Global Courant
The reference of the Carlos Melconian Mediterranean Foundation will meet next Tuesday with his team made up of 70 professionals to outline the portfolio that he will present to the next president. And he announced that the comprehensive economic plan will be concentrated in “twelve photos.”
“We will review all the issues we are working on. Macro, energy, work, social policy, modernization of the State, agriculture… all areas,” anticipated the former president of Banco Nación.
Although recently he was linked to Patricia Bullrich, presidential candidate for Together for Change, Melconian generalized that the project “is set for the next president of Argentina.”
“If it is from Together for Change, it will be from Together for Change. We are going to put the program on the table in a patriotic act. Afterwards, each one reserves the right to accept to put it into practice or not, but we are working for that”, he assured in dialogue with radio Miter.
Regarding some of those “twelve photos of a structural nature” that the government that takes office on December 10 must resolve, he explained: “A hole in fiscal policy, a suffocating tax policy, explosive and unfinanced public spending, a Central Bank bankrupt, backward export policies, trade agreements we don’t know about, and a fight with the world”.
As I suggest, each of those “macro” issues to be resolved have a “micro” detail. And he mentioned some: “If next week the Fund is paid and if it continues or not; if there is going to be a STEP and who wins it; what signal does the STEP give and how is August versus October”.
“All these details have to go to metamorphose those 12 structural photos that we present and with which we know we are going to find ourselves. It is forbidden to say here ‘I did not know what I was going to find with this,'” he warned.
Stopping the monetary issue was highlighted by Melconian as one of the priorities. “Reducing the inflation rate is the best job that can be done for the salary. And that is incompatible with continuing to issue currency in this magnitude, supposedly to help the poor,” he explained.
“It will be necessary to explain to the people that, once again, what will punish them is the inflation rate, which is a fiscal and monetary phenomenon of impossible financing that is done with the issuance of currency,” he added.
When asked about reducing the deficit, he slipped that “there are different variants”, but it is not possible to “go to extremes”. And he exemplified: “It is one thing to point out where you are going and another thing is to want to go overboard announcing the first day that you are going to become Germany. And that is out of the question. That does not exist.”
On the other hand, the economist spoke again about two important transitions. The first, “now”, he defined it as “taking advantage of and pointing out the costs of populism.”
“At some point the second is going to start. It’s how the one who leaves and the one who comes together patriotically so as not to leave him 100% stupid. I know it’s utopian. Sometimes I feel like an idiot saying this, but I dream about it “, He launched.
“The history of Argentina shows that you leave, but one day you can come back. So, come, sit down and talk. I’ll stay in charge of this hot potato, but we are going to explain to people that I have to do A, B and C because you are leaving this,” he exclaimed.
Talking to the IMF “like an adult country”
Regarding the turbulent negotiations that the current government had with the International Monetary Fund, Melconian recalled that he had contact “20 years professionally” with the organization, and warned: “If at any time I have to represent the country in formal dialogue, I will do it.”
In this sense, he questioned the last meetings held: “We would be very stupid if we had to go and ask what program to do. You go to the IMF when you don’t have a program, when you have it up for grabs and when they impose something on you against that chute. Here I have to lose 20 kilos for my health, not because the Fund tells me to,” he ironized.
He suggested “going to a serious, adult country negotiation” to “eliminate the question of ‘who is in charge there in Argentina’.”
“They are not going to ask that question anymore. All that ends. You have to sit down with a foreign policy, an orderly economic policy, you go with the mandate of the President, you have to go with a team. Suddenly the minister does not even go “, he pointed out.
Finally, he remarked that “it is not a coincidence that the few periods where the economy worked well in Argentina there was somehow a unification in the management of the economy.”
“Not to be confused with super ministers. Politics has learned that the unification of the ministry makes common sense. The success of politics is the success of the economy. And you can give the minister the unified leadership of everything you can think of but If you don’t have the slightest political support, you won’t go anywhere, you have to go home,” he concluded.
