Peronists want to use pandemic to redevelop all low-income neighborhoods in Argentina

Congressman Máximo Kirchner, son of Nestor and Cristina Kirchner, former presidents and current Vice President of Argentina, is spearheading the Plan San Martín, an ambitious project to urbanize all low-income neighborhoods in the city and suburbs of Buenos Aires with the support of activist Juan Grabois, mayor Horacio Rodríguez Larreta, and province governor Axel Kicillof.

Grabois, head of the Confederation of Workers for the Popular Economy (CTEP), spoke on several occasions about his "Creole Marshall Plan," designed for use the day after the coronavirus, which even contemplated the possibility of "giving land to small farmers".

The government received the project and to prevent it from dying before starting a national debate on private property, it turned it into a plan that has the approval of even the conservative mayor of Buenos Aires.

The San Martín plan calls for an investment of US$3.2 billion over three years, which coincides with the term of President Alberto Fernández. It is modelled on the law of the National Registry of Popular Neighbourhoods in the Process of Urban Integration (Renabap), presented by Elisa Carrió, Mario Negri and Nicolás Massot. Máximo praised the law last month, when he winked at Larreta in the middle of a congressional session.

With the collaboration of social movements like Grabois, Cáritas and Un Techo para mi país, Renabap identified 4,228 popular neighborhoods in cities with more than 10,000 inhabitants throughout the country. More than 1,600 are in the province of Buenos Aires, and although only 53 of them are in the city, some of the most populous towns in the country are in Buenos Aires territory. It is estimated that more than 3.5 million people live in these low-income neighborhoods.

The law, which allows for the expropriation of land to be developed through the creation of a socio-urban integration and regularization regime, was passed in 2018 during the government of Mauricio Macri and with the support of the Kirchnerists. Plunged into the economic crisis that led him to turn to the IMF, Macri never addressed the plan after the law was passed.

Using a trust to finance expropriations, integrated with the federal government, the provinces, and the municipalities, a national appraisal committee and the State Property Administration Agency intervene. The initial idea did not include the construction of housing but rather sewage, electricity, water, and natural gas projects. But the Minister of Territorial Development and Housing, María Eugenia Bielsa, also took part in the plan. This weekend, in a conversation with news agency Télam, Bielsa announced a "national agreement" on the redevelopment of low-income neighborhoods and settlements in the country, to make them "worthy of housing and compliance with rights".

The Minister of Social Development, Daniel Arroyo, also participates in the plan through the cooperativesd in the mega plan "Potenciar trabajo", which has 580,000 beneficiaries under social programs. The plan includes construction, recycling, textile, personal care and food cooperatives. It will be through the construction cooperatives that the workforce for the San Martin project will be obtained.

In addition, the company Aysa and Acumar, responsible for cleaning up the Riachuelo, could also participate. In the meantime, Grabois is negotiating with Larreta so that the funds from the sales of public properties made by the City will be used for the urbanization plan of the communities.

Grabois has total control of the Secretary of Social and Urban Integration in the ministry headed by Bielsa. There he placed two leaders of the CTEP, Fernanda Miño and Fernanda García Monticelli. Along with attorney García Monticelli (leader of the Movement of Excluded Workers, MTE) Miño worked on the elaboration of the Renabap.