The political maturity of a society is seen more than anything at electoral time, when the change of hands of power is discussed.
It is one of conflict, of fiery dialectic, which is only resolved when the voice of the polls speaks, not with inopportune dialogues.
But above all, it is a time that demands moral and fiscal discipline from the rulers, because the temptation to seek survival at any cost is accentuated, and with it the risk of mortgaging the next period.
Here is the crux of the matter: once again we are witnessing one of the outgoing historical notes of the party in power in discount time, that tendency towards fiscal and legal imbalance, to excesses of power in the State, under the premise that they are paid to the Greek Kalends.
As the possibilities of perpetuation fade, the "Baglini theorem" is inverted: an incitement to overflow in the management of public accounts, with a relaxation of controls and commitments, to the detriment of the institutional responsibility that it must always have a government, and more than ever in these instances.
It began to take shape with thousands of permanent staff appointments;
it continued with an irresponsible moratorium (one more) to ensure the check of the pension system;
then a scandalous debt "mega-swap" for certain sector favors, and now continues with "the intervention" of the Edesur company.
At full speed the inventory of inheritance liabilities for the next government is accumulating.
But there is something serious that is not finished dimensioning: it does not only affect the one who comes;
It affects, as always and although it is not seen immediately, the entire Argentine society.
Plan “little money for today, hunger for tomorrow”.
Yesterday the "intervention" of Edesur was announced.
It is enough to read the resolution of the regulatory entity (ENRE) to realize that nothing was arranged, or in any case a hogwash that shows one's own errors and lack of expertise.
Because what was done is simply appoint an overseer, to make a report and submit it to the authorities.
There was already an auditor to review the past, and now a veedor to control the future.
It is a very curious ad and at some point absurd: "from now on I am going to do my job";
He sets out to do what he already had to do, did not do and should have done.
First recognition: they supervised little or nothing.
And at this point, the only thing left to do is wonder about the sense of opportunity and the consequences of the measure.
Everything responds to the trap created by the government itself.
Ruling out an expropriation or a rescue of the public service, because they would imply the recognition of a cost for the State, the extreme state measure that remains would be the termination of the concession contract with cause.
But it has a problem, which is enormous, as well as revealing: inquiring into the cause leads to the unfailing conclusion that the disinvestment of the company is a consequence of the subsidy scheme and the lack of macroeconomic conditions.
Second acknowledgment: who turns off the light is not so much the distribution company as the reckless action of the government.
Since the present is woven from multiple pasts, one looks back and the list of abuses is long: the AFJP, Aysa, Airlines, Ciccone, YPF, trains and on and on.
And here comes the third acknowledgment: they cost and continue to cost billions of dollars.
Trials in the country, in arbitral tribunals and in foreign jurisdictions, which mean enormous potential financial damage, added to another much greater one, which has to do with the reputation, good name and honor of the country.
Although some try to disguise it as sovereignty, it translates into something as concrete as an exorbitant “country risk”, which affects access to financing and investment.
Luckily they learned something in this from making so many mistakes: they have consequences that we all end up paying for.
This seems to explain that in the case of Edesur they have remained in a superfluous measure, which announces one thing that means another and that implies nothingness itself.
The paradox of politics is that it is continuity, but also change.
Periodicity is called, which with the vote ensures that no one stays in power.
There are many who do not want to understand it and who insist on artfully undermining the path to which they are coming.
And this should be a lesson for the opposition: it is time to accentuate the controls on the eve more than ever, because we have already seen what it means to accept an inheritance without the benefit of inventory.
When the floodgates of the ravings so typical of an electoral time open in which power vanishes from some hands, everything is reduced to politics and control.
There are two reservoirs left to contain the power on the run, in addition to Justice.
One is the political opposition in Congress.
The other is the press, which with all the criticism that can be made of it, continues to control the controls.
While we wait for the fiat lux (for the light to come on) both are the shelter for an active and informed public opinion, so central and so needed in Argentine democracy.
Bernardo Saravia Frías is a lawyer. Former National Treasury Attorney