(Buenos Aires) The government of ultra-liberal President Javier Milei announced Thursday a “protocol” to fight against the “absolute disorder” of social demonstrations with blocking of roads, by increasing the radius of action of the police and pledging to make “the organizers pay”.
Security Minister Patricia Bullrich, already in this position under the presidency of liberal Mauricio Macri (2015-2019), announced measures, and a future law, to prevent “cuts, pickets, roadblocks”, which impact the activity and “prevent Argentines from living in peace”.
Argentina, and greater Buenos Aires in particular, are the scene of hundreds of demonstrations with cuts to traffic routes each year, and according to Bullrich “daily” in certain provinces.
From now on, all federal forces will be able to intervene in a demonstration blocking a traffic route, she announced, and not only the reference police, provincial or in the capital.
“The force used will be the minimum necessary, but proportional to the resistance,” she added, and “the bill for this device will be sent to the organizations or individuals responsible. The State will not pay for this use of security force.”
Mme Bullrich also said sanctions will apply to parents who bring children or teenagers to protests. “There will be strong consequences for anyone using children as shields.”
The Milei government announced on Tuesday a first series of austerity measures, including a shock devaluation of more than 50% of the peso, and the reduction from January of transport and energy subsidies. Measures which, coupled with inflation already at 160% over one year, are destined to severely impact the purchasing power of Argentines.
Milei himself agreed that the situation “will get worse in the short term”, before an improvement in the accounts and the economy.
Unions and social organizations have already warned that the working world “will not stand idly by” in the face of the “blasting of purchasing power”. An important radical left social movement, Polo Obrero, denounced “a plan of aggression against the people” by Bullrich.
Vice-President Victoria Villaruel, for her part, called on the unions to be “cautious”, warning them against “a degree of aggressiveness or social conflict”, while the measures of “a four-day government” have have just been announced, and for some not yet materialized.
PHOTO AGUSTIN MARCARIAN, REUTERS ARCHIVES
Argentine Vice President Victoria Villarruel
A first “street test” is expected on December 19 and 20, with mobilizations commemorating the traumatic “Great Crisis” of 2001.
Several media outlets highlighted Thursday, after Bullrich’s announcements, that a similar anti-protest plan had already been launched, without much success, under the Macri government.