A SOCIAL GENOCIDE
To those who resisted
during all those years
To their dignity and their courage
Argentina, October 2001:
The government of the Alliance loses the legislative elections.
President De la Rúa refuses to change his policies.
In 2 years of power,
his progressive program was replaced by the plans of the IMF,
a continuation of the policies of Carlos Menem.
The recession deepens
Millions are poverty-stricken and unemployed
Massive flight of capital
Bank-accounts are blocked
The crisis worsens
December 19, 2001
In view of the situation,
I have decreed a state of siege
for the entire country,
and informed Congress of it.
Our country is going through a difficult period...
Kick 'em all out!
Every one of them!
The government must resign
Together, we'll never be defeated!
After many years
of apathy in the country,
the insurrection exploded.
This spontaneous revolt of "faceless" people
meant saucepans were being banged
in every neighborhood,
all the way to the city's vital centers.
People took to the streets,
without getting any orders.
I've been out of work for six weeks,
and I've slaved away my whole life.
I don't want a state of siege,
or to be a pawn of the International Monetary Fund.
It's an outdated economic model.
De la Rúa must resign, and all the swindlers with him.
December 20, 2001
We're dying of hunger!
"In glory we shall die!"
"This square belongs to the Mothers,
"not to cowardly others!"
"This square belongs to the Mothers,
"not to cowardly others!"
You bastards!
We're not in a dictatorship anymore!
Bunch of idiots!
Armed baboons!
Who ordered you out?
Can you kill a woman?
Can you kill a whole nation because you're ordered to?
Repression fails to empty the Plaza de Mayo
Hundreds of citizens rally to the movement
"The people won't clear out!"
And the people don't clear out.
They're workers, housewives,
employees, pensioners, students,
the heirs of those who, for decades,
defied the dictatorships and the persecutions,
put up with the policies of austerity,
and were betrayed
by democracy.
What happened in Argentina?
How was it possible that in so rich a country
so many people were hungry?
The country had been ransacked by a new form of aggression,
committed in time of peace and in a democracy.
A daily and silent violence
that caused greater social disruption,
more emigration and death,
than the terrorism of the dictatorship
and the Falkland Islands war.
THE NEVER-ENDING DEBT
Ever since Independence, almost 200 years ago,
Argentina's foreign debt has been a source
of impoverishment and corruption
and the biggest scandals.
Since the first loan negotiated by Rivadavia in 1824
with the British bank Baring Brothers,
the debt was used to enrich Argentinean financiers,
to control the finances
and empty the country of its wealth.
This foreign debt always went hand in hand with big business,
and with the complicity of nearly every government,
from Miter and Quintana, to Menem and De la Rúa.
The policy of indebtedness gave rise in Argentina
to generations of technocrats and bureaucrats,
who favored banks and international corporations
over their own country.
Educated at Harvard, Chicago, Oxford or Buenos Aires,
their portraits hang in the official galleries.
There you can see 19th century lobbyists,
like Manual García and Beláustegui,
or the latest heads of the public banking system,
Pedro Pou, Macarrone and Colombo,
administrators of a debt
that was born in the 1970s
under the military dictatorship.
We have turned the page
of government interventionism...
The present debt
was the illegitimate offspring
of the military dictatorship.
Even though the Courts demonstrated its fraudulent origins,
the pressure of the Establishment won the day.
From then on,
it dictated national policies
and depleted the public heritage.
All this is perfectly symbolized
by the statue of George Canning, an advocate of colonial policies,
that was donated by the British Government in 1857,
in recognition of the debt.
American defeat in Vietnam
Conservatives return to power
Crisis and rising oil prices
Petrodollars flood the world
Banks offer credit at 3%
Birth of the Third-world debt
Interest rates reach 16%
Bankruptcy of indebted countries
An alliance of foreign banks and multinationals
comes to power in Argentina.
After 7 years of neo-liberal policies,
the dictatorship leaves a country bled dry, with a foreign debt
of 45 billion dollars,
of which half is a private debt.
23 billion
is owed by multinationals operating in the country
like Citibank, First Boston,
Chase Manhattan, Bank of America, Banco de Italia,
Banco de Londres, Banco Español, Banco Francés, Deutsche Bank,
Banco Río and Banco Quilmes,
Banco Galicia and many more.
And by multinationals like Esso, Fiat, IBM,
Ford, Mercedes Benz, Swift, Pirelli,
as well as local groups owned by Pérez Companc, Bulgheroni-Bridas,
Macri, Techint, Fortabat,
Pescarmona, Gruneisen, Soldati,
Cogasco, Celulosa and others.
An excessive private debt
that a top bureaucrat of the dictatorship saddled the State with:
Domingo Cavallo.
A "super-Minister" of Finance in the Menem and De la Rúa governments,
he is responsible of the unending growth of the debt
and the worst pillage ever suffered by the Argentinean people.
THIEVES, BANKERS, GOVERNMENTS
GIVE US BACK OUR DOLLARS
What did you say?
The police protects the thieves, Mr. Solanas.
The world's turned upside-down.
Now people must demonstrate peacefully
to defend their savings, that were confiscated by the banks
with government complicity.
The State should guarantee citizens' rights,
not steal them.
Thieves!
A dollar at a time,
I saved during the 25 years I worked,
so I could live decently when I retired,
not on a State pension.
Why don't the banks treat us
like their foreign customers?
I chose private banks, I didn't trust ours.
I already got swindled in 1989.
But I must be stupid.
What do they want? A bomb? That's not my style,
that's why I'm banging on my pan.
I used to cook with it for my kids.
Every time I look at it, I'll be reminded of those scoundrels,
but I'll know I fought for my rights.
I'm the oldest newsvendor in Avellaneda.
For 65 years I've sold newspapers.
All my savings are in Citibank.
The manager of the agency says they'll return them to me,
it's a lie!
Everything I saved by making sacrifices is in their hands.
In fact, the foreign banks
owe money to the Argentineans.
In a way, it's a reversed debt.
The parent companies must be responsible for the deposits.
That was decided by law in Argentina in 1971,
in the well-known Swift Deltec case,
which established that parent companies were responsible
for the debts of their subsidiaries.
It's a swindle to make the government responsible
for the debts of the banks.
