MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Filmus pleased with the ministerial appointment: “I am passionate about science and technology”

“I am passionate about Science and Technology so it comes as an enormous opportunity to fight for such issues” said Filmus

Argentina' s newly appointed Science and Technology minister, Daniel Filmus, said he was very thankful to president Alberto Fernandez for the job since “it's a enormous opportunity to fight for an issue” of which he is “passionate” and was also pleased that the consequences of last Sunday's primary elections were “quickly settled” with a consensus cabinet.

Filmus who until now was chair of the Malvinas, Antarctica and South Atlantic Islands Secretariat admitted that the offer to head Science and Technology took him by surprise.

“I am passionate about Science and Technology so it comes as an enormous opportunity to fight for such issues” said Filmus, and only had praise for his predecessor, Roberto Salvarezza, whom he described as an “excellent minister”.

“I belong to the same group of scientists as Salvarezza. he is a fellow whom I admire”, underlined the incoming minister who will be sworn in with the new cabinet this Monday.

President Alberto Fernandez asked me to promote “science in a more articulate form in line with the needs of the country”, adding his team of aides in the area are all ready to begin working on Monday.

As to last Sunday's primary results, Filmus admitted he never expected incumbents to lose, “much less by such a margin”. Although he also mentioned he was among the few “who believed it was going to be a very tough competition”.

”To the discontent from the previous government (2015/19), we faced an economic downturn which the pandemic impeded us to address, plus months of living in quarantine“.

Anyhow Filmus said that Sunday night after the primaries, he was satisfied with the presidential speech, ”sober and sincere“ admitting government had evidently committed many errors.

”I think the fact Fernandez spoke immediately acknowledging errors, pledging to see where we failed and not being annoyed with voters, was the correct attitude“.

As to the squabbles and infighting following Sunday's surprise defeat, Filmus pointed out, ”we were lucky, in just a week we all recomposed unity and evidence of that is changes were agreed on consensus. I witnessed the process“

Finally Filmus considered that now begins another chapter, the battle for 2023, and to that respect ”we need to build a society that not only grows but also reaps the benefits of growth”.