[Marxism] Re: Argentina: violent confrontation among Peronists over Peron's corpse, many wounded

[Carlos Petroni]

Eric:

Here is a brief answer to your question:

The CGT (General Confederation of Workers) organized the transfer of Gral. Peron's
remains from a cemetery to a new mausoleum/museum in San Vicente.

This was to coincide with the conmemoration of October 17, 1945 mass
demonstrations of workers that liberated Peron from jail and eventually
led to his ascent to power through elections the same year.

More than 60 years after that event, and after two presidencies, one ended
by a reactionary coup (1955) and the second by his death (1974), Peron
remained one of the most powerful figures in Argentinean history.

So, different sectors of the Peronist party now in government are disputing
as to their right to be the heirs of Peron's legacy.

Different groupings of the CGT, led by one of the most sinisters labor
bureaucracies in Latin American, clashed at the entrance of the mausoleum
to gain predominance around the stage for the rally organized to conmemorate
Peron, October 17 and generally Peron's legacy.

One of the factions, led by the trucker drivers union of the CGT General
Secretary Moyano clashed with the goons from the Construction Workers
Union (UOCRA).

This is not the first time.  In 1996 they clashed twice with many people
wounded.  The first time, the UOCRA leader was kicked out as General
Secretary of the CGT, the second time Moyano was kicked out.

This third time, it seems, will cost Moyano to get kicked out for the
second time.

While in the 1990s there were some political differences between Moyano's
faction and another faction called Los Gordos (Fat guys) since Moyano was
taking distance from Menem's government and Los Gordos supported it, this
time the confrontation is blurred as both factions support Kirchner's
government.  Both Kirchner and Menem are also Peronists but enemies.

During the confrontation, the UOCRA goons left a contingent of truck
drivers locked out of the place where the rally was taking place.  The
truck drivers attacked the construction workers and one of them,
the driver for Moyano's son, Pablo, used a .388 caliber pistol and
fired several shots at the UOCRA guys.

Over 100 got wounded in the melee. Now Los Gordos are using the
incidents to try to get rid of Moyano as General Secretary and Kirchner
and other politicians are taking distance from the incidents.

This violence did not occur in a vaccum and was preceeded by some
of Moyano's people in government dennouncing some of the Los
Gordos capos of using money otherwise assigned  to the health
system (in Argentina administered by the unions) and Los Gordos
responded by facilitating the indictment of Moyano's close colla-
borators of the same.

A typical maffia-like struggle for power.   I'm sure that other observers would
look into this as if very serious political differences exist that justified
the confrontations.







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