What about our foreign debt?
In many ways, that debt is illegitimate.
In a fundamental way:
It's illegitimate to repay the banks
with 18 million people poverty-stricken
and 9 million paupers.
There's a human priority.
Then the banks charged usurious interest rates.
If they'd charged normal interest rates,
the foreign debt would have been paid off by 1988.
What was this swindle?
The parent companies made loans to their subsidiaries,
so these were internal movements.
These loans were assigned to the foreign debt,
when in fact they were internal to the companies.
Dollars were bought here, and placed in accounts in the United States.
With this deposit as collateral, you got a loan
to purchase more dollars and so on,
because of the difference in interest rates.
It's what's known as "bicycling" funds,
and many got rich on it.
The main beneficiaries were the big conglomerates,
as usual.
At the end of Alfonsín's presidency,
the foreign debt was close to 54 billion dollars.
Menem let the creditors determine what they were owed.
The Congress never debated on the debt,
neglecting the Constitution
and a decision by the law courts.
Ten years later,
the debt reached 130 billion dollars.
People have a false idea of the debt.
You get into debt,
then you say it's bad.
But indebtedness is what enables credit.
Indebtedness is beneficial.
We are going to develop credit for everyone...
Owing money is fine.
A good example
is what the North Americans invented around 1898,
at the time they occupied Cuba.
Some Spanish banks
had granted loans to the colonial government of Cuba.
The North Americans said:
If the Cuban people didn't benefit from these loans,
there's no public debt.
In 1923,
a British bank,
the Royal Bank of Canada,
lent a petty tyrant of Costa Rica,
called Tinoco,
a sum that he used for personal goals.
The Royal Bank of Canada asked Costa Rica for repayment.
There was a lawsuit,
of which the arbitrator was an ex-president of the United States,
President William Taft.
President Taft ruled in the litigation, saying:
It's about a private debt,
not a public debt.
You can't have a public debt without a "public",
with the public as the beneficiary of the debt.
These operations never benefited the public,
quite the contrary.
It's the person who shops in a supermarket
and pays VAT
who ends up paying
for the private debts of big enterprises,
or of very rich people.
The problem of private debts,
that were illicitly nationalized
by Mr. Cavallo,
must absolutely be reexamined.
What is this theory?
It's the theory of the Odious Debt.
A director of the IMF, Karen Lissakers,
representing the United States, said:
"If we applied the theory of the Odious Debt,
"the Third World's debt would no longer exist."
A CHRONICLE OF TREASON
Democracy was re-established
with the Radical Raúl Alfonsín
and his social-democrat approach.
He promised to defend human rights,
to fight poverty
and to show that in a democracy "you get education, care, and food".
We have the huge responsibility
of guaranteeing democracy
and respect for human dignity in Argentina.
As we've said,
this means that the State
cannot bow to international financial groups,
or to privileged local groups...
But the State was bankrupt,
and had to make a choice.
Economy minister Grinspun, suggested repudiating the debt
and favoring growth.
Alfonsín won't go along, and yields to financial power.
The only solution is a policy of austerity,
that will be very hard
and require great efforts by everyone.
It's called, my dear compatriots,
an economy of war.
We must all learn from it.
This drastic measure is called "Plan Austral".
Once more,
huge public funds
are transferred to the banks and big corporations.
Alfonsín says two things at once:
He promises to repudiate the debt
but orders the president of the Central Bank to legitimize it.
He favors prosecuting Army officers
for their crimes during the dictatorship,
but two years later,
the "Due Obedience" laws exonerate crimes committed
on orders of a superior.
Laws that resulted from the insurrection
of the rebel "painted face" officers.
People took to the streets
and defied the tanks...
We've had enough of jackboots!
Alfonsín amnesties the rebels.
Dear compatriots,
Happy Easter!
The insurgents...
have put down their weapons.
Among them,
were heroes of the Falklands war,
who had strayed...
The electoral defeat of the Radical party
accelerates the crisis.
Stockmarket instability and hyperinflation
lead to runs on the supermarkets.
I've decided to resign
from the job of President of Argentina...
Alfonsín has to resign
6 months before the end of his mandate.
The neo-Peronist Carlos Menem
becomes President
after having, for many years, governed
the province of La Rioja,
one of the poorest in the nation.
His lightning rise
coincided with the fall of the Berlin wall
and the ideas of the "Consensus of Washington".
With his frankness and his preacher's gestures,
he promises a Productivist Revolution and big wages.
He has long sideburns like the old rebel Facundo Quiroga,
the "Tiger of the Plains".
For every Argentinean, standing,
for poor children who are hungry,
or who are sad,
for our brothers without work,
for the homes without a roof,
for the tables without bread,
for our homeland,
I ask you to follow me,
follow me,
I won't betray you,
I won't betray you...
As God is my witness,
and facing the judgment of History,
let me proclaim:
Argentina, get up and walk!
Sisters and brothers,
in a single voice I say to the world:
"This is the advent
of a new and glorious Nation."
This is the era of the theory of the "End of History",
of the single-mindedness of globalization
and of neo-liberal democracies in Latin America.
Long live Carlos Saúl Menem!
A few days later,
he abandons his sideburns and his promised reforms,
and betrays his voters:
His program becomes that of the liberal conservative minority,
directed by the former rebel officer Alvaro Alsogaray.
Everything has changed now, there's a new relationship
between conservatives and Peronists.
We appear to be the same,
but a fundamental change
amongst us has occurred.
Historically, it's only fair,
that a neo-Peronist president should bring this about...
No one before Menem
had dared to carry treason so far,
or undertaken so cynically
actions that harmed the Nation.
The two-faced game of the new leader
will pulverize 50 years of popular resistance:
He imposes allegiance to the global model,
amnesties the leaders of the junta,
and betrays millions of workers
who lived through the repression.
He abandons popular anti-imperialism
and non-alignment extolled by Perôn and Evita
and initiates a "physical relationship" with the United States.
His policies will be dictated by the World Bank and the IMF.
But Menem is not the only one who betrayed.
Many of the political and union leaders
dumped overboard a whole life of resistance.
Many of them accepted arrangements
and opted for indemnifications.
Others climbed
onto the bandwagon of privatizations.
