertakefirst on the radio, then in a business forum and finally on television, to respond to Cristina Kirchner after her speech in Chaco.
Máximo Kirchner, on Friday in Lanús. Photo Rafael Mario Quinteros
The minister, the most questioned behind closed doors, had one of his weeks of greatest media exposure since Kirchnerism declared war on him. Exacerbated, to a great extent, by public hearings for increases in electricity and gas rates in the Metropolitan Area of Buenos Airesone of the most controversial points with the former President and La Cámpora.
It was not by chance, in that sense, that Frederic Basualdothe undersecretary of Electric Power who answers to Cristina Kirchner, will appear hyperactive throughout the week: last Monday at a CAMMESA center in Rosario, Wednesday at the Ezeiza Thermoelectric Power Plant, Thursday in Santa Fe and Friday at the Atucha nuclear complex.
“They cannot continue in the Government”
In Europe, the President had let it be known that the officials who did not agree with the rate increases “They cannot continue in the Government”: “It is a decision that we have already made”Fernandez challenged from the German capital as he re-launched his re-election and publicly confronted his Vice President.
On Monday at noon, for example, there was a zoom called by Economy and led by Rodrigo Ruete and Santiago Lopez Osornio -two officials from Guzmán’s kidney- with references from social organizations, ministers such as Juan Zabaleta and Gabriel Katopodisand related leaders, to supply them with information for the media battle over tariff segmentation with which the Casa Rosada is determined to continue in the coming months.
Last week, in addition, the criticism of the Minister of Economy added a weighty actor in the society of the Front of All: the president of the lower house requested, in writing, that the government urgently implements the increase in the non-taxable minimum income.
For Guzmán it was a move in bad taste: She complained behind closed doors that said increase was already planned, and that Massa’s request was unnecessary.
The President tried to comfort him. Last Sunday, hours before embarking for Europe, he had eaten grilled pizzas in the barbecue area of the head of the Deputies of the Isla del Sol country, in Tigre. Massa said that he could join the tour, but the parliamentary agenda, and the internal ones, in the end prevented him from doing so.
In Paris, the last night before returning to Buenos Aires, Fernández dined with his intimates in the department of the French capital of ambassador Marcela Losardo.
They talked about the internal tension, the tour and what’s to come. For example, the act of May 25, within two Wednesdays, which, in principle, will take place in Antarctica. It will be only for a small entourage. In the southernmost continent on earth, temperatures at these times are freezing.
