Milei reduces his cabinet and makes Luis Caputo ‘super minister’ of Economy

The first reform of the Argentine president’s cabinet, Javier Mileihas concluded with the elimination of a ministry and the empowerment of the head of Economy, Luis Caputo, who becomes a ‘super minister’ by absorbing into his portfolio the area of ​​the head of Infrastructure that the libertarian fired this week.

Milei asked this week for the resignation of his former Minister of Infrastructure, civil engineer Guillermo Ferraro, and decided that the portfolio in charge of public works, housing, communications and transportation policies would become a Secretariat within the Ministry of Economy. .

Economy already had the ministries of Finance, Treasury, Energy, Commerce, Treasury, Legal and Administrative, Agriculture, Livestock and Fisheries; Economic policy; Mining; Industry and Productive Development, some of which were ministries in the previous Government, that of Peronist Alberto Fernández (2019-2023).

Despite defending the independence of the Central Bank, the president of the monetary entity is Santiago Bausili, a partner of Caputo in his private consulting firm Anker Latin America and who had previously succeeded him as Secretary of Finance in the administration of Mauricio Macri (2015-2019).

Caputo, a 58-year-old economist – who had gone through Ministry of Finance of the Macri government, before presiding over the central bank in the final stage of the center-right’s mandate – has the challenge of organizing an economy with strong macroeconomic imbalances.

With the assumption of this ‘super ministry’, the head of the Treasury Palace crowns a high-profile week for having defended the increase in taxes and the modification of the formula for updating pensions proposed in the ‘omnibus law’ that Milei sent to the Congress.

However, these measures, along with others that increased income and were part of the fiscal package included in the ‘omnibus law’, were withdrawn from the bill to speed up its parliamentary process, as Caputo announced this Friday, due to the lack of the necessary support. to get it through.

However, the objective remains zero deficit, as highlighted by the Minister of Economy, which is why he announced that he is evaluating measures to reduce spending in other areas.

The Milei government took office on December 10 with the intention of reducing the weight of the State in the economy, deregulating and eliminating the fiscal deficit, which in 2023 reached 6.1%, to recover economic growth and lower inflation, 211.4% annually in 2023.

Since taking office, Milei kept his promise to drastically reduce the number of ministries, which he had promoted with the cry of “Get out!”

The members of the ultraliberal government team are, in addition to Caputo, the economist Diana Mondino (Chancellery), the lawyer Guillermo Francos (Interior), the graduate in Family Sciences Sandra Pettovello (Human Capital, which includes Education and Employment), the cardiologist Mario Russo (Health) and the criminal lawyer Mariano Cúneo Libarona (Justice). The cabinet is completed by the members of the presidential formula of the center-right coalition Together for Change that competed in the last elections: Patricia Bullrich (Security) and Luis Petri (Defense).

The chief of staff is the industrial engineer Nicolás Posse, someone Milei trusts most, to the point that he is her closest person along with her sister, Karina Milei, who is the secretary of the Presidency.

Newspaper versions comment that, precisely, it was the bad relationship between Posse and Ferraro – and not the alleged leak to the press of a phrase by President Milei – that ended with the latter out of the cabinet.

Of the 21 ministries that the Fernández Administration had at its close, Milei reduced it to nine and now, after Ferraro’s departure, he reduced his cabinet by one, which has – like the Peronist one – a ‘super minister’ of Economy.