Senator Cafiero,
you are a historic leader of the Peronist party.
How do you explain Menem's treason?
It happens frequently
in the political life of every nation.
There's a small French book, "In Praise of Treason",
where they prove
that treason is part and parcel of politics.
To succeed, you have to lie.
If you say what you think, no one will vote for you.
That's what happened in Argentina,
but much more intensely, let's face it,
when Menem was in power.
He even admitted he hid his goals to get elected.
Of course, in my opinion,
it's politically unethical,
but that's the reality.
Then, some international parameters changed...
And the model gradually exhausted itself.
How do you explain
the existence of a real "mafiocracy"?
Economic power, banks and the political class...
On that, Pino,
I won't pass judgment...
how can I put it... in an absolute way.
My long experience
has taught me that things are relative.
It's not all black or white,
things aren't corrupt or pure.
Argentinean society as a whole
can't call itself pure
and assign corruption to the ruling classes.
The ruling classes come from that society.
On one hand, we politicians have been a failure,
and I'll assume my part of responsibility.
But on the other hand...
many of the ruling circles let us down,
and to reach a verdict on everyone,
I'd say we're all in Dante's hell.
Undoubtedly,
treason is very effective.
Treason has phenomenal political power,
precisely because it's treason.
It's insidious,
it sneaks up behind you, without warning,
where you least expect it.
Otherwise it wouldn't be treason.
In this sense, the neo-Peronist party
was the most brilliant representative
of Cafiero's point of view.
If you ask Argentinean society to choose
between San Martín - our national hero - and Spiderman,
it'll vote for San Martín.
But between Spiderman and Superman,
how can you fault society for the consequences of that choice?
So we have...
a society with a weakened role,
a party that betrays its historic ideas and surrenders to the enemy,
a working-class movement eroded by de-industrialization,
infested with traitors...
Law courts that pay lip-service to all that,
Opposition parties without much room to maneuver...
and the result of it all is...
THE REPUBLIC DETERIORATES
Menem's neo-liberal model
is inseparable from the deterioration of the republic and corruption.
His political plan needs a biased Supreme Court
and federal law courts under his control,
and for special powers to be delegated by Parliament.
In one month, he got his Law of Laws passed,
the Reform of the State,
that opened up for him the door to privatizations.
Today the Senate is debating
a fundamental law for the country.
For the first time,
we are going to attack head on
the structural weaknesses
of the State as a whole,
notably of its public corporations.
We must be grateful
to the President of the Republic,
because this law is the beginning
of the Productivist Revolution.
Democracy was ridiculed by Parliament
during the Menem era.
He gave Ministries extraordinary powers,
absolute powers, total public power.
He gave Ministries the power
to privatize State enterprises,
without inventories, balance sheets,
without verifying beforehand
if these enterprises generated profits or losses.
Meaning that this vote
was the starting point of the plunder of State property.
Who voted for it?
The neo-Peronists,
the Radicals, very obligingly...
I remember very well the Radical Jaroslavsky
ordering many of his congressmen
to withdraw from the House
so that the neo-Peronists could pass these laws.
Rarely does everything enable
a minority to come to power
without throwing a bomb,
or firing a shot.
Yet that's what the conservative Alsogaray got
for the Reform of the State.
This reform gave Menem,
absolute, dictatorial powers,
that even the dictator Videla never had.
- Alsogaray said it openly. - What did he say?
He told the neo-Peronists
that they were taking part in an extraordinary moment,
that they'd have total power.
But now, this ostensibly democratic power
was going to be held
by those who once censored, executed and slaughtered.
That's what Alsogaray brought about.
How far would they go? What were they capable of?
Of a lot more.
And they kept it up.
There were denunciations
over the privatization of the national oil company YPF.
A congressman denounced the remittance to senators
of a bribe of 8 million dollars,
then denied it hours later.
Of 130 congressmen present,
114 voted "Yes",
10 voted "No", with 1 abstention.
We should be delighted
that the House was able to perform its duties.
For Argentina, this is a day of jubilation.
From now on,
the oil belongs to the provinces,
YPF will be quoted on the stockmarket
and benefit from private investment.
Thanks to this, old-age pensioners,
will benefit from billions of dollars...
These fine words
hid one of the most odious acts
that Parliament committed.
With the help of bribed congressmen,
it voted the privatization of YPF and Gas del Estado,
the two biggest Argentinean companies.
The country lost enterprises
that financed its infrastructures,
and of course old-age pensioners and workers
got swindled.
The opposition couldn't prevent it,
though dissident Peronists formed
the "Group of Eight".
Reforming the State
doesn't mean privatizing it.
In an emergent country,
you don't begin with layoffs.
Other opponents of the oil company plunder
were threatened or attacked.
In May 1991,
for having filed charges against Menem
for dismantling the YPF,
I got 6 bullets in my legs.
The privatization of YPF is madness.
It's an outrageous theft.
Of course there was corruption! It's a fact.
It goes hand in hand with privatization.
Just look at the heritage of those who voted for it.
I mean the leaders. Look at them...
There's no evidence...
Nobody saw suitcases full of dollars.
Yet it was never denied.
There were so many lobbies,
so much money to be made, again and again,
so many deals made on the quiet...
while the media praised
the advantages of privatization.
Like the TV journalist Neustadt.
He had high ratings.
Not only the politicians,
we reporters and the media, also played a role.
How long must we put up with this idiocy?
TV and radio in the hands of idiots,
for a nation of idiots? How long?
The Congress of this mafioso decade,
that voted such disgraceful laws against the Nation,
needed the police to protect it.
The people were so outraged
that each week brought its share of protests.
Pensioners, teachers, civil servants,
students, workers,
and the unemployed from every profession.
It was the beginning of a dark era:
The national budget had to be approved in Washington
before it was by our Congress.
The government asked for people's understanding,
because the country was on its knees...
"We were called the hand-raisers
"We were devoted, committed
"We voted with our eyes closed
"As the party asked us to
"We were called the hand-raisers
"We legislated without remembering,
"And our voters, we betrayed
"And we didn't hear their boos..."
THE ECONOMIC MODEL
The instrument used to apply the neo-liberal model
was the Convertibility Plan
that liberalized imports and was based on a lie:
One peso equaled one dollar.
