POLITICS-ARGENTINA: De la Rua Assures Governability, Downplays Crisis

By Marcela Valente Reprint | | Print |

Marcela Valente

BUENOS AIRES, Oct 9 2000 (IPS) - Argentine President Fernando de la Rúa gave assurances Monday that governability was not threatened by the resignation of his vice-president and coalition partner Carlos Alvarez.

However, the future of the governing Alliance comprised of De la Rúa’s Radical Civic Union (UCR) and Alvarez’s left-leaning Front for a Country with Solidarity (FREPASO) is uncertain.

“There have been misunderstandings. However, they have not given rise to a crisis — because the president remains in office — but to tension, which is not good in the least, although it does not at all affect governability, the unity of the Alliance or the work of the government,” De la Rúa declared Monday.

Alvarez, meanwhile, who resigned Friday, said his aim was to work on “strengthening the Alliance” and keep the opposition Justice (Peronist) Party from capitalising on the current political crisis.

According to a survey released Monday by the D’Alessio, IROL & Harris polling firm, 56 percent of respondents said they were witnessing the “beginning of the end” of the Alliance.

The president’s attempt to downplay the crisis and to shore up his government was accompanied Monday by a pledge that economic measures would soon be announced, aimed at bolstering growth, attracting investment, boosting revenues and creating new jobs.

But Alvarez, as well as leaders of the governing coalition and the opposition, were less optimistic regarding Argentina’s political future, warning that while there was a consensus to hold the Alliance together, there were serious difficulties.

The president, meanwhile, played down reports of social gatherings among his close associates allegedly held to “celebrate” Alvarez’s resignation, after the former vice- president complained.

Argentina’s current political crisis broke out two months ago, when reports surfaced that government officials had bribed senators to vote in favour of widely unpopular labour reforms. As president of the Senate, Alvarez urged the legislators and cabinet officials tainted by the vote-buying scandal to hand in their resignations.

But his campaign to “clean up” the Senate led to few results. The heads of the Alliance and the Justice Party in the Senate gave up their leadership positions, one senator went on leave, and only one resigned.

In the meantime, the justice system launched a probe into the supposed vote-buying.

The tension between De la Rúa and Alvarez grew as it appeared that the vice-president was on his own in confronting the scandal in the Senate, which he saw as a unique opportunity to make good on the Alliance’s proclaimed intention of cleaning up politics and uprooting corrupt practices.

Thus, the president’s decision to confirm two cabinet officials suspected of shelling out the bribes in the Senate in their posts last Thursday was seen by Alvarez as intolerable, and led him to step down, further accentuating the crisis.

On Monday, Alvarez said the cabinet shuffle was aimed at demonstrating greater efficiency and resolution in terms of reactivating the sluggish economy, while it failed to respond to the Senate scandal as he had hoped. However, he recognised that the president had exclusive authority in putting together his cabinet.

Alvarez’s move Friday led to the immediate resignation of one of the officials suspected of paying off senators — Alberto Flamarique, who was serving as labour minister at the time the reforms of the labour code were approved.

Flamarique, who belonged to FREPASO, had been fingered by the vice-president as one of the leaders who should step down. But last Thursday, De la Rúa named the official to the post of secretary-general to the presidency.

The president also confirmed Alberto de Santibáñes, another of the officials that Alvarez wanted out of the government, given suspicions that the bribes came from his quarters, as the head of the Secretariat of Intelligence.

Alvarez reiterated Monday that De Santibánes should hand in his resignation, “as honourable people do,” if he really considered himself one of the president’s friends. “He is inflicting great damage on the government by staying,” he stated.

The confirmation of the two senior officials in the government was seen by the former vice-president as a strategy to minimise his complaints about the vote-buying scandal, and leave the crisis in the hands of the judiciary — which Alvarez criticised, as the judge handling the inquiry has himself been accused of illicit personal enrichment.

The vice-president thus resigned despite De la Rúa’s attempts to get him to change his mind, including an offer to undo several of the latest cabinet changes. Alvarez said his political maneuvering room as vice-president was limited, and that he was now considering the possibility of becoming a “coordinator” of the Alliance.

Alvarez’s resignation initially raised fears that the Alliance, which was created in 1997 and has been in the government for just 10 months, was breaking apart. But the former vice-president urged the ministers from his party to remain in the cabinet, and asked the FREPASO parliamentarians to continue supporting De la Rúa.

Alvarez explained that his withdrawal from the government did not transform him into an opponent, and that his intention was to put an end to widespread talk of a power struggle between him and the president. “Once this crisis is over, the figure of De la Rúa will be strengthened,” he added.

The deputies of the Alliance promised that they would remain united, although there were still some unresolved differences between the UCR and FREPASO.

Interior Minister Federico Storani warned that “governability will be very difficult to maintain if the Alliance breaks apart in Congress, because it would be impossible to drum up the majority needed to enact laws.”

The acting president of the Senate, José Genoud, resigned on Sunday. He had refused to do so earlier, when Alvarez publicly urged him to give up his leadership post in the upper house of Congress.

And on Monday, Justice Party Senator Jorge Massat abandoned his post, after his own family accused him two weeks ago of engaging in a business deal in which he corruptly lined his pockets.