Argentina has a long tradition of resistance in the streets to the most controversial laws and the project that gives ultra Javier Milei tools to dismantle the State has been no exception. “The country is not for sale, the country is defended,” chanted thousands of people gathered this Wednesday in front of the Argentine Congress in protest of the law that the Senate will vote on in a few hours. The climate of tension was high since ten in the morning, when the legislators began to debate, but it worsened as the hours passed. A group of protesters threw stones and Molotov cocktails and the police immediately repressed the protest. The square in front of Congress became the scene of a pitched battle and the Kirchnerist senators unsuccessfully asked to pause the session due to the violence in the streets. So far there are three detainees and at least eleven injured.
The Government had designed a large security operation to prevent opponents from blocking traffic on the avenues surrounding the legislative building. The demonstration passed peacefully until after noon, when the first serious incident occurred. The riot police repressed people who tried to enter the square with pepper spray, including six Kirchnerist deputies, who had to receive medical assistance.
“It is a very violent situation that is being experienced today. We have five colleagues hospitalized. But workers and people who approached Congress to demonstrate peacefully were also repressed, gassed and kicked,” Peronist deputy Cecilia Moreau, from the Unión por la Patria coalition, denounced before the cameras. “Today the Government is declaring war on the Argentine people. Very controversial laws were voted, but it never happened that there was a police operation, I would say paramilitary, like this one,” Moreau stressed.
From the square, a union member addressed her colleagues with a megaphone in hand to ask them not to be intimidated by what she considered “a new provocation from the Government” and the Minister of Security, Patricia Bullrich. “An anti-popular law cannot pass if it is not with repression,” she stressed while she harangued those present to remain in a heated square.
The situation worsened quickly. Around four in the afternoon, several protesters threw stones and Molotov cocktails at the security forces and tore down the fences that prevented access to the street in front of Congress. The riot police first used water cannons and then advanced as a group to dislodge the opponents with tear gas and rubber bullets. The air became unbreathable several blocks from Congress.
As they lost concentration, violent episodes multiplied. Some protesters burned containers, trash cans and even a car. In other nearby streets, however, small peaceful protests were held. The police prevented pedestrians from accessing the area around Congress but did allow vehicles to pass through.
Uncertain outcome
Social and political organizations, both close to the left and to Peronism, had displayed their flags among the crowd early on while some followed the debate inside the Senate, phone in hand. The result of the vote is uncertain and everything indicates that the Upper House is divided into two equal halves, with 36 senators in favor and another 36 against. In that case, the last word would be the vice president, Victoria Villarruel, who would break the tie in favor of the Government.
The protesters mobilized in the streets oscillated between resignation and hope. “Senators, today you become heroes. No to the Bases law,” said the banner of one of the optimists, paraphrasing Javier Mascherano’s famous phrase to the Argentine national team goalkeeper, Sergio Romero, in the 2014 World Cup.
The people who protest in front of Congress oppose the entire law, but especially the delegation of legislative powers to a president who seeks to dynamite the battered Argentine welfare state (“I am the mole who destroys the State from within, he defined himself days back) and the privatization, closure or definancing of companies and public organizations. Trade unionists warn that the labor reform included in the draft will make layoffs cheaper in a context of economic recession where thousands of people have already lost their jobs.
This Wednesday’s vote is crucial, which explains the tension that exists in the streets of Buenos Aires. The ruling party La Libertad Avanza has only 10% of the seats in the Senate and has had to make numerous concessions to obtain the support of the dialogue opposition. The project will return to the Chamber of Deputies for final approval, but there it is taken for granted that it will have enough positive votes to become law.
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