This Monday, the national government made official the intervention of Enacom, the entity in charge of controlling communications, and defined
Juan Martín Ozores
(a consultant and former Movistar employee) as its intervener.
This is a man who answers to Santiago Caputo, today one of the most influential people in the Government.
Enacom is an autonomous and decentralized entity that functions within the Head of the Cabinet of Ministers of the Nation.
Its objective is
to lead the process of technological convergence and create stable market conditions to guarantee access for all Argentines to internet services, fixed
and mobile telephony, radio, postcards and television.
The measure, published in the Official Gazette through decree 89/24, states in the recitals that, "in accordance with the guidelines" of DNU 70/23, dictated by the current administration "to strengthen the deregulation process initiated in the sector", it is argued "that as of December 2020, important decisions" adopted by Enacom
"have been verified that would imply open breaches of the current legal provisions", and that these measures "have motivated numerous judicial conflicts,
as well as the decree of measures contrary to the administrative acts issued, which must be adequately studied and, where appropriate, reviewed".
And it orders "
to carry out an orderly and complete investigation of its actions, it is necessary to arrange for the intervention" of the organization, concludes the decree
published this Monday, which bears the signatures of President Javier Milei and the Chief of Staff, Nicolás Posse.
Funds for people of Grabois and Massa
This means that evaluations will be carried out on
funds such as FOMECA and the Universal Service Fund, where funds were transferred to organizations linked to Peronism.
Enacom is responsible for implementing subsidy contests that, among other projects, support technological updating processes, management improvements and production of audiovisual content for radio stations, channels and community media production companies.
This distribution of funds called FOMECA
(Contestable Development Fund for Audiovisual Communication Media) allows the redistribution of resources that come from audiovisual communication media (taxes and fines) to "promote community, border and indigenous peoples' media."
And for that reason,
he allocated about 2 billion pesos a year to community radio stations linked to Juan Grabois and to Mapuche sectors
,
according to opposition complaints.
While
the FSU (Universal Service Fund) allowed cooperatives and SMEs linked to Sergio Massa to reach around 62 billion pesos granted during 2023
.
Governments such as Salta and La Pampa, linked to Peronism, also benefited, warn sources in the sector.
Cool backgrounds for friends
An example is from
an association called the Salteño Residents Rehabilitation and Training Center (close to Milciades Peña
who militates with Juan Grabois) 49 million for the FSU and for FOMECA, about 34 million.
Another was the
El Hormiguero Association, which was granted 48 million by the Universal Service Fund and another 18 million by FOMECA
.
That is, community media receiving money to obtain fiber optic or cable service.
All of this will be audited to see if a political criterion prevailed here.
Repercussions and background
Regarding the intervention defined this Monday by the Milei administration
,
the former Kirchnerist vice president of the organization
Gustavo López questioned
the decision, considering that "it was not necessary" and because "it avoids the participation of Parliament in the board of directors."
While the
Argentine Union of Internet Providers
publicly supported the Government's policies and requested that there be a “deep verification of the allocation and destination criteria of the Non-refundable Contributions granted in the period 2019-2023.”
From the PRO, they pointed out that this force does not participate in the intervention, in which they did take part but from 2016 to 2019, when
during the administration of the current national deputy Silvana Giudici, they had reduced Enacom's employee base by 2 thousand people.
.
This cut was reversed during the Massista administration in the organization, with Claudio Ambrosini at the helm.
Ozores will be accompanied as deputy auditors by the lawyer (with 30 years of career in state organizations and who is at Enacom) Patricia Roldán;
and the former director of Enacom during the administration of President Mauricio Macri, Alejandro Pereyra.
Pereyra had been a lawyer for several companies, including Telefónica.