The new one pension moratorium and the Rental Law These are two issues that will test the relationship between the Minister of Economy, Sergio Massa, and Kirchnerism. He IMF targeted those two policies and the pressure it exerts for the Government to make changes threatens to overheat the internal From the Front of All.
He full IMF report -which is longer than the version initially released to the press- explicitly stated, in the middle of the fourth revision of the program that was negotiated with Massa, that the Government will have to issue “a decree and Specific rules to contain fiscal costs” of the new moratorium “including measures to focus entry into the regime to those who need it most.”
The key point of that instruction is the term that gives the Government to do this: “Prior to the meeting of the board of directors”. This is before July, when the fifth review of the program will take place to define a new disbursement of dollars for Argentina. It is discounted that Massa accepted this condition.
Now the application of the law that Vice President Cristina Kirchner pushed from the Senate and that the block of deputies of the Front of All managed to approve after several months of efforts to break the blockade of the quorum that Juntos por el Cambio had used was conditioned by the IMFwhich pointed out that it is a policy that “undermines the objectives of accumulation of reserves and fiscal consolidation”.
In Kirchnerism they are silent on the subject for now. Unlike his predecessor Martín Guzmán, Massa did not have to deal for the moment with criticism from the vice president, deputy Máximo Kirchner or the leaders who usually act as spokespersons for space, but the tension exists.
Pension moratorium: IMF conditions and the challenge for a delicate relationship
When Massa’s visit to the United States had just finished, which led to the approval of the fourth revision of the IMF program, The Campora published a text on the occasion of the Day of the Veteran and the Fallen in the Malvinas War, in which he maintained that the presence of the International Monetary Fund in a country is a form of “colonialism”.
The IMF’s observations on the pension moratorium test the link between Massa and Kirchnerism
“The IMF seeks to discipline dozens of countries, especially in Latin America, with actions that aim to guarantee the hegemony of the United States,” said the letter from the group led by Máximo Kirchner regarding the organization that has just agreed with the Minister of Economy that there will be measures to contain the fiscal cost of a law promoted by Kirchnerism.
The clash between Massa’s management and the discourse of the sector that is the largest repository of the ruling party’s votes is undeniable. The pension moratorium puts to the test the will of Kirchnerism to surgically select their criticisms to avoid a public crossroads with the minister that aggravates the political situation of the Frente de Todos.
The fact that the conditions to access the pension debt payment plan claimed by the IMF do not have to go through Congress makes the trance somewhat easier. Indeed, some of them They appear in the regulatory decree 173 published by the Executive Branch on March 31.
Among them is the prohibition that people who take advantage of the moratorium can buy official dollars for 12 months and control over the applicant’s annual gross income, declared assets and expenses with credit and debit cards.
However, the parameters for those controlssuch as the level of income allowed to enter the moratorium, will have to be defined by the Anses, the body headed by the leader of La Cámpora, fernanda raverta, close to Máximo Kirchner. It will be she who must ensure that the conditions for accessing the moratorium allow a savings of around 0.2% of GDPas the IMF text expects.
The Rental Law: suspension and litmus test for the Massa/Kirchnerism link?
The Rental Law (27,551), which had a medium sanction in 2019, during the last stage of Mauricio Macri’s government and was finally approved in the Senate in 2020 with the push of Kirchnerism, has also been subject to questioning by the IMF. . . . The Government plans to suspend her, as iProfessional advanced.
The Rental Law is also being questioned by the IMF and now the Government could suspend it
The idea of modifying, suspending or repealing it is not new. Massa had already suggested it during his tenure as president of the Chamber of Deputies and even opened the debate for his reform. But the new attempt to unsubscribe that the minister spoke with President Alberto Fernández and it came out last Monday is just given after his meeting with the IMF.
Unlike the pension moratorium, Any change made to the Rental Law should go through Congress. This is recognized in the Government. In this case, the tension between Massa’s management under the scrutiny of the IMF and the policies defended by Kirchnerism would be more difficult to contain. and they would have an important sounding board in the Chamber of Deputies.
A preview of this was the reaction of the group Grouped Tenants headed by Gervasio Muñoz and who maintains a good link with Kirchnerism. “They returned from the United States and the IMF gave them instructions”pointed out the entity on its official Twitter account.
In a later statement, Muñoz went a step further and described the minister as “an employee of the real estate corporations”, after which he added: “He says that the Rental Law does not work when in reality what does not work is the Massa’s economic plan and the IMFwhich asked not to regulate the rental price”.
It will be difficult for the minister to avoid this controversy if the debate is reopened in the Chamber of Deputies and again, his relationship with Kirchnerism will be put to the test. In addition, in the Frente de Todos there was never a common position on the Rental Law.
It even took time for the pro-government bloc to agree on a reform project that, in reality, does not touch any of the points objected to by the real estate market, which are the same ones that led Massa before and now to think about making changes. The balance that the minister must make between the IMF and the majority partner of the ruling party thus seems to be approaching a limit.
