Argentina: Layoff of 15,000 civil servants this week

Hibapress

The Argentine government will lay off 15,000 civil servants this week, in application of the austerity policy decreed by ultraliberal President Javier Milei.

The spokesperson for the presidency, Manuel Adorni, gave this clarification after the commotion caused the day before by Milei who had indicated to businessmen that the State was preparing to dismiss 70,000 civil servants before the end of the month .

“There has been some confusion: the total of contracts under examination exceeds 70,000. Of this number which is not final, 15,000 will stop working on March 31,” said the spokesperson, adding that the other contracts will be renewed for six months only, before the State makes a decision.

Adorni stressed that this massive termination of employment contracts in the public sector comes in addition to 50,000 other layoffs which had affected employees of public establishments in recent weeks.

The spokesperson explained that the audit work of administration staff will take more time than expected, adding that the objective of this approach is to clean up the public service.

The reaction of the state workers' union (ATE according to its acronym in Spanish) was not long in coming. Its leaders announced a general strike and threatened to occupy ministries in protest against these massive layoffs.

In addition to downsizing state structures, the government has decided to suspend all recruitment in the civil service and to stop infrastructure work in order to achieve its primary objective: zero budget deficit from this year.