It managed to stop inflation,
but left our nation's industries defenseless.
Until then, the country produced 95% of what it consumed
and exported machine-tools,
trains, and household electrical goods.
Henceforth, it imported fabrics,
meat, dairy products, fruit and pasta...
The country was "dollarized":
You could pay for anything in pesos or dollars.
But with zero inflation rate,
credit outfits and banks
lent at usurious rates of 50% per year,
when in the U.S. And Europe, the rates were 7%.
The euphoria of peso/dollar parity
made tradesmen and small businesses unable to compete
and bankrupts them.
Hundreds of factories and workshops disappeared:
In textiles, metallurgy, automobile spare parts,
consumer goods and many other areas.
These were the years of flaunting
illegally acquired wealth.
Let's try not to steal for 2 years.
Bribes and swindles are permitted.
If you put your hand in the till,
do it discreetly!
Life is privatized and walled in.
Security agents and country clubs...
The land of "Rich and Famous"...
You're a Peronist?
Always have been.
... and of pizza with champagne.
The media as the driving force of change
Meddling with the YPF, with oil,
was sacrilege.
It was like offending the tango or the flag.
The State meant corruption and bureaucracy.
Oil underground is no good to anyone.
Private ownership is modern and efficient
Everyone has the right
to a little frivolity.
Your lover-boy image embarrasses you?
The opposite: It helps me.
Politics become a spectacle
My love, it's really hot here...
He's so cute! Politicians are handsome now.
I'm thrilled by this economic model.
It's a lie,
a total lie,
that it creates poverty.
We've lived here a long time:
The politicians always make promises.
But our local representatives,
never did anything for us.
So we, who live here,
decided to block the road,
so that they'd understand what our daily life is like.
Kids can't get to school.
Patients can't be moved,
as ambulances can't get through.
We want to live decently, we deserve it.
We're poor, humble,
but we're not fooled
when they offer us a meal, clothing,
booties for babies...
We wanted them to build drainage.
There was money, everything that was needed.
But they kept the money.
When it comes to stealing,
they are the masters.
They teach people how to steal.
We're no longer just teachers,
now we're also social workers.
Moms come and ask
if we don't have extra sneakers...
We take care of the whole community.
When there's flooding, we become the emergency shelter.
We put up the students,
when the roof of their house blows away,
when they have nowhere to sleep.
The kids are worried for their families,
and want to take home
any remaining sandwiches.
We can't make them concentrate,
their minds are on other things.
Sometimes, they faint.
Then we ask them:
"What did you eat yesterday? And this morning?"
They answer: "Soup, tea..."
They faint very often.
We've got used to it.
But it's shameful.
The Convertibility Plan was part of a global project
linked to a debt that had become irredeemable.
In 1992,
Finance Minister Cavallo negotiated
with the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, Nicholas Brady,
exchanging this debt against our national heritage,
for a bargain price.
State enterprises are purchased, with national bonds
pegged at 15% of their face value,
but redeemable at 100%.
This agreement made the country lose
more that 30 billion dollars.
PRIVATIZATIONS
The Argentine government
achieved tonight
seven fundamental privatizations,
in seven strategic sectors for the country.
We'll move on to the privatization of TV,
of phone companies,
of a forthcoming tollbooth system,
of forthcoming road and railway concessions,
as well as the privatization of radio,
without forgetting, of course,
the privatization of the national airline.
We've elaborated our Ten Commandments,
the Menemist Ten Commandments for the Reform of the State.
Commandment number 1,
Menem doesn't know it yet,
is taken from one of his speeches:
"Nothing belonging to the State will remain in its hands."
Nothing was spared.
No matter what it was, or how much it cost,
or how and why it was sold.
Cued by the methods of other centuries,
these privatizations
were an extension of the old colonial expropriations.
Once, the Potosí was robbed of its silver and gold.
Now oil, water, and communications are stolen.
The foreign companies did in our country
what they couldn't do in their own countries.
Non-execution of works
They were exonerated
for the non-execution of works.
Rates were raised
to make the users pay for the investments.
No new capital was needed.
The more you risk, the more you earn.
In Argentina, no risks yielded huge profits.
Outstanding profitability
They either doubled or tripled the rates in dollars.
26 privatized concerns, 13% of the total number,
pocketed 60% of the income.
26 privatized concerns 60% of the income
France Telecom in Argentina
had a profitability of 15%
and Telefónica of 16%,
whereas the ten biggest international operators
only average a profitability of 5,4%.
5% worldwide 16% in Argentina
These concerns are private here, and public in their own countries.
Stripping
The Argentinean enterprises were sold without debts.
The State took care of the 150000 layoffs
required by the purchasers.
The main investors were Spanish and French:
The profitable ENTEL was sold for a fifth of its value
to Telefônica and France Telecom,
who saddled it with a 6 billion dollar debt.
Aerolíneas Argentinas was profitable and owned 37 planes.
The Spanish line Iberia mortgaged them to purchase the business,
and stripped it of all its assets.
The State water utility was taken over by a European syndicate
headed by Suez and Vivendi.
After making it owe 8 times its assets,
huge profits were made,
but the works agreed to were not completed.
800000 people were left without drinking water,
and a million people had no sewers.
The worse case is probably
the dislocation of the railroads
that dealt a fatal blow to regional economies.
Thousands of families had to move.
36000km of tracks existed,
now only 8000 remain.
There were 95000 jobs,
now only 15000 are left.
Ten years later, the State pays out more and more subsidies,
and now owes the World Bank
700 million dollars borrowed to pay for the layoffs,
and another 700 million in interest...
Just to suppress 80000 jobs!
Billions in subsidies
Privatizations were supposed
to end the payment of subsidies
that supposedly led to the public deficit.
The irony today, is that most of the privatized companies,
are subsidized.
Just for the national highway system,
the subsidy was 1,1 billion dollars.
And as the 980 million for acquiring them weren't paid,
they stole a total of 2 billion dollars!
They never paid the fee
You have to pay a fee
to use public property belonging to a country.
They never paid it.
- Who didn't pay? - No one.
Not for the roads, the postal system, the airports...
Impunity
Legal protection always favored
the conglomerates.
