Milei criticizes the late former president Raúl Alfonsín; Opposition politicians reject the attacks and defend the former president

() – The president of Argentina, Javier Milei, criticized this Wednesday the late former president Raúl Alfonsín whom, according to the president, “they show him as the father of democracy, even though he was a supporter of a coup d’état.”

Milei made these statements during a forum in Córdoba, where he spoke about the measures that his Government has taken to try to reduce inflation, and on the same day that the 41st anniversary of the Day of the Restoration of Democracy, as the day is known, was commemorated. date on which Alfonsín was elected president—October 30, 1983—and which marked the end of the military dictatorship that extended from 1976 to 1983. This coincidence and Milei’s own words generated annoyance among some political sectors.

During his speech, Milei said that, during the Alfonsín Government, from 1983 to 1989, there was hyperinflation in Argentina and that when he began his mandate last year there was a social situation that, in his opinion, was worse than what existed in the economic crisis of 2001, which led to a social outbreak and the resignation of the then president Fernando de la Rúa.

“And, in addition, we also had social indicators that were worse than those in December 2001, prior to the fall of convertibility and the coup d’état promoted by (Eduardo) Duhalde and Alfonsín, which, paradoxically, shows Alfonsín as the father of democracy, being that he was a supporter of a coup d’état,” accused Milei, referring to the 2001 crisis as a “coup d’état” and without showing evidence of his statements and without recording historical or journalistic investigations of the time. or later that involve Alfonsín or Duhalde in a conspiracy of that type.

In fact, Duhalde, who had been Carlos Menem’s vice president and governor of the province of Buenos Aires, was a senator when he was appointed interim president by Congress in the midst of an institutional crisis in which five leaders succeeded one another in 11 days. With the political support of Alfonsín and his party, in addition to Peronism, Duhalde headed a transitional government in the midst of a severe situation of cessation of external payments, business bankruptcies, unemployment and families in homelessness, and managed to stabilize the situation until he could call elections in 2003. is trying to contact Duhalde to get his reaction to Milei’s statements.

Regarding Milei’s own fight against inflation, the National Institute of Statistics and Censuses reported a slight increase in prices in August, a month in which a price increase of 4.2% was recorded, two tenths more than in July . In September Milei presented the budget for 2025 warning that he will veto laws that go against his fiscal strategy. Milei took office on December 10, after winning the second round of the 2023 elections.

The leadership of the Unión Cívica Radical (UCR) party, to which Alfonsín belonged, considered that Milei’s attacks on the former president are “a provocation in which a truly democratic president should never fall.”

“Lying about Raúl Alfonsín’s democratic commitment is not only an unjustified insult to his memory, it is an affront to the Argentine people,” the UCR said in a statement published on its X account.

The Block of National Deputies of the UCR also rejected Milei’s statements and highlighted Alfonsín as “a tireless defender of human rights and justice in Latin America, even during the dictatorship.”

Deputy Martín Lousteau, who is also president of the national committee of the UCR, said in

Deputy Sergio Omar Palazzo, from the opposition Union for the Homeland bloc, also rejected Milei’s statements.

“Alfonsín will go down in history as the democratic president that he was, as the transparent man with great ideas that he was and will go down in history for his political generosity to improve the lives of Argentines, while Milei will surely remain in the suburbs of the history as an unintended consequence of the democratic system,” he said in X.

Gustavo López, former vice president of the National Communications Agency, expressed himself in a similar sense, who on the same social network pointed out that Milei “crossed all limits by accusing the father of our democracy of being a coup leader.”