The elected Argentine President Javier Milei is already preparing to take power Rumors are circulating about who will be part of his ministerial team and the stock market continues to respond positively to his election because of his promise drastically slim down the inefficient Argentine state and clean up the national economy with ultra-liberal recipes.
Milei finally met with his predecessor, President Alberto Fernández, who will present him with the presidential sash on December 10th. The meeting, which had been postponed and which Milei himself had ruled out, according to Argentine media, due to disagreements over the staging, finally took place in a cool atmosphere at the Olivos presidential residence. Despite everything, it was a gesture of institutional normality and politeness that helped calm the waves somewhat after the tense weeks of the election campaign.
The Liberal leader continues meetings to finalize the formation of his government and management plan. At the Hotel Libertador in Buenos Aires he met with his closest team of employees, from which a few names already stood out. His sister Karina, whom he describes as “the boss” of his project, was present. They also took part Guillermo Francoa technocrat who comes from Peronism and sounds like a possible interior minister, and the liberal economist Diana Mondinofuture head of the Foreign Ministry.
Eight ministries
The remaining names will be announced in the coming days, but Milei has already made it clear that he will be in office. it will have no more than eight ministries, as part of your savings plan, so there are fewer unknowns to clarify. It remains to be seen what weight Macrismo will have in the executive branch. Former President Mauricio Macri and his candidate Patricia Bullrich supported Milei after her defeat in the first round of elections and it is foreseeable that the new president will compensate her with her own portfolios in the new government.
At the moment, Milei appears to be softening the radical profile he portrayed during the election campaign. This Wednesday received the call from Pope Francis and spoke warmly to him after calling him “the representative of evil on earth” and accusing him of being close to “murderous communists.” The call ended with an invitation to the Holy Father to visit his home country of Argentina in 2024.
In the afternoon, Milei planned to continue his telephone round with international contacts, which has already taken him to talks with the Italian Prime Minister. Giorgia Meloni; newly appointed British Foreign Secretary David Cameron; and the Chilean President, Gabriel Boric; among others.
Euphoria on the stock markets
While, The stock markets continue to celebrate Milei’s election and his first steps before he even assumed the presidency. State oil company YPF, which will be the first public asset to be privatized if Milei keeps his promises, has become in the object of desire of investors and continued to lead an increase that sent the Buenos Aires Stock Exchange up 20.8%.
However, there are many obstacles that Milei’s controversial economic program must overcome. The renowned Wall Street Journal referred to his plan to adopt the dollar as the national currency in order to stop the permanent devaluation of the Argentine peso and capture the urgently needed foreign currency. “The plan might work better on YouTube than in reality”wrote the American specialist media.
And warnings are already coming from the trade union world about the new president’s privatization plans. Pablo Biró from the Association of Airline Pilots (APLA) referred to the situation of Aerolíneas Argentinas. “If you want to load airlines, you have to kill us and load dead people,” he warned the president-elect.
Biró asked to wait to know in detail Milei’s plans for the company, but tens of thousands of employees in Argentina’s vast public sector are now seeing their jobs threatened, and that is likely to be the main source of resistance the new government will face may be the case Consider also the established opposition to Peronism. Only time can tell whether Milei’s determination and Macrismo’s support are enough for the attempt.