No one negotiated for the consumers.
Why such impunity?
Politics.
Big business and political scheming.
The big conglomerates
Privatizations were planned in the interest in the big conglomerates.
They were the ones who financed all the election campaigns,
all the governments,
all the coups d'état,
all the major public-works undertakings.
No other sector benefited from such privileges:
Protected markets, astronomical subsidies,
fiscal advantages, rate-overcharging,
exoneration of penalties for non-performance of work,
extensions of concessions,
and conversion into pesos of debts in dollars.
They failed to honor their contracts with the State,
swindled it and then sued it for damages.
Among these were:
Macri's Socma and Sideco,
Bulgheroni's Bridas,
Fortabat's Loma Negra,
Pérez Companc's Pecom,
Rocca's Techint,
Benito Roggio, Pescarmona, and others.
Unemployment is spreading like a plague,
contaminating the whole society.
The lines of dole seekers get longer everywhere.
Unemployment has gone from 11% to more than 20%,
not counting the temps.
What's the situation of the workers?
They've lost their salaries,
their social benefits,
their unemployment insurance,
their accident and sickness coverage.
More than half of them are moonlighting,
a social situation
that only prevails in the most under-developed countries.
People don't dare resist, they fear layoffs,
and that the next day
there may be no solution at all.
So they agree to salary cuts,
deteriorating work conditions,
working in unsanitary surroundings.
Losing your job means ending in a void,
joining an army of beggars,
the army of the excluded.
It leads to depression, to anxiety...
In the Latin-American country
where social rights were once most advanced,
thousands of destitute people
flock to the church of San Cayetano,
patron saint of work,
asking for help.
THE LIQUIDATION OF OIL
Argentina is a unique case
in the world and in Latin America.
No other country gave up
its gas and oil without losing a war.
The country was truly betrayed
by the ruling class.
Mexico, Brazil and Venezuela
never privatized their oil.
Why was the sale of YPF such an atrocity?
Because of the role that YPF played
in the country,
and in the world oil-market.
You have to remember that when Mosconi
created YPF, the first State enterprise in the world,
oil was considered to be very strategic,
and the sale of fuel to be of national interest.
If the international price rose,
YPF kept the price low,
according to its costs and not the market price.
YPF was created in 1923
on orders of General Mosconi.
In 1907, oil had been discovered in Patagonia.
In spite of its detractors,
the oil company was developed
without the need for foreign funds,
and became a model for Latin America.
It expanded so rapidly
that it earned as much for the country as the province of Buenos Aires.
Its reserves were estimated to be worth 200 billion dollars.
To privatize it, they had to commit many irregularities.
Actually, if the law was applied,
most private concessions would be invalid.
Argentina could soon rebuild its national oil company,
if it had true political motivation.
The strategic reserves,
where the greatest sums were invested,
were awarded for 25 years,
for a price equivalent to 9 months of production.
They were so poorly sold
that Menem had to deal with it personally.
$19 for shares that were worth $38...
350 million shares at $19, is a gigantic swindle.
They even hired the McKinley company
to underestimate the reserves.
A year later, the reserves reappeared in the accounts at their real value.
So they sold, say, a reserve for 100,
when it was worth 140.
A cartel of four multinationals
applied the highest rates on earth to us
and paid the lowest royalties.
Who checks up? They pump as much they want?
They make a declaration under oath.
Meaning?
By a declaration under oath,
informing the Argentineans how much they pumped.
The reserves, the facilities, were sold for a pittance.
They didn't have to do anything.
The site was there, with the staff and the facilities,
and everything needed to transport the oil.
A high quality infrastructure that belonged to YPF.
They didn't have to do anything, because a concern like YPF
had completely planned
its future 20 years ahead.
Now they were exploiting it,
benefiting from their State acquisitions,
in terms of oil and gas infrastructures.
That's the reality of Argentina.
You can't understand industrial development in Argentina
and Patagonia,
without knowing about YPF.
It had developed pipelines,
steel plants, roads and factories,
and given birth to dozens of towns,
geared to the social needs of their inhabitants.
In particular:
Comodoro Rivadavia, Caleta Olivia,
Cutral-Cô and Plaza Huincul,
which was the first oil-town
in the province of Neuquén.
All these empty, walled up buildings,
lying neglected,
were Camp 1,
the administration block,
the heart of YPF.
When it was privatized,
people had to leave to look for another livelihood.
They abandoned their homes,
in search of new horizons.
Were you adequately paid?
The wages? No problem...
Here, no one was ever needy.
What happened was a crime, a murder.
No one ever imagined this could happen.
Privatizations were done almost without inventories.
YPF left behind lots of things that disappeared.
Large motors, for instance...
Vehicles, new equipment,
drilling bits, tools, clothing...
No track was kept of many items that were never found.
You can dismantle a hangar
without anyone asking questions.
This is what's left of PEXSE,
a company created by the oil-workers union SUPE
to make the workers believe they could be entrepreneurs.
The company went bankrupt, owing us money.
The SUPE executives were in on the fraud.
They knew very well that YPF would be dismantled.
People accepted $40 or $50000 dollars
and agreed to get fired.
They were paid to take a training course in pastry-making,
data processing, anything, for a year.
They accepted privatization and layoffs without a struggle
because they had money in their pockets.
Then they spent this money,
bought a car, enlarged their home, started a business.
Did it create many unemployed?
Between 5000 and 7000, maybe more.
There are no reliable figures,
but it's known to be in the thousands.
There were thousands of us semi-employed,
trying to get by.
The unemployed weren't all from YPF.
Thousands of others came
from the factories and businesses
that also had to close.
Some years later,
during the winter of 1996,
there was a revolt in Cutral-Cô.
We're starving!
We give them gas, oil, electricity!
Unable to find work,
thousands of unemployed blocked the main highway
for days and nights,
in freezing temperatures,
and facing the charges of the state police.
That single victory
created the "piquetero" movement
with its "roadblocks".
I cannot rule on this. The police and I are withdrawing.
This judge ordered the state police to withdraw.
The people has won!
Natural-gas field of Loma de la Lata
Gas del Estado was the pride of the Argentineans.
It was a showpiece for companies all over the world.
Why?
