Senator José Mayans from Formosa talks about everything prior to the Bases session in the Senate. Head of the Unión por la Patria interblock in the upper house, criticizes the extractivist model and the Large Investment Incentive Regime (RIGI), with which foreign companies will obtain multiple tax benefits for thirty years without leaving a single dollar in the coffers. national. He questions the governors, who, pressured by the economic suffocation in the coffers due to pressure from the central government, support the measures and the allied blocs that seek changes that the Casa Rosada does not want to respect. Instead, he is confident that retirement mobility will finally see the light of day and that they will reach close to two-thirds in the Upper House to block the veto promised by the head of state.
-Unión por la Patria opposed the Bases Law, but the Government is willing to insist on its approval. What are the main criticisms of the project?
-First, the powers delegated to the Executive that are expressly prohibited by article 29 of the Constitution and by article 99 paragraph 3, which says that the Executive Branch cannot make legislative decisions. It is the same issue that we had with the mega DNU. The law gives him powers over the central administration entities, the decentralized ones and the social security organizations to do whatever he wants, when all of them are created by law. Here there is an invasion of the Executive on the Legislative Branch, it is unconstitutional. The same happens with state companies, with a list where some are not subject to privatization. Same as the 29 trust funds, most created by laws. We are against the law because Milei says that ‘it is a mole infiltrated into the State to destroy it’, and we have a vision that the State has a mission of social order and social progress for all people, with public policies that go in that direction and because we believe in education and public health, security and justice. It is a position diametrically opposed to making the State disappear. Milei wants everything, including culture, to be and be in private hands without any type of regulation.
-What other measures do you reject from such a comprehensive project?
-The labor part that creates new figures, as collaborators, no longer a worker and subject to direct exploitation, which is unconstitutional and goes against 14 Bis of the Constitution, which Milei wants to eliminate because he considers it socialist. The State has the mission of protecting work and the President wants to limit it to an agreement between parties, of the strongest against the weakest. Milei is always in favor of capital, when it should be equitable.
-The RIGI was also harshly questioned.
— The RIGI favors large foreign capital and unprotects the national industry in a very unequal way: large investors can even bring their used machinery from abroad and other elements and have practically no tax obligations on import and export duties, plus others. tax benefits and for a period of 30 years. And the worst of all is that it exploits our natural resources with a national law and in which the provinces that, by the Constitution, are the owners of those resources, have nothing to do with it, and can only go to litigate before an international court like the ICSID. . It is total surrender. All that remains is for the United States ambassador to ask the senators to vote on the RIGI.
-There are many governors more concerned about introducing some benefit for their territory than about what happens at the national level with this law. Because?
-Many, because they have a debt problem and try to solve the short term because they need it, but they do not see the strategic issue of the country. Others, like the case of Misiones, were not enough to cover the salary increases; the National Government told them: “Well, I’ll give you a portion.” But then they have to solve the problem alone with the same argument as Milei: ‘just as we fire people, if they have extra police, doctors, teachers, let them fire them.’ That is bread for today and hunger for tomorrow: they are going to give you enough for one or two months and nothing more. Because what is sedated in the country is the economy, without a decent wage people cannot buy and consumption drops. Others like (Alfredo) Cornejo (Mendoza), who are anti-Peronists, tell him ‘look, if we fall, the Peronists will come back’ and that is why they vote with the Government.
-Does something similar happen with Profits?
–Half of the governors do not agree with Ganancias because the equation does not close: if they add Ganancias to the co-participation, but subtract the reduction from personal assets, in the long run the provinces lose. While 800,000 workers who earn $1,600 are going to pay again and reduce the personal assets of those who have more money, the caste wins.
-Likewise, the ruling party obtained the basic legal rulings and the fiscal package.
-The ruling party obtained a majority opinion because the regulations of the Chamber were violated in the proportional distribution of the commissions that each block corresponds to due to its number of members. At the last meeting of the commission they left without having an office and both commissions (General Legislation and Budget) went to an intermediate room, from which they never returned. Then the Chief of Staff appeared, spoke with some dissident senators and they gave him an office, where the majority of the signatures are with dissidents.
-From the presidency of the Senate they propose a debate by chapter and not article by article…
-Because they don’t want people to know what it is about, the ruling party has no arguments to defend them and then Milei goes out to sell fruit. We are going to request the treatment, item by item without time. Don’t come here because we are in a hurry to go to sleep, if at midnight we are tired we go to an intermediate room until the next day at eight in the morning. We do not want the same thing to happen as in Deputies, who at four in the morning were arguing with the chamber almost empty, no one knows what is being voted and at nine in the morning they vote on everything as it comes.
-The dialogue opposition proposes changes but the Government is working to get Deputies to ratify the half-sanction. What do you attribute to the fact that the allies insist on changes that would not prosper?
-The changes they propose are only cosmetic, not fundamental. But, on the other hand, (Miguel) Pichetto appears saying that the change proposed by the opposition is reasonable. What opposition? It is the Government project that they make the dialogueists sign. The change is what we propose: discuss law by law.
-Will UxP remain united because of the vote against?
— For now yes. There are operations of all kinds on the senators, especially through the social networks managed by (Santiago) Caputo. Also about the governors, who are racking their brains and urgently hoping that this will bring in money, I don’t know from where, that it will stabilize the markets, and because Milei is going to have the pen. Milei works for the true caste: the markets and the most concentrated sectors of the economy.
-And with retirement mobility?
-The pension system is 45 percent of the Budget and social assistance is 5, while caste, which according to Milei is us, represents 0.34 percent. The thing about caste is a whole verse and the mask falls off. He says that he is not going to accept and veto the increase for retirees, which seeks to overcome the poverty line and get closer to the basic basket that is a thousand dollars, which is what a retiree wants to be able to eat and have medicine for a minimum decent life. Milei does not want formulas, to handle it according to how he feels and modify it as he wants. He talks about a surplus but screwing up the provinces and their people, taking away the money for the pension funds, the education fund, the health system, public works and subsidies. All this is 65 per cent of the budget, so caste is not the problem. The problem is the debt that (Federico) Sturzenegger and (Luis) Caputo generated during the government of (Mauricio) Macri and that reaches 100 percent of GDP. The Central Bank had debt in pesos that it managed with rates and now Caputo spends 35 billion dollars and is no longer pesified. They say we swept the pesos, what bosses they are, if you converted it to dollars.
-Can the half-sanction on retirement mobility prosper in the Senate?
-It’s going to move forward. We are close to two-thirds, which brings us closer to resisting the presidential veto. It remains to be seen if Milei insists on starving and leaving 9 million people without medicine.
