Wednesdays from 10am. Take to the streets against the veto and for our retirees!

It is often said that a picture is worth a thousand words. The meeting at Casa Rosada with the radical deputies on offer confirms this. There you can see the deputies Picat (Córdoba), Tournier (Corrientes), Cervi (Neuquén), Campero (Tucumán) and Arjol (Misiones), who in June had supported with their vote the increase in pensions. Now they have turned around and Martín Menem, Patricia Bullrich, Karina and Javier Milei are smiling.

The president threw himself into the arms of the caste to guarantee the infamous veto against the increase in pensions. While he calls them “rats” and “degenerate prosecutors” on social networks, he invites them to negotiate positions and other weeds in exchange for modifying their vote and not validating the minimal increase of 17 thousand pesos that they themselves had voted for in June. A disgrace with few precedents that recalls the scandal of the corrupt Ley Bases, approved in the Senate in exchange for embassies and appointments for senators such as Crexell, Espínola and Kueider who thanks to that accompanied the officialism.

In just nine months, the Government has shown at every opportunity that the anti-caste narrative was just a campaign pose, that it has no qualms about negotiating all kinds of perks with Peronists, Radicals and Macrists to achieve the necessary numbers and that the parliamentary cabal is one of the two fundamental legs to continue with its adjustment and chainsaw plan.

The other indispensable leg is the enormous complicity of the union leaders and social movements, who have so far refused to call for decisive measures that would shake a government as ambitious as it is weak. The last important precedent was the pitiful role played by the CGT and the CTA in the vote on the Ley Bases, with one sector directly absent and another that left the square early, abandoning any hint of resistance.

In view of the session on Wednesday, the CTA, Truckers, Bankers and the unions of Corriente Federal, among others, will be part of the call but without calling for a strike to guarantee that the march is strong and forceful. On the other hand, the “fat cats” sector of the CGT, with Daer at the head, will not even call for it. “There is a tactical decision not to participate institutionally in the march on Wednesday” said Andrés Rodríguez, head of UPCN and deputy general secretary of the CGT, days ago. A position consistent with that of the last few months, where they dedicated themselves to negotiating behind closed doors and behind the backs of their representatives the labor reform that the government wants to implement.

“There is a tactical decision not to participate institutionally in Wednesday’s march” Andrés Rodríguez, CGT deputy for @AM750 in @TomayDacaRadio. #TomayDaca pic.twitter.com/0GhG0OG3gc

— Mariano Martin (@marianoemartin) September 7, 2024

Street mobilization, the only language that those at the top understand

The government has already made it clear that it is willing to do anything to impose its veto on the modest increase of 17 thousand pesos for pensions. Once again it makes it clear that it governs for the big businessmen, for whom it lowered the tax on their wealth (personal property). With the hunger of the retirees it subsidizes the richest in the country, while claiming that “there is no money.”

While a group of UCR deputies turn around and anticipate that they will vote against what they had voted three months ago, it is very likely that sectors of Peronism will also make their contribution to the government. At this time, it is still not known what position the deputies who respond to the governments of Salta, Misiones and Río Negro will take. Also included in that list are the Neuquén deputies who have a single block and those from Tucumán, who were the first to abandon the ranks of Unión por la Patria to run into the arms of Milei by order of Governor Jaldo. The latter, absent from the June vote, will surely end up supporting the presidential veto.

The parliamentary cabal shows a regime that is rotten and corrupt to the extreme, with sectors of all the big traditional parties actively collaborating with the plans of the government. That is why one cannot trust even a millimeter in these negotiations behind the backs of the retirees and the entire people.

There are many pollsters’ studies that claim that there is an overwhelming majority of people rejecting the presidential veto. The government has crossed a line and has confirmed it with the repression of retirees in the latest demonstrations in front of Congress.

That is why it is essential that this Wednesday’s mobilization be massive and forceful. We must move from words to actions and demonstrate in the streets all our support and solidarity for those who have worked all their lives and who are today the main variable of adjustment for a government that came to fatten the pockets of businessmen and impoverish those of us who live off our work. It is necessary to continue demanding from the unions, from the student leaders and federations and from the social organizations to build a massive response, strike together and overturn the veto. That is the only way to respond adequately to this new attack, and it is the only language that capitalist politicians and big businessmen understand.