By Global News Service
Students, professors, and administrative workers at universities in Argentina are preparing for several weeks of mobilizations and work stoppages to protest President Javier Milei’s announced veto of the University Financing Law which would allocate necessary funds to universities. The university community called for a strike on September 26 and 27 and a national mass mobilization on October 2 in cities across the country, in Buenos Aires, people will march to the National Congress. Trade unions and social organizations from across sectors will also join students, professors, and university workers to defend public, free, and quality education in Argentina.
On September 12, the Argentine Senate approved a law that updates the amount of money universities should receive to maintain optimal functioning; this includes slightly improving the budget allocation to cover expenses for teaching, research, and administrative functioning. According to the law, the budget increase would be only 0.14 percent of GDP.
Milei has announced that it will veto the law. According to some official sources, the government plans to offer only 3.8 billion pesos to Argentina’s national universities while the National Interuniversity Council (CIN) says at least 7.8 billion pesos are required for the country’s universities to operate properly.
According to Víctor Moriñigo, president of the CIN and rector of the University of San Luis, “there is no certain intention of adjusting teaching and non-teaching salaries [to the current economic situation] to at least equalize the situation of loss [of purchasing power] in the face of inflation.”
from the Peoples Dispatch / Globetrotter News Service
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