It managed the extraction of gas,
despite of the remoteness of the deposits,
like clockwork.
Europeans copied it, and even some North Americans.
In 50 years of existence,
it provided natural gas to 5 million Argentineans,
whereas in 90 years of British companies,
only 300000 Argentineans got high-priced imported gas.
The Petrobras company estimated that Gas del Estado
was worth 25 billion dollars.
After being appraised by international consultants,
it was sold for 2,5 billion dollars.
- Ten times less? - Precisely.
Repsol polluted the area to such an extent
that the Mapuche Indians
lodged a complaint with international organizations.
Here, a member of our community
built a home
but couldn't move in.
When he dug a well to pump water,
he realized that in fact,
it was gasoline
that was coming out.
This is the pipe...
installed by my father in 1995,
so he could pump water to drink
and irrigate.
You'll see what he got...
It's gasoline.
I'll show you,
It's pure gasoline.
Seven years ago, supposedly,
Repsol decontaminated this area.
What you pump out is almost hi-octane gas.
Not only on these 55 hectares.
The whole ground water is contaminated,
to the very bottom...
Where the ground water begins.
CORPORATISM AND MAFIOCRACY
Menem concludes a pact
with Alfonsín for his re-election,
in exchange for a constitutional reform
that includes new statutes
and an extra senator
for the Radical party.
The "Olivos Pact",
or bi-party pact,
is signed without consultations or debate,
behind the backs of the citizens,
in order to guarantee the continuity of the model.
This reform legitimizes Menem,
who has enacted more than 300 decree-laws,
ten times more than in Argentina's whole history.
The parties have nothing left to propose.
Radicalism and neo-Peronism
are emptied of their substance.
They become organizations
for doling out public appointments:
A corporation of professionals
without any ideology
that infects nearly all political parties,
whose only loyalty is to their own privileges.
The once-powerful CGT workers union
is now a ghost of its former self.
Its zealous association with Menem
finally drove the workers away.
As they hugged each other,
the union bigwigs
betrayed the workers
and amassed private wealth.
The Supreme Court
The court of impunity
No court was as criticized and challenged
as the Menem era court
Argentinean society faults the Supreme Court
for its role in a mafioso pact of impunity
set up in the country in the 1990s.
It is blamed for authorizing and legalizing
the sale of State-owned corporations
at odious prices,
stripping pensioners of their rights,
stripping workers of their rights,
and finally for exonerating politicians
who committed offenses while in public office.
For dozens of years,
no important bureaucrat who committed an offense against the State
has been sentenced.
Menem's second term
Protected by corrupt judges,
the sinister alliance of politicians and union-leaders
with big business,
consolidates the mafiocracy.
Gentlemen, it's no easy task
to lead a country,
especially in such hard and complex times,
where notions like homeland,
common good, morality,
respect of others and social friendship
are so damaged
or discredited...
Eat what?
I have 7 children, no work...
I have nothing.
No mattress, no blanket.
We're totally indigent.
Come see my shack.
Come see it.
See how I live.
Everything's wet. No one helps us.
They must think we're dogs, us and our kids.
I never got help.
I have no right to anything, I'm not paid anything.
I give my youngest some boiled maze or boiled rice.
I have nothing, that's the truth.
I have no way to get another home.
They promised, they put down my name, that's all.
The same as for others.
Mariela, come see...
My sister tells me: "Go to the doctor,
"you're not well, you're so skinny."
I can't take it anymore.
It's intolerable. There's no work,
I can't feed my little girl and that hurts.
She asks when we're going to eat,
but there's nothing.
A child can't understand, but you have to tell the truth.
It hurts to have to say I have nothing, but it's true.
MAFIOCRACY
The mafiocracy unites businessmen, politicians and magistrates,
traffickers and bureaucrats,
union leaders and media moguls.
Their complicity was only matched
by their hypocrisy.
The commission on money-laundering
showed how
the dirty money from drugs and corruption
left Argentina via dummy companies
located mainly in Uruguay,
where they were managed,
toward relay-banks in the U.S. Or in Switzerland.
Money-laundering
We investigated Citibank, Credit Suisse,
Trainers Bank, JP Morgan...
Argentina was the center of their illicit operations,
via Citibank, Banco República,
and Monetta's Federal Bank.
Raúl Monetta: Menem's banker.
Monetta owned
60% of the media in Argentina.
Of the media? Like what?
Like cable channels, Telefé, Azul Televisión,
Radio Continental, Editorial Atlántida, Torneos y Competencias,
provincial cable stations, Cablevisión...
He was also the biggest shareholder of Telefónica Argentina.
And on top of it well-connected
to political power and the Supreme Court.
The very same Supreme Court that allowed
telephonic rates to be altered
favoring France Telecom and Telefónica
against international competition.
Curiously, it seems
that a member of the Supreme Court,
a cousin by marriage of Monetta's lawyer,
received $800000 dollars
sent to the Citibank of New York.
What are the global estimates
of kickbacks connected to privatizations?
- Between 5 and 10 billion dollars. - And who were the perpetrators?
Mainly Cavallo, Menem and Kohan,
in the last ten years,
and for money-laundering, the Banco General de Negocios.
We also discovered
bribes paid during Alfonsín's government,
mainly to the central Bank,
from the BCCI, a bank that laundered drug-money,
that financed 80% of Menem's campaign.
There is a definite complicity between the political class,
the narcotraffickers,
and encouragement of capital flight.
Kickbacks
Plunder of public funds
via dividends and rate-overcharging
was the norm for government contracts.
Over 20% of government investments is estimated
to have vanished in "commissions".
Minister Manzano said, referring to the President:
"I steal for the crown."
A major source of corruption was the PAMI,
the pensioners' health-insurance organization.
The system of illicit contracts
made with companies owned by bureaucrats
lasted during several governments.
A monument to corruption
The Yacyretá Dam, N.E. Argentina
Yacyretá is one of the biggest earthfill dams in the world,
with a retaining dam on the river Paraná
that is 67km long.
This huge worksite, financed by Argentineans,
fed the country's slush funds,
ever since the dictatorship.
How did corruption at Yacyretá dam operate?
Overestimation of costs,
overdue work schedules.
