The decision of the National government from breach the judgment of the Supreme Court that forces him to stop the withdrawal of funds that he imposed on the City of Buenos Aires motivated new expressions of concern and denial.
The Bar Association of the City of Buenos Aires issued a statement titled “judicial decisions must be complied with.” There he warns that “instead of abiding by the decision and seeing how to execute it, the President of the Nation, together with a group of provincial governors” announced that “he will challenge his members and will file an appeal to try to modify the sentence”.
“Actually, the recusatory petition it is late and inappropriate. There are dozens of precedents in which similar maneuvers have been rejected. The same corresponds to say of the resource that is announced will be deducted ”, points out the statement of the Law School.
As a general rule, the judgments of the Supreme Court are final, unchangeable unless exceptionally a material error has been incurred. A material error is not invoked here. In its place it is stated that the sentence deducts funds from the provinces, which is false and that it is a ‘partisan’ ruling, rhetoric that disregards the balanced reasoning used in the sentence. In fact, we are facing a decision that defends the so-called federalism of consultation in an exemplary manner. Finally, it is argued that we would be facing an unprecedented ruling, when it is enough to read the sentence to identify previous cases that the Court has considered similar in substantial aspects, “adds the entity.
In its central section, the communiqué states: “the judicial decisions of the Court and of any other court can be vehemently criticized, but they must be complied with.”
“The entire edifice of the Republic ultimately rests on that idea., without which it would be impossible to maintain social peace because conflicts would be settled by force. The Executive Power is on the verge of rising up once morest a sentence of the Court, which is as much as rising up once morest the Constitution. The institutional severity, in such a case, would be unusual and with unpredictable consequences”, he concludes.
In turn, the Progress Cluban association founded 170 years ago, deeply regretted “the course given by the heads of the national powers and several provinces in response to the precautionary resolution of the Supreme Court of December 21.”
“The due respect between the different powers that concur to the healthy balance of forces designed in our National Constitution it is threatened by unilateral acts that border on the dangerous extremes of anomie and anarchy,” said the Club del Progreso, in a statement. And he proposed that the Coparticipation law be enacted, which is 26 years late. “This failure and unconstitutionality by omission configures the root of this and other conflicts that might be avoided if the democratic debate were assumed to reach consensus and agreements for the necessary convention law prescribed by the constituents of 1994″, it closes.
The decision of the President and the governors led to criminal complaints and a strong reaction from the opposition. The head of the Buenos Aires government, Horacio Rodriguez Larretaaccused Fernández of trying to “break the constitutional order” with his decision to not abide the ruling of the Supreme Court of Justice that restored the co-participation funds that the national government had taken away.
In a Press conference that he granted on Friday from the headquarters of the Buenos Aires administration in Parque Patricios, Larreta described Fernández’s surprise maneuver as “very high institutional gravity”. Last night, pushed by 14 governors, the President chose to disobey the ruling of the country’s highest court.
In turn, Larreta questioned that the head of state has said that will challenge the four judges that make up the Court. “This is not once morest the City, it is once morest the Constitution, legal security,” highlighted the mayor of Buenos Aires.
According to the Pro referent, who aspires to compete for the succession of Fernández in 2023, the position of the head of state threatens “any possibility of development.” “Who is going to trust a country where the decisions of Justice are not respected? Who is going to invest? Who will generate work? What can we Argentines expect if the President himself does not comply with the law?”, he pointed out.
To defend the City’s claim, he sought to highlight that the Court’s ruling “does not harm the provinces at all, as Kirchnerism tries to install.” And he warned that the funds that the Government took from the Buenos Aires coffers were destined for the district governed by Axel Kicillof, that is, the electoral stronghold of Cristina Kirchner. “When they took away our co-participation, the President did not give a single peso to the provinces. Do you know why? Because he gave everything to the province of Buenos Aires, which is of the same political color,” said Larreta.
Larreta remarked that Fernández’s decision “exceeds all imaginable limits.” “The President decided to break the constitutional order, completely violate the rule of law and attack democracy. Since the return of democracy, there is no record of a President not complying with a Court ruling, ”he stressed.
In this sense, he anticipated that the City “will denounce the agencies and each of the officials responsible for failing to comply with the ruling.” In parallel, he commented, the JxC interblock analyzes the chance of promoting “judicial and legislative actions to defend legality and the rule of law.”
After the Casa Rosada confirmed that it will not abide by the Supreme Court ruling, Larreta gathered his small table to define a counteroffensive: on the one hand, he decided to make “an institutional claim” and, on the other, to advance with a judicial presentation. That text, which is being prepared by the Buenos Aires attorney general and with which they will ask that the Court’s decision be made effective, will be presented on Monday before the highest court.
Rodríguez Larreta insisted that he will eliminate the tax on credit card purchases, a tax imposed by the City following the pruning of funds, once the Government complies with the sentence and turns the resources. In fact, the first vice president of the Buenos Aires Legislature, Emmanuel Ferrario, had called a session this morning with the aim of repealing that tax. But, due to a lack of agreement with the Frente de Todos, the treatment of the project fell through.
The ruling party needed 40 votes to approve the initiative on tables. “The Buenos Aires Kirchnerism refused to vote to lower taxes in the City. With their backs to the people of Buenos Aires and in complicity with the abuse of presidential power, they decided not to support the treatment of the projects presented following the Court’s ruling in favor of the City”, said Ferrario.
On Wednesday, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the Larreta government in its claim once morest the Nation for the removal of co-participation funds. In 2022 they will represent a loss of $154,000 million for the City’s coffers.
Last night, through a statement, Fernández and fourteen pro-government governors argued that the Court’s ruling is “unprecedented, inconsistent and impossible to comply with.” At the same time, the president ordered the four judges of the highest court to be challenged and to present a request for revocation in extremis of the judicial decision.
The President’s move unleashed a serious institutional conflict. Together for Change, the main opposition force, accused Fernández of rising up once morest the Constitution and committing the crime of sedition.
The national leadership of the opposition coalition expressed its “strongest repudiation and deep concern for the explicit disobedience” of Fernández before the Court’s ruling. “You cannot choose whether the Constitution is fulfilled or not. A ruling by the Court in this matter is the last word of legality. From JxC we are not going to admit living in a country where the law is optional, ”said the national force table.
For her part, the CC leader, Elisa Carrió, filed a criminal complaint once morest the head of state and the officials who do not abide by the Court’s ruling in the federal courts of Comodoro Py.
While, Ricardo Lopez Murphy (United Republicans) is pushing an impeachment petition once morest the President in Congress. Former President Mauricio Macri, co-founder of Together for Change, warned that “disobedience to a Supreme Court ruling would destroy the legal continuity of the Nation and would expose us to anarchy.”
In addition, Macri said that “there is no precedent in Argentine history of such serious ignorance of another state power.” The former president learned on Wednesday at noon that the Court had ruled in favor of the City in the case for the cut in co-participation funds, while he played soccer in La Matanza. “The sentences are not discussed, they are fulfilled,” he said.
Patricia Bullrichhead of Pro, warned that the government of Alberto Fernández has “reached the limit in which there is no type of law.”
In that macro, Fernando Straface, secretary of government and international relations of the City, considered that the situation is “much more than a conflict of powers.” “The President ignores the National Constitution and initiates a democratic conflict with profound consequences for the country’s international democratic credibility,” he opined.
THE NATION
