President Javier Milei
has just entered the "twilight dimension"
.
The image perhaps serves as a metaphor for a political event never before experienced by an ruling party that has been in charge of the National Executive Branch for only seventy-seven days.
On Friday night, when it seemed that the political week was entering a certain calm, the Casa Rosada lined up
against it twenty-three of
the twenty-four provincial governors, including the Buenos Aires boss, Jorge Macri.
For different reasons and with dissimilar moral authority, these leaders expressed their support for
Ignacio Torres
from Chubut .
The Patagonian had made public a strong complaint, with a warning of retaliation, with a controversial addressee: President Milei.
In an act, he stated that he was willing to cut off the supply of energy produced by his province to the Nation because the Government
suspended the payment to Chubut
of thirteen thousand five hundred million pesos that should be transferred to it as a co-participation.
Milei, following his style of permanent confrontation against the leadership that does not belong to La Libertad Avanza, fiercely criticized Torres.
All previous negotiations to avoid that conflict had been exhausted
the day before.
The Casa Rosada accused Torres of demanding money that does not correspond to him because, according to the government's vision, Chubut has a debt with the Nation for loans from the so-called Trust Fund for Provincial Development, so this lack of payments would be compensated with the multi-million dollar non-transfer claimed by Torres.
Torres' protest achieved an unusual consensus after tweets and crossed calls: twenty-three governors expressed their support for the Chubut citizen, tired, for varying reasons,
of the adjustment that affected the flow of funds
that they previously used to receive from the central power through different regulations and entities and to different purposes.
The uprising of the provinces was also due to exhaustion in a dialogue that many of the governors analyze as almost impossible to implement again with Milei.
The "Torres problem" is already a problem of the Presidency and of all the governorates that stood opposite the Casa Rosada.
The only president who did not express himself about this affair was Osvaldo Jaldo from Tucumán,
although he does not think differently from his colleagues
.
What will happen, from this event, with the previously complicated link between the Nation and the territorial chiefs who lead the management of the districts that make up the Argentine Republic?
Do all of them, although they had never joined forces, even possibly momentarily, have enormous influence in a Congress, in which the ruling party only has enormous minorities in both chambers?
Will Milei escalate the confrontation with the governors as he has deepened it until now?
What could be the consequences of this dynamic that spirals more every day?
In politics there can always be a time, although agonizing, to agree on antagonistic positions.
Is that Milei's plan?
Hit to negotiate an end to the conflict favorable to his beliefs, his tactics and his strategy?
The margins changed dramatically for that solution to be a solution.
The outcome caused by Chubut's money, unexpected until Friday, especially for the Peronist governors, has a prequel that could also modify the plan of the Presidency and its allies from the PRO, the party that seeks a merger with the ruling party.
Torres assured that he made the decision to make his protest public, including a threatening speech to the Nation, because it was the most prominent national officials who warned him that the suspension of Chubut's co-participation payment
was a "political" issue
that would be used as an example for the rest of the leaders.
Torres swears that
he tried to pay Chubut's debt
with the Provincial Development Trust Fund, which would have generated the transfer of the thirteen thousand five hundred million pesos of the co-participation in dispute.
But, always according to his version, he clashed with the ruling party because it purposely put bureaucratic obstacles in place to force him
into financial suffocation
.
The final negotiator of the Torres conflict was Mauricio Macri himself, Clarín learned from qualified sources aware of this plot.
Macri would have communicated
with Milei himself
to achieve peace with Torres.
The President would have responded evasively.
And even he would have postponed a meeting between the two that was scheduled for Monday.
The former president's entourage
denies that this communication existed
.
Other very prominent sources confirm it.
On Wednesday, Torres had told Macri of his hardships in a meeting in which Rogelio Frigerio also participated.
"You're right," said the former president who is in full negotiations with Milei to agree on an alliance with Milei.
The conflict escalated to such a degree that these negotiations could enter the never-advisable terrain of a drawn-out enigma.
The Casa Rosada added to the narrative of this case total opponents of the ruling party that Torres supported, but also "partners" until yesterday who supported libertarian policies.
In the official statement from the Presidency, ultra-K governors were mentioned - as if everyone had the same line of conduct with Milei - such as Ricardo "El Gitano" Quintela from Rioja, or Axel Kiciloff from Buenos Aires.
But in the same paragraph warning about the policy of adjustment with the national districts, which will deepen the libertarian management, the Entre Ríos native Rogelio Frigerio and the Buenos Aires boss Jorge Macri were included.
All in the same mud and abused?
Torres repeated on Friday night that he was shocked by Milei's reaction: "Our legislators approved everything requested regarding the Omnibus Law project."
This new conflict between Milei and all the governors occurs in a context in which several leaders from northern provinces, from different political parties,
had tried to redirect legislative
and economic "peace" with the Nation.
On Tuesday, in Salta, the local president, Gustavo Sáenz, received with his counterpart from Misiones, Hugo Passalaqua;
that of Jujuy, Carlos Sadir;
that of Tucumán, Osvaldo Jaldo;
and that of Catamarca, Raúl Jalil.
After the temporary break with all of them, who supported with varying effectiveness the vote on the failed Omnibus Law in Congress.
After that failed session, Milei criticized everyone, opponents and dialogueists, alike.
He even fired national officials who were "disloyal," among them Flavia Royón from Salta, in charge of the Mining Secretariat.
Sáenz acted as spokesperson for the leaders meeting with the indefatigable Francos:
"We have to look forward
," he told him, more or less words.
And he specified: "If there is not going to be love or trust from Milei with us, and vice versa, we propose making a great national agreement with the Government, where the governors who agree, with Milei included, let us establish in a text what the new fiscal framework for the provinces, that it be clear what funds we are going to receive from now on, and at the same time we guarantee that we vote for the ruling party for a package of laws in Congress. Of course, we all have to sign what let's reach a consensus."
Francos assured that he thought it was a correct approach and stated that he would inform the President of this news.
Sáenz insisted: "It would be an agreement, not a pact,0 and we must all sign it."
A day before, the vice president, Victoria Villarruel, had also met in Salta with Sáenz.
On Friday everything changed.
Within a few days, perhaps a couple of weeks, we could begin to measure what the true consequences of that change and of that whole will be.