MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Kirchner official says no “transparent” inflation index until November

Argentina's cabinet chief Alberto Fernandez promised union leaders on Friday that the controversial Consumer Prices Index, CPI, will be “transparent” as of next October because the government is intent on ensuring the chances of presidential candidate Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, reports La Nacion.

"A new CPI will be released but on October 29", promised Fernandez, which is a day after the October 28 election according to trade union sources, whose leaders met with the cabinet chief in government house and were quoted by La Nacion. Staff from the Argentine Prices and Statistics Institute, Indec, has been on conflict for weeks with daily protests claiming the indexes released by the office have been manipulated to favor government interests and technical officials have been replaced by political nominees. The CPI information, that is inflation, is particularly sensitive since it not only is the floor for salaries discussions but also has been incorporated to the restructured sovereign bonds yields to the extent that according to Argentine officials a one point variation is equivalent to 489 million US dollars annually in interest payments. However union leaders anticipated that Indec staff will be making public the CPI methodology and the indexes, which will be distributed among the media before election day October 28. The Indec staff accuses Domestic Trade Secretary Guillermo Moreno and Beatriz Paglieri the interim director of the office, of manipulating official statistics since last February. A federal prosecutor has opened an inquiry into the Indec controversy and has recommended both officials be separated from their posts for alleged "violation of statistical secrets".