The governors and representatives of the 23 provinces and the City of Buenos Aires met for more than 4 hours
at the Casa Rosada
with the Chief of Staff, Nicolás Posse, and with the Minister of the Interior, Guillermo Francos.
There were differences on the topic of Profits, crossovers and what a new version of the Base Law would be like.
The meeting was
the first step in an attempt at rapprochement with the provinces
that President Javier Milei inaugurated in his speech before Congress last Friday and, if everything goes as the Government hopes, it will lead to the signing of the Pact on May 25 in Cordova.
The Minister of the Interior, Guillermo Francos, was the Government spokesperson after the meeting.
"We are going to set up a commission of the economic ministers of the provinces with economic officials to debate the issue of Profits and move forward towards what the May Pact proposes," he said.
The Milei official expressed that the four-hour meeting was progress regarding the dialogue that is needed to advance with the reforms proposed by the president.
Francos starred in a conference at Casa Rosada with the governors of Tucumán and Entre Ríos, Osvaldo Jaldo and Rogelio Frigerio.
Guillermo Francos, Minister of the Interior with the governors of Tucumán and Entre Ríos, Osvaldo Jaldo and Rogelio Frigerio.
"It was a very cordial and positive meeting, in which we had a long conversation. We presented to the governors the version of the Base Law on which there was consensus. We decided to move forward with all those aspects that have parliamentary consensus: declaration of emergencies, powers delegates and protection of large investments and the hydrocarbon regime. The majority of the governors were in favor," he said.
Francos stated that "the Government will present a project that will include a formula for updating pensions and another for the fourth category of Earnings" since he argued that "neither teaching funds nor transportation are within national powers."
Jorge Macri
, head of the Buenos Aires government, was the first to speak at the end of the meeting.
"It was a productive meeting," he assessed.
"All the provinces spoke, there is no single position regarding Profits," stated the PRO leader, who announced that there will be meetings of the provinces with Economy officials, as well as a political commission to advance with issues related to the reform. policy.
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The Head of Government of Buenos Aires said that it was a "good" meeting where "everyone was heard."
"It was a good starting point," said Jorge Macri, who described the meeting as a first step toward the approval of a new "Bases Law."
Ignacio "Nacho" Torres, governor of Chubut, also praised the meeting in which the omnibus law was reviewed.
"The governors proposed eliminating all trust funds and ATNs," said the Patagonian president, who also acknowledged that there are many differences regarding the issue of the return of the Income Tax.
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The governor of Chubut spoke after the meeting at Casa Rosada.
The previous meeting at Casa Rosada and its background
The first to arrive at the Casa Rosada were Axel Kicillof from Buenos Aires, Martín Llaryora from Cordoba, Ignacio Torres from Chubut, Gerardo Zamora from Santiago, Jorge Macri from Buenos Aires and Marcelo Orrego from San Juan.
The meeting with the governors at Casa Rosada.
On the Government side,
in addition to Posse and Francos
, there are the Secretary of the Treasury, Carlos Guberman;
the Secretary of the Interior, Lisandro Catalán, and the Executive Secretary of the Government, José Rolandi. The Minister of Economy, Luis Caputo, will not be part of the meeting, since he is traveling in Washington.
The meeting was planned to defuse a relationship that has been gaining tension since Milei's arrival in the Government, when
the President decided to drastically cut the sending of
federal funds to the provinces.
In recent weeks, the issues have flared up twice.
The first was a month ago, when the ruling party did not obtain the votes to give half a sanction in Deputies to the articles of the Omnibus Law.
The President singled out the governors
for this failure
and accused several of them - particularly Martín Llaryora from Córdoba, but also other Peronist leaders and even Together for Change - of having worked to overturn the law.
Meeting with governors in Casa Rosada beginning the path towards the “May Pact”.
End. pic.twitter.com/nXaxUNTuMV
— Manuel Adorni (@madorni) March 8, 2024
The second occurred on February 23, when Macrista Ignacio Torres, governor of Chubut, revealed that the Nation had interrupted the sending of federal co-participation funds and that the province was willing to stop oil shipments from its wells
if that flow of funds was not restored
.
After several days of exchanges, the Government and Chubut lowered the level of tension, but that episode put all the provinces on guard and practically all the governors - with the exception of the Tucumán Peronist Osvaldo Jaldo, a new ally of Milei - spoke out. in favor of Torres.
At this Friday's meeting, the Government will ask the governors to contribute the votes of the deputies and senators who respond to them so that they vote in favor of a bill that
reverses the elimination of the Income Tax
for the vast majority of employees, a decision made last year by the former Minister of Economy, Sergio Massa, to shore up his presidential campaign.
Until now, the Government does not have the number of supports in Congress to advance this new law.
In turn, the governors will come with their own demands, all of them budgetary.
The governors argue, in summary, that, if the debt for the transfers that were planned for 2023 is added that the Government would not do throughout 2024 if it continues with its hand closed, the provinces will have
between 4.3 and 4.7 billions of pesos less
.
Among the affected items are the National Treasury Contributions that were budgeted and that remained undistributed, the transfers for the Check Tax that were provided for in the 2017 fiscal consensus that the provinces signed with Macri and the collection of the Income Tax and of the Fuel Transfer Tax