MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

CFK supporters pack Plaza de Mayo after house imprisonment

“They can lock me up, but not all the Argentine people,” CFK insisted in a recorded audio message played to the crowd

Crowds supporting former Argentine President Cristina Frnández de Kirchner (CFK) marched Wednesday onto Buenos Aires' iconic Plaza de Mayo following their leader's six-year house arrest conviction in the so-called Vialidad scandal. The demonstration was organized by the Justicialist (Peronist) Party (PJ), social organizations, and unions, with replications across several provinces.

In a recorded message, CFK thanked her followers and criticized President Javier Milei's economic model, which she claimed was bound for failure. Hence, the popular movements would keep up the fight “from whatever trench” because Peronism is “going to come back.” The PJ ”will defend democracy with the same tools with which we built it,“ she insisted.

”We are going to come back with more wisdom, unity, and strength, and from wherever it is my turn to be, from whatever trench, I will be there with you. Because we have something that they do not have: people, memory, history, and homeland,“ she also pointed out.

In this scenario, Peronism is ”going to come back“ because Argentines deserve ”a country where children can eat four times a day, where they can have books and computers at school and where workers can make ends meet and can save again to buy a house, a little car and a plot of land.“

CFK also said she was ”firm and calm“ despite being banned from showing up at her apartment's balcony by the magistrates dictating the conditions for her house arrest, which, if not fulfilled, could result in her being sent to a correctional facility. What a bunch of junk they are!” she maintained. “This model has no future, they know it is falling, and that is why I am in jail,” CFK also claimed.

“I want to thank everyone and all the signs of affection. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. I heard them singing slogans, marches, and the national anthem, but what I liked the most was that they sang 'we are coming back',” she further noted.

“They can lock me up, but not all the Argentine people; they are scared,” CFK further argued. “It is necessary to organize to clarify what the real problem our country has,” she also warned.

“How do you sustain an economic model where people have to [charge on a credit] card their daily food and then they cannot pay the card?” she wondered. “How does a country subsist where it is much better to buy food, to travel, to buy clothes abroad? Because it is cheaper than here in the country. And while this is happening, the Economy Minister, the nefarious [Luis Toto] Caputo, rents dollars, rents dollars to pretend that he has a reserve,” CFK went on.

“The Argentine people know how to stand up, to resist, to organize, to fight, and also to return. I do not know what the immediate future holds for me, but I do know one thing: I have already gone through almost everything in this life. I have endured this infamous judicial process that has been dragging on for years and that came to an end with the same corruption with which it began,” the former head of state added.

“Dear Argentines, we are going to come back. And from whatever trench I am in, I will continue to do everything in my power to be with you. We have something that they will never have. We have people, we have memory, we have a history, and we have a homeland. We are going to come back, one and a thousand times,” she pledged.