Share/Save

Argentina re-nationalized railways

Аргентина, vigiljournal.com

The Senate approved with 53 votes in favor and two against the government initiative of Cristina Fernández, which has already been backed by the Chamber of Deputies.
With the enactment of the law on Wednesday, the Argentine State recovered control of the freight and passenger rail system, privatized in the 1990s.
In fact the State has regained control over most of the country’s railway lines because of failure of the companies that controlled them to provide the services.
The new law states "national public interest and priority objective of Argentina's policy is reactivation of passengers and cargo rail transportation, renewal and upgrading of rail infrastructure and incorporating technologies and services that contribute to modernization". To this purpose the Ferrocarriles Argentinos SE has been created 
The law enables to “restore, counterclaim or renegotiate agreements sighned in form of concession".


While most of the opposition voted in favor of the initiative, the leader of the bloc of senators from the Radical Civic Union (UCR), Gerardo Morales, said that after the government took control of the railways in 2012, a tragic accident occurred in which 52 people were killed, when a train crushed in to a terminal.
For its part, the government senator and president of the commission of infrastructure, housing and transportation, Adolfo Bermejo, described the new law as "a historical reparation" deepening "the policy of nationalization" carried out by the kirchnerism, aimed at companies privatized in the 1990s, such as Argentina Airlines and YPF oil company, among others.
Tonight, Argentina's President Cristina Kirchner has written several times in her Twitter account on the nationalization of the railways. One comment says: "Today is a historic day for our country, which has recovered the management of our Ferrocarriles Argentinos".