Pope Francis and Javier Milei will have plenty to talk about together on February 11th at the Vatican. While these days Argentinian protesters have staged the biggest opposition show against the new liberal president's plan to reshape the South American country with a national strike that has closed schools and businesses, beyond the Tiber the meeting is confirmed. The occasion is the upcoming canonization of an Argentine figure, who died at the end of the 1700s and is particularly loved by the masses of the poor who live in the villas miserias, Mama Antulas, a kind of Mother Teresa who spent herself for the last, for the indios, and for those who were enslaved at the time by the Spanish colonists. Practically the symbol of a Church close to those who have nothing and are oppressed by despotic power.
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Francis did not hide his concern about the neoliberal turn in Argentina. During the election campaign of Milei, an economist rather eccentric for some of his public outings and for this nicknamed "El Loco" (the madman), he did not hesitate to define Bergoglio as the shadow leader of left-wing Peronism, adding a series of offensive epithets never heard before from a politician towards a pope. The Pope never responded to those attacks but when Milei was duly elected he did not hesitate to contact him for an institutional phone call. The conversation reported by some Argentine newspapers summarized a cordial and strategic exchange: Milei invited Francis to visit Argentina assuring him that he would have given him a triumphant welcome and the Pope let him know that he had never taken offense at the insults. Something he also repeated yesterday to the newspaper La Stampa, underlining that what is said during the election campaign always slides away and is said just for the sake of saying.
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In the agenda Milei and the Pope have set an important appointment that will serve both to understand their respective margins of maneuver. Francis will most likely make a moral suasion operation not to make too drastic economic cuts against the poorest, protecting the fragile sections of the population. Milei, however, will bring home a photo opportunity that is worth him as a kind of viaticum. The rest will be seen.
In the meantime, Milei's decree and the bill to save a country from default involves a wave of privatizations, fierce spending cuts, an expansion of presidential powers and a downsizing of workers' rights. Nine of the 18 government ministries have already been closed, including those responsible for education, the environment, and women, gender and diversity. The Argentine currency, the peso, has been devalued by over 50% against the dollar. Milei will have to explain to Pope Francis why these moves will save Argentina from the "economic hell" of the Peronists. Monthly inflation has reached 25.5% compared to 12.8% in November. Annual inflation has reached a three-decade high of 211.4%.
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