Argentina Cristina Kirchner denounces being the victim of a "firing squad"
Argentina Alberto Fernández appoints three ministers after three resignations in a government adrift
Argentina attended a historic sentence on Tuesday: a federal court sentenced Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, twice president and current vice president of the Nation, to six years in prison and perpetual disqualification from holding public office for defrauding the State.
The number of diverted money is impressive: one billion dollars.
Never before in Argentina had a vice president in office been convicted by the Justice.
In the case of Fernández de Kirchner, 69, the sentence takes on even greater significance, because
she is the most influential and polarizing leader of the last two decades in the country.
The prosecution requested 12 years and perpetual disqualification from holding public office, but the Federal Oral Court 2 determined that they were half.
At the time of being sentenced, Fernández de Kirchner was in the exercise of the Presidency of the Nation, since the head of state,
Alberto Fernández
, traveled to Montevideo, Uruguay, on Tuesday to attend the Mercosur Summit.
The relationship between the president and the vice president is brimming with tension
and dialogue is scarce.
Despite the conviction,
Fernández de Kirchner will not go to prison
: she has the possibility of appealing and is also protected by special privileges as vice president.
In the event that the sentence is confirmed in the appeal instances,
the prison would be home
, a benefit that those over 70 years of age have in Argentina.
After reading the sentence,
Fernández de Kirchner planned to speak on his social networks.
The two-time president (2007-2015) has been denouncing that the sentence was already "written" and that she is being persecuted from an alliance between "real power", politics and justice that she summarizes in one word:
lawfare
.
A few days ago, the widow of
Néstor Kirchner
, president between 2003 and 2007, was less subtle: she said she was no longer facing a judicial sentence, but rather
a "firing squad"
.
The metaphor is not accidental: on September 1, a man put a gun on her face.
He fired and the bullet did not come out, but the former president is convinced that there are powers that want to eliminate her, either through the courts or through physical means.
The sentence came on a day of overwhelming heat in Buenos Aires and in a week in which the Argentines had their interest in two issues: the sentence in the trial of the vice president and the fate of the national soccer team this Friday in the Quarterfinals of the World Cup in Qatar 2022 against the Netherlands.
Cristina Kirchner and Lionel Messi as protagonists of the burning end of the southern spring.
The hours before the sentence was known were more than difficult in the center of the Argentine capital.
Piquetero groups blocked traffic on Avenida 9 de Julio
, the main artery of Buenos Aires, and threatened to spend the night there in tents.
In this way, they supported Fernández de Kirchner, who also had the support of a couple of hundred demonstrators outside the headquarters of the Federal Courts, in which she was not present.
How did the most decisive political leader of the last two decades in the third largest economy in Latin America get to this situation?
The ruling confirmed that the vice president of Alberto Fernández headed during his two presidencies a system that, through public works contracts, defrauded the State by
directing million-dollar contracts
for road works in the Patagonian province of Santa Cruz, which the Kirchners control. for three decades.
Prosecutors
Diego Luciani and Sergio Mola
affirmed that the contracted works were incomplete, overpriced and even unnecessary.
Lázaro Báez
, the man who went from a simple teller at the Banco de Santa Cruz to a construction magnate, received all the contracts.
Through different channels, that money later reached the Kirchners.
To divert funds, "Lázaro Báez, a friend of the then President of the Nation and a business partner of him and his wife, became a construction businessman overnight," Luciani explained.
Báez has already been sentenced to 12 years in prison for money laundering
, a sentence appealed by his defense.
Despite the devastating evidence of the prosecution and the sentence of the Federal Court, there is a very important group of Argentines who believes that Cristina, as she is popularly known in the country, is the victim of a conspiracy and totally innocent of the charges against her. they accuse her.
And there is another sector that maintains a similar position, although with nuances:
yes, Cristina and her husband may have stolen
, but to do politics and support the "national and popular project" you need "caja", money to confront the established powers .
For many other Argentines, largely voters of the opposition coalition Together for Change,
the conviction of Fernández de Kirchner is a fact that was celebrated with the intensity and joy of a World Cup victory.
The sentence in the case of diversion of funds for public works has a very important collateral effect: the sentence and the evidence contained in it
can serve as a basis to activate other judicial processes
in which the vice president is involved, and which also involve to his children.
Máximo is a national deputy, so he has privileges, but Florencia is not politically active and does not enjoy that special protection.
That situation is, say those who know the former president, the issue that worries her the most.
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