Security Ministry ends Federal Police presence in City public sites; City Gov't outraged

The National Government ratified its decision to cancel the contracts of all Federal Police officers working on their free time guarding City public sites and deploy them back in the streets. The government of BA City Mayor Macri administration harshly attacked the decision after the announcement that the measure would be enacted after Wednesday's midnight.

The Security Ministry ratified that all Federal Police officers stationed outside of the city’s public buildings such as schools and hospitals would not be returning to their posts after Tuesday, even though it had previously been announced that police protection would continue until May 6th.

These two seemingly contradicting announcements coming from the Security Ministry and the Federal Police respectively created confusion among the population and only helped deepen the controversy between the National Government and the City Hall.

At noon, Federal Police Chief Enrique Capdevilla sent the City’s Justice and Security Minister Guillermo Montenegro a notification saying that, starting May 6th, “the agreement between both governments for an additional deployment of police officers on the City’s streets was rescinded.”

This communiqué led to a misunderstanding; since the City Government considered that the measure had been suspended and even praised the Security Ministry for their “good will.”

However, after 1 pm, the Federal Police issued a new telegram and sent it to the 53 police stations across the city, ratifying that starting on Wednesday, no police officers would be assigned to protect any of the city’s public parks, monuments, hospitals or schools.

“We ratify the decision to stop the deployment of all Federal Police officers to guard any of the locations that fall under the jurisdiction of the City Government,” the message read.

The reason for this is that, even though contracts must be rescinded with at least a one-month notice, the agreement states that police officers are not paid in advance, but at the end of the month. Therefore they would be getting their monthly pay in May for their services in April.

The argument between both governments continued, since the Security Ministry states that the City Government has a $27 million pesos debt (seven months of service). However, the Federal Police says the Macri administration is only 60 days behind.

Federal Police officers “will not be deployed where they are needed instead of being assigned to protect a building where the crime rate is low,” Security Ministry Planning Secretary Gustavo Sibilla said.

The Macri administration bashed the measure and warned that there aren’t enough Metropolitan Police officers to be deployed throughout the city, for which “there’s no alternative.”

“We’re all very surprised. We don’t understand where the President is trying to go when it comes to dealing with insecurity. This is directly affecting the city population. If we have to argue, then let’s argue, but leave the population out of it,” Mayor Macri said.

At the same time, the City Cabinet Chief Horacio Rodríguez Larreta warned that “there’s no Plan B. The security of the City depends on the Federal Police. In any case, it’s them who should be presenting us with an alternative plan.”

However, Sibilla replied that “if they’re incapable of protecting a hospital, then they’re much more incapable of patrolling the streets, since they are much more dangerous.”

At dawn, 1,400 Federal Police officers were removed from 114 posts that included hospitals, schools, public parks and government buildings. They were reassigned to the City streets in order to “prevent crime,” Security Minister Nilda Garré explained.