The state interventionism that the Argentine president, Javier Milei, abhors, generously fed his family and himself. The transportation companies of which his father, Norberto Milei, was president and shareholder received subsidies from the State for at least 33 million dollars between 2005 and 2007, during the Government of Néstor Kirchner. With that money, the far-right president and his sister, Karina Milei, acquired a car and an apartment, as revealed by a journalistic investigation based on official data. From the Casa Rosada there was no formal response to the revelation, but informally they sought to downplay its importance by pointing out that these were events that occurred years ago and that they involved third parties, not the president.
After starting out as a bus driver, Norberto Milei became a shareholder and owner of three transportation companies in the metropolitan area of Buenos Aires. The head of the business group was the firm Francisco de Viedma Sociedad Anónima, formed in 2001, whose function was to control the company Teniente General Roca SA, in turn controlling half of the shares of the company Rocaraza SA. With Milei Sr. as president, and initially as a majority shareholder as well, as recorded in the firms’ balance sheets, the group operated four bus lines that cross the City of Buenos Aires and its surroundings.
The Ministry of Transportation of the Nation distributed state subsidies to Lieutenant General Roca SA and Rocaraza SA for million-dollar amounts. Between 2005 and mid-2007 they received at least the then equivalent of 33 million dollars. The information comes from the forms filed by that organization, in accordance with the joint investigation of the DiarioAR and The nationcoordinated by the Latin American Center for Journalistic Investigation (CLIP) and published this Wednesday.
However, the companies documented the receipt of amounts much smaller than those disbursed by the national State. With the signature of the father of the current president, the balance sheets presented to the General Inspection of Justice (IGJ) declared that the contribution of subsidies represented between 2003 and 2007 the equivalent then of about 10 million dollars, that is, less than a third of what is recorded in the forms of the Ministry of Transportation.
Help and inheritance
State help was key to consolidating the fortune of the presidential family. The transport subsidy policy, established by the Peronist governments after the political, social and economic crisis of 2001 in Argentina, allowed the firm Teniente General Roca SA, which had declared insolvent and had opened bankruptcy in 2002 , pay your debts.
Beto Milei, as the president’s father is known, sold his shareholding in the bus companies in 2006, but continued as an executive of the group until mid-2007. He then launched other business ventures linked to transportation and agricultural exploitation. And he also benefited his children. Karina Milei, today general secretary of the Presidency, was able to acquire a 150 square meter apartment in one of the most affluent areas of Vicente López, in the Buenos Aires suburbs. In her sworn statement before the Anti-Corruption Office (OA), He reported that it was an “inheritance.” Javier Milei accessed a Ford Ecosport 2.0 vehicle, 2005 model, which he later sold and, adding other resources, bought a Peugeot RCZ. His statement before the OA assures that he acquired it in 2013 with “his own funds.”
While the Argentine president has promised to eliminate all forms of state subsidies, and repeats at every opportunity that the State is “a criminal organization” to be eradicated, his father, in his role as a transportation businessman, recognized the contribution of the public coffers. to the sector and, incidentally, requested more funds, as stated in the 2003 Report of the firm Teniente General Roca SA: “We cannot ignore the effort that the national Government has been making to alleviate this emergency situation of our activity, avoiding generating an increase in costs for the population that uses the service by granting subsidies to companies, in any case it is clear that it has been and is insufficient.”
Unpaid taxes
Perhaps there is some point of agreement between Milei father and son in their relationship with taxes. President Milei has defined them as “a robbery.” His father’s companies, meanwhile, accumulated million-dollar debts with the State for not paying them. The journalistic investigation coordinated by CLIP revealed that the firms left unpaid settlements from the Federal Public Revenue Administration (AFIP), the National Social Security Administration (ANSES) and the Buenos Aires Collection Agency (ARBA). The Rocaraza firm, for example, entered into a moratorium plan in 2005 for debts on taxes known as Gross Income and Vehicle Filing. A court ruling determined in 2005 that the firm Teniente General Roca SA evaded taxes. Beto Milei himself had a similar performance as a taxpayer and added four tax executions initiated by the AFIP before the judicial courts.
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