The police of the province of Buenos Aires revolt to demand a salary increase

Police officers demonstrate outside the presidential residence in Olivos.Agustín Marcarián / Reuters

The Buenos Aires Police has risen up.

In the midst of the economic and health crisis, with the province subjected to a severe quarantine, the agents have been demanding a salary increase of close to 60% and the right to organize for three days.

On Wednesday they decided to raise the tension and surround the presidential residence of Olivos, which provoked the rejection of both the government and the opposition.

The police of the province of Buenos Aires is a large force, with about 130,000 members (90,000 of them in office), and poorly paid: basic salaries do not reach 40,000 pesos, equivalent to 400 dollars at the official exchange rate and 307 at the real exchange rate. .

To the governor of Buenos Aires, Axel Kicillof, the problems spread to him.

In addition to managing an overcrowded province with high rates of poverty, the main focus of the pandemic in Argentina, not knowing what to do about land occupations by desperate families (and more or less mafia groups) and finding themselves in full renegotiation of the debt, now has to face an uprising difficult to control because there are no leaders or representative structures.

Both he and his Security Minister, Sergio Berni, are criticized by the national government for not knowing how to foresee that the police were about to boil.

Kicillof and Berni, two faithful of Vice President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, are going through the worst moment since they took office last December.

The province's Peronist mayors also complain about Berni, fed up with his desire for leadership and his authoritarian style.

Confronted with the national government's Security Minister, Sabina Frederic, and not especially close to President Alberto Fernández, Sergio Berni could be the ideal victim if it were decided that someone had to pay for the ruin of the police.

I appreciate all the expressions of concern and affection that I have received.

We must face and solve problems peacefully and sensibly.

To those who want to come to join me, I hug them and ask them not to forget that we are in a pandemic.

Let's not increase risk.

- Alberto Fernández (@alferdez) September 9, 2020

The Buenos Aires Police has a troubled history.

Cases of corruption and wanton violence abound.

Right now he is under investigation for the death of a young man, Facundo Astudillo, and has starred in several shootings caused by simple disobedience of young people to respect the quarantine.

As of 2016, the city of Buenos Aires opted to have its own police force (much better paid) and to dispense with the Buenos Aires one.

The stoppage of activities due to the quarantine has substantially reduced the income of the agents, who are used to receiving extraordinary remuneration for maintaining security in massive events, such as football matches, or for private services during drafts, as protection occasional jewelers or other businesses.

The land seizures, the control of compliance with quarantine and the increase in crime, due to the crisis and the partial emptying of prisons due to the pandemic, have kept agents in permanent tension for months.

Provincial Minister Sergio Berni met at dawn with several police representatives at his headquarters on Puente 12, in La Matanza, and reminded them that the Kicillof government had committed to making a “significant improvement” in wages, estimated at one 30%.

But there was no agreement.

The agents are demanding a 60% increase in liquid wages, the right to unionize, better paid overtime hours and more than 2,000 pesos a month for the maintenance of the uniform and equipment, among other demands.

Following the failure of the meeting with Berni, a police noncommissioned officer whose son was killed in 2018, climbed onto the watchtower of the Puente 12 barracks and threatened to commit suicide.

Another policeman managed to climb up with harnesses and convince him to desist.

Shortly afterwards, hundreds of agents surrounded the presidential residence of Olivos with their vehicles, whose protection had to be reinforced with forces from the Prefecture and the Federal Police.

President Alberto Fernández offered to host a delegation, but the proposal was rejected.

Fernández expressed his full support for Kicillof and said that the problem was not going to be solved with the policemen "hiding in patrol cars and honking horns."

The main leaders of the opposition also criticized the agents for surrounding Olivos, although they said they understood the reasons for the protest.

The main Argentine union, the General Confederation of Labor, a filoperonista, described the police protests as "insubordination."