Today, the site, is still not completed,
and still generates costs.
It has reached 13 billion dollars...
And we still don't know when it will end.
5 times the estimate?
I'll give you an example:
In 1985, there was a cost reappraisal
estimated at 30 million dollars,
that was presented several times to the World Bank
and the Inter-American Bank of Development.
It was finally signed in 1989
for 180 million dollars.
Many accepted it.
Some didn't.
They were excluded from Yacyretá by the auditors.
- You, among others? - Yes.
- Who headed the auditing firm? - Mr. Carretoni.
He was campaign-manager for Alfonsín,
then for Angeloz.
A member of the Assembly?
Yes, for the reform of the Constitution in 1994.
Mr. Carretoni, owned the leading auditing firm in Argentina,
and was the father-in-law of the construction company's boss.
Say that again...
Mr. Carretoni
was the father-in-law of Mr. Risso.
So the head of the audit cabinet that had to control costs,
completion date and technical quality,
was the builder's father-in-law?
Precisely.
Arms smuggling
We sent arms to Ecuador,
that was at war with Peru,
when Argentina was guaranteeing a truce between the two countries.
We also sent arms to Croatia and Bosnia,
violating UN dispositions.
Those implicated were the Army factories,
the top army brass, the Río Tercero factory,
through which most arms passed
coming from the North, a free-zone.
What happened?
The Río Tercero factory was blown up, causing 7 deaths.
As I started a procedure in March, 1995,
they tried to erase all traces of the explosion,
all documents, inventories, fingerprints,
anything that could prove
that it wasn't an accident,
but a planned act to conceal their crime.
Who was part of this plot?
Its leader was
an ex-president of the republic, Carlos Menem,
but many others are implicated.
Many other shady events occurred:
"Suicides",
accidental deaths...
A helicopter crashed
opposite the race track, on a polo field,
causing the death of a key figure...
General Andreoli...
The "suicide" with his wrong hand of Captain Estrada,
who had been part of the "terror groups",
during the country's darkest hours.
Today,
a question needs to be clarified:
Where's the money they stole?
Carlos Menem, his brother-in-law Emir Yoma,
Cavallo and others,
implicated in arms smuggling,
were arrested.
But the Supreme Court set them free.
These offenses concerned leaders at all levels.
Ministers, judges, top bureaucrats
were hauled into law-courts for corruption.
Neo-Peronists: Alberto Kohan,
Gerardo Sofovich, Juan Carlos Alderete,
Matilde Menéndez, María Julia Alsogaray,
Carlos Grosso, Claudia Bello,
Triaca, Dadone, Grisanti,
Amira and Emir Yoma, Vico and Spadone.
Radical civil servants:
Delconte, Mazorino and many others.
Presidential candidates: Angeloz and Massachessi.
I'll lead the struggle against corruption.
All the cases were dismissed
The threats concerned
a gold exporting business,
with phony financial records.
The gold mafia
"If you don't want trouble...
Drug trafficking
"...stay out of this." They slashed my arm.
During the Menem years...
"Parallel" Customs officers
... the mafiosi thrived under an obliging government,
and have ever since.
The Buenos Aires police mafia
Among their deeds: Abductions for extortion,
murders...
IBM-Banco Nación affair
... car thefts,
trigger-happy deaths,
fake accidents and unexplained suicides.
Deadly bomb attacks
Israeli Embassy
AMIA Jewish center
106 deaths
Crimes still unpunished
The betrayals of the Alliance
In the Argentina of the mafia organizations,
the Alliance campaigns
on promises to create jobs and fight corruption,
but without altering the economic model or the foreign debt.
Made up of the Radical party
and center-left parties,
it promises to investigate bureaucrats, but disregards
corrupt privatizations
or financial plundering.
Good luck!
The team of Fernando De la Rúa and Carlos Alvarez
beats the neo-Peronist candidate Eduardo Duhalde.
The new government continues the IMF's recessionist policy.
Long live De la Rúa!
Don't disappoint us!
Once more,
the voters mandate is betrayed:
Civil servants' salaries are lowered
and taxes raised.
In Spain, De la Rúa, offers to extend
the concession of Argentina's richest gas reserves,
Loma de la Lata,
to the Repsol oil company.
Worth 50 billion dollars,
they are illicitly surrendered
for 300 million dollars.
The government bribes the Senate
to get it to pass a controversial labor law.
Vice-president Alvarez doesn't question the law,
but wants the bribery investigated.
I hereby resign irrevocably
as vice-president of the Nation,
so as not to harm the President,
or jeopardize our institutions...
Alvarez abandons his voters
and works for the return of Cavallo.
Appointed again as a super-Minister, Cavallo renegotiates the debt.
This operation, baptized "mega-exchange",
is another swindle that costs the country
55 billion dollars.
The "Argentinean miracle" ended in social disaster.
Cavallo's plans wiped out the middle class,
made the rich richer
and the poor poorer.
60% of the wealth
wound up in the hands of the richest 10%.
People are suffering!
People are hungry!
We're not guerrillas!
De la Rúa opts for repression:
Two unemployed youths are murdered in Corrientes,
as a bridge is cleared of protesters,
3 "piqueteros" are gunned down in Salta and Jujuy.
Never had an elected president
caused so many deaths in such short time.
SOCIAL GENOCIDE
Here, we foresaw exactly
the effects of the austerity plans
adopted by the country. The well-known austerity plans,
of the era of Alfonsín, of Menem...
These measures meant the hospital would receive
a huge number of underfed people,
underfed kids with their families.
We would say to each other:
"This one, in 2 or 3 months, will need a bed."
An incredible number of undernourished kids.
We said: Enough! In 1982, we took to the streets,
formed a major movement, that the press took up,
and reached the whole country.
But the policy continued.
The policy of austerity...
Each time it was like a stab in the back for us doctors.
We knew that 4 to 6 months later,
the kids born then would be so poorly fed
that a huge amount of them would wind up in here.
That's why we wrote this text saying:
"Others decide, but we see them dying."
When we started to find out what to do,
we translated books from English.
We found some solutions there for balancing liquids,
salts, and proteins.
But we were so overcrowded,
and then we read a little Argentinean book,
by a man called Juan P. Garrahan...
