In the midst of the tug-of-war over Javier Milei's megaDNU after the rejection in the Senate, the deputies of the Civic Coalition, Elisa Carrió's party, presented a bill to privatize 25 State companies from different sectors, including
Río Turbio Coal Deposits, Correo Argentino, Aerolíneas Argentinas, and Radio and Television Argentina
.
The President's initiative, which remains in force beyond the victory of the negative vote in the Upper House, proposes privatizing 33 state companies.
The civic initiative leaves out several of them and proposes a public-private scheme for Banco Nación, Nucleoeléctrica and Arsat, among others.
The idea of the CC-ARI seeks to create a State Business Administration Society to group companies that are not privatized, with the aim of improving efficiency, integrity, administration, transparency and rules of good governance, in line with the recommendations of international organizations such as the OECD.
“Argentina does not need a huge State, but rather an intelligent State, which does not generate macroeconomic imbalances that harm citizens,” say the CC legislators.
“The important thing is not whether the companies are public or private, but rather the central thing is to provide quality services for all Argentines at the lowest possible cost,” they add.
“For many years, practically all companies have been closing their accounts in the red and need abundant subsidies that arise from taxes that we all pay.
In fact, subsidies during the year 2023 amounted to $2.3 billion,” they say.
“The ranking of the largest subsidies is headed by ENARSA, followed by AYSA, Trenes Argentinos, Aerolíneas Argentinas and Correo Argentino.
Despite the numbers in the red, in recent years companies have had the luxury of increasing their staff,” they maintain from the CC.
The Civic Coalition also proposes to improve the privatization process by eliminating direct contracting, so that privatizations should be carried out
only through public bidding
, public auction, or sale of shares on the stock market.
It also requests the collaboration of SIGEN, the AGN, and the National Authority for the Defense of Competition, to guarantee a transparent, competitive, and anti-privilege process.
News in development