After a marathon session of more than 12 hours, the ruling party managed to approve in the Chamber of Deputies the agreement with the IMF to refinance the USD 44 billion debt contracted by Mauricio Macri in 2018. The voting closed with 202 positive votes, 37 negative and 13 abstentions.

After having maintained his position in the strictest secrecy throughout the afternoon, Máximo Kirchner and the deputies of his space chose to go down to the premises at the last moment. La Cámpora voted negatively, as did the three legislators from Patria Grande. The Front of All had 28 negative votes

The Libertarian deputies also rejected the project -with strong speeches by Javier Milei and José Lus Espert-, the two from the Clasista and Combative Current, Ricardo López Murphy and the four from the Left Front interblock. The vote finally came after 3 in the morning.

At the end of the session, from Together for Change they once again questioned the irresponsibility of Kirchnerism. “If we were not here tonight, Argentina would go into default”, they assured Infobae.

For their part, the ruling party bench was satisfied with the number of total affirmative votes and stressed that the result confirmed that they chose “the right trading strategy”. It should be noted that if Together for Change decided to abstain as it stated before reaching an agreement with the ruling party, the positive votes (77) would have been less than the total abstentions.

At the beginning of the day, the absence of Máximo Kirchner during the call to give a quorum had been a first alarm signal for the ruling party, which was still unaware of its position when it came to voting. The leader of La Cámpora, who recently resigned as head of the bloc in rejection of the agreement, was in his office but decided not to participate in the debate. The session began with 129 deputies in the room, the exact number to start the debate.

The empty chair of Máximo Kirchner fueled speculation throughout the afternoon about the position that hard-line Kirchnerism would assume since a score of deputies could be absent, abstain or directly vote against. Finally, the last alternative was confirmed, which represents a serious blow to the unity of the Frente de Todos and to the governability of Alberto Fernández for the next two years.

Averaging the afternoon in the ruling party they recognized that a unanimous vote was never in the forecasts. A deputy told Infobae thatGermán Martínez had only one request to the members of the bloc who were going to speak: go through the debate calmly and avoid outbursts. Something that was respected.

Another sign of the fracture within the ruling party came minutes before 7:00 p.m. when the heads of the blocs finished agreeing on the number of individual speakers: among the 80 deputies who asked to speak were not Máximo Kirchner nor any legislator identified with The Campora.

During the first hours of the debate, in the vicinity of the Congress, there were incidents with leftist groups that gathered in the square to reject the agreement. Hooded men burned rubber bands, threw stones at the windows in front of the building and threw a Molotov cocktail at the uniformed men. The City Police ended up evacuating the area. The chaos that was experienced in the streets did not filter into the interior of the enclosure and the weather was calm throughout the afternoon.

Yesterday, the president of the Chamber of Deputies, Sergio Massa, and the head of the ruling caucus, Germán Martínez, led the negotiations with the opposition to be able to advance in the plenary session of the Budget and Finance commissions with a unified opinion.

The Government yielded to the demands of Together for Change and eliminated from the wording all references to the economic program designed by Martín Guzmán and negotiated with the technical staff of the ruling party. The annexes that contained the plan and the goals negotiated with the IMF staff were excluded from the project. That had been the opposition’s main objection since the deal was announced. Only the loan was approved.

“Approved, in accordance with the provisions of article 75, paragraph 7 of the National Constitution and under the terms of article 2 of Law 27,612, the public credit operations contained in the “Extended Facilities Program” to be held between the Executive Power National and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for the cancellation of the “Stand By Agreement” duly entered into in 2018 and for budgetary support. The National Executive Power will sign, in use of its faculties, the necessary instruments to comply with what is established in the preceding paragraph”, marked the agreed paragraph.