03/13/2021 11:55 PM
Clarín.com
Politics
Updated 03/13/2021 11:55 PM
With all the actors in political, social and economic life, I always tried to convey a different vision of our country.
With
Hugo Moyano
too.
His strong anti-Kirchnerism during the second term of Cristina Fernández caused us to have a closer dialogue and share the stage at the inauguration ceremony of the monument to Juan Domingo Perón, in front of the Customs building, in Buenos Aires, in October 2015 That afternoon I
vindicated once again the Perón of productivity
and the one who promoted equal opportunities as access to social justice.
In our conversations, I insisted to Moyano that our project involves achieving a productive Argentina, that can go out into the world, capable of growth and that, in order to achieve those objectives, there is no other way than to
reduce the costs
of what we do.
Neither the Argentines nor the world have to overpay for our production.
We cannot export our fiscal inefficiency, our distorting taxes, and the cost overruns generated by labor agreements from another century.
"Hugo, the truck cannot be worth between 40% more and twice what it is worth in other Latin American countries."
And he answered me that he agreed, that yes, that I am going to see, that there is no problem.
When I got to the government, we began to suggest that we needed him and his union to make their contribution so that Argentine products could compete.
But everything became much more difficult.
That initial understanding would turn into
open confrontation
over the months.
At first, Moyano seemed to agree with my vision.
It was evident that the amount of arbitrary benefits and privileges that he and the Truckers union had obtained was counterproductive to the productivity of the country.
And, like a dog that wants to bite its own tail, lower production always means less work and fewer trucks.
Seen in perspective, I think Moyano knew that he had before him the same challenge that we had in the government and that many leaders of our country still have today:
either they are part of the problem or they are part of the solution.
A part of his union supported the need to make changes.
But on the other side was his own son,
Pablo
, with a more extreme look, which led directly to the rejection of any alternative.
The situation was more than clear.
It reached the point of extortion when the union itself had become the issuer of a voucher of free debt in order to deliver the load to the truckers.
The work regime of the drivers, the question of the percentages of employer contributions was a kind of tourniquet that prevented access to more reasonable costs.
Like a funnel, everything ended up in small or medium-sized companies that have one or two trucks and that end up paying the union what the union determines at its discretion.
And as if that were not enough, the unclear handling of black payments were added to obtain the free debt certificates.
We had two years of conversations with small advances and small setbacks.
Representing the interest of the State, that is, that of all Argentines, the Ministry of Transportation, Production and Labor were sometimes together, sometimes successively.
But the conflicts began to escalate.
At a certain point, the Ministry of Labor began to apply very important fines to the union led by Moyano because of conciliations that were not followed.
Once there,
the relationship with Moyano entered a new stage, with no return.
In 2018, a woman who owns a transportation company,
Nancy Pastorino
, with great courage denounced the Truckers' union for extortion and made it possible for others to be encouraged to report as well.
The legal cases began to add up, but strikingly we all noticed that the judges stopped them.
I am confident that, beyond the power and influence that Moyano may exercise, the judge and the judges who are in charge of these cases will ensure that the law is respected.
Moyano had decided to be part of the problem
: the change we wanted to make ended up slowing down.
And the preventing machine scored a small triumph over the vast majority of Argentines, by flatly rejecting the idea that there will be no work or good wages for truck drivers in a country that cannot sell their products to the domestic market or to the domestic market. Exterior.
In those months, other scandals related to his role as a soccer leader in the
Independent Athletic Club appeared
, based on complaints of barrabravas.
The question of football undoubtedly generated a lot of interest for the people who follow the club, but as president my main concern was already to prevent it from continuing to punish producers and consumers.
According to a study carried out by the Coca - Cola bottler in Argentina, the cost of the truck in the price of that drink in our country is double the rest in Latin America.
That
extortionate attitude
of Moyano would reappear some time later before
MercadoLibre
, when he compulsively tried to affiliate all the personnel of his logistics plants through gangs, illegally blocking the activity of these centers and harming even his own truckers affiliates, who lost days of work.
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