He wrote: "Undernourishment
"is a socio-economic and cultural disease
that can be cured by giving everyone a job."
He doesn't say: "By giving food to everyone."
That triggered things off, we got it...
Why send an undernourished kid home?
What's the country doing?
We had a scientific approach,
but this year, it's become exponential.
Before, we had about 18% underfed kids.
Now it's close to 80%.
In garbage dumps, all those abandoned children,
pregnant girls of 14 or 15,
the kids called "nobody's kids",
only eat every other day.
Should I tell a 14-year old mother:
"To fight your baby's diarrhea,
"you need chicken, polenta, milk,
"clean water..."
It's totally unethical,
an inconceivable cruelty.
How can I say that, if she's eating garbage?
These children live on garbage.
The survivors of the 3rd generation of underfed people
are giving birth to these kids.
A lot of kids die.
Those that survive
are smaller, weaker, and have less intellectual capacity.
But they're people like any others, with feelings.
To consider them...
as a sub-species of society,
is revolting.
They're people like you and me.
They have the same rights as others,
they suffer like others,
if their child dies or gets sick,
they have a right to a home, with drinking water,
and food daily, and a job.
We speak of human rights...
What rights do these people have,
when they're put down this way?
I really feel
that a certain part of society
wants to get rid of these people.
As if they were bothered by them.
What part?
We know who: Those who grabbed everything.
90% are paupers, and 10% own everything.
That's not a system...
I'm 54 and it's always the same.
That same old austerity.
They always go back to the same things.
They don't give a damn.
And the kids
have no place at the table and aren't fed.
The people we don't want to see in this country
are those who are born, who live and die
without ID's, without legal existence.
The other Argentina, the hidden one.
Those who've been excluded,
for whom nothing is done,
who shouldn't be allowed to reproduce,
who should be taken out of circulation,
of whom no one dares say yet: "Let's hide them."
When our country
produces enough commodities to feed
300 million people,
the level of poverty denounced
in the film "The Hour of the Furnaces"
in the 1960s,
never foresaw the incredible neo-liberal genocide of the 1990s.
Curable diseases and undernourishment
cause every day in Argentina
the death of 55 children,
35 youths and adults
and 10 elderly people.
An average of 35000 people per year.
The international organizations
This country was held up to the world
as a model to follow.
The IMF
applauded Menem in Washington
for the "Argentinean miracle."
President, this photo will be great for me.
- For me, too. - I don't know...
They say that a photo with the devil is dangerous.
Come on...
Our government's responsibility in social genocide
doesn't exonerate international organizations, or their proxies,
the United States and Europe,
or the unfair North-South commercial relationships.
These neo-racist programs
that generated huge profits at the cost of segregation
and the premature death of millions of people,
are peacetime crimes against humanity.
Their authors
cannot go unpunished.
A quarter of century later,
the economic results are disastrous:
The public and private debt rose from 7,8 billion
to 170 billion dollars,
and 150 billion more were paid out for services,
and a similar sum was sent abroad.
Argentina lost another 150 billion
because of agricultural subsidies in Europe and the U.S.
Since 1999,
growth is non-existent,
and the country is heading toward devaluation
and bankruptcy.
THE BEGINNING OF THE END
Going over this memoir,
it may appear that the reality can't be changed,
that the plunderers won the day,
and we are the losers.
It's closer to the opposite:
Neither the dictatorship, Menem, or De la Rúa
brought their projects to fruition,
and the wealth they gave away isn't lost forever:
It can be recovered.
The neo-liberal model ended in a mass sell-off,
but those responsible weren't able to sell everything:
Not the major public banks,
or the big Río Santiago shipyards,
or the nuclear power plants, or Yacyretá,
or Salto Grande, or Epec.
Menem and De la Rúa
weren't able to impose a repressive solution,
or to silence the protests
against mafioso and police crimes,
or to stop the persistent action of the Mothers,
Grandmothers and Children of the "disappeared".
A new spirit kept them at bay:
That of all the struggles, the rallying to causes,
in the social movements that grew during the decade:
The local organizations,
the "piqueteros", canteens, and neighborhood assemblies,
the occupation of land and settlements,
the huge nation-wide march and hundreds of other marches,
national strikes...
the CTA movement,
the factories reclaimed by the workers,
the successive demos of pensioners,
the struggles of women farmhands,
students and bank depositors,
storekeepers, artists...
It all led to the big December, 2001 uprising:
As on October 17, 1945 and in Côrdoba in 1969,
Argentinean history was changed.
My heart has closed up tight
so it can survive
Living so I can save
my skin, which is all I have left
My soul is wasting away
Don't think, don't protest
Don't even try, don't interfere
Anyway, nothing makes sense
Our lives are preordained
In this apocalyptic comedy
We're all headed for the slaughterhouse
We're not eliminated the same old way
Now we're told to make ourselves disappear
Asking questions without answers
Protesting without hassling anyone
Domesticated, neutralized, paralyzed
When will we wake up?
There's no work, might as well split
Human dignity is as good as dead
Everything's hanging by a thread
What's difference between dead or alive?
I refuse to shut my mouth now
I'm not here to spread around bad news
They haven't won yet, so choose
You got balls or not?
I'm bug 'em, but they listen to me
Friend I'm not scared to go against the grain
And I encourage all those who fight
To join us in our struggle
My heart has closed up tight
so it can survive
Living so I can save
my skin, which is all I have left
That's the bind we're in
My soul's an empty shell
I want a miracle to make us wake up
I want a miracle to make everyone rise up
Don't expect anything from destiny
What we need is for the earth to quake
I'm gonna talk and act, I won't stop
My poetry's gonna penetrate your soul
and if it enters through the wrong hole,
You put the vaseline there, pal...
Dammit to hell!
Let's kill 'em all!
In the face of these violent events,
let's not get carried away...
President De la Rúa resigns
"I'll only like
"Cavallo and De la Rúa
"when they are in jail!"
34 deaths
First Argentinean victory against globalization
Carlos Menem pulls out of the run-off
in the 2003 presidential elections.
Néstor Kirchner is elected President of Argentina.
The information contained in this film
came from official Argentinean and international sources
Subtitles: A. Whitelaw
Subtitling Titra Film Paris