Piquetero
As piqueteros (singular: piquetero) one describes demonstrators in Argentina who want to draw attention to their bad economic situation by blocking streets and companies. This takes place in the form of so-called "piquetes", illegal road blockades. (Piquete actually means picket in Spanish .)
In their demonstrations - some critics say extorted - the piqueteros often demand concessions from the state as a condition for the end of their actions, such as the payment of social welfare plans, but also the improvement of schools, hospitals and other centers of public life. They continue to try to exert a direct influence on the circulation of the economy through their roadblocks and thus exert pressure both on the companies in which they were employed and on the state, which is supposed to ensure more social justice.
Organizational form
The piqueteros were loose groups of unemployed people in their early days, but today they are largely organized and largely dependent on political parties. They make their decisions in asambleas , assemblies in which the forms of action (for example carrying out demonstrations) are decided by voting. The piquetero groups are financed through contributions from their members, between 2 and 10 pesos (0.50 to 2.50 euros) per month and person, which they usually pay with the state social assistance allowance. For these so-called social plans amounting to 150 pesos (approx. 40 euros) per family, which the piqueteros receive through their organizations (usually only after some time), four hours of daily work have to be performed in return. Since 1999 it has been possible for the piquetero organizations to offer their own projects in which the working hours are completed. These are mainly social projects such as people's kitchens , children's meals or health centers, but there are also increasing attempts to set up small productive projects such as bakeries, sewing shops or recycling projects . In most cases, the requirements for members of the piquetero organizations include participation in the demonstrations. The social plan can be withdrawn from members who do not participate. Most organizations keep attendance records for working hours and demonstrations. On the other hand, the work done for the piquetero organizations is hardly controlled by the state. In addition, the piquetero organizations distribute food parcels won by the state to the members who actively participate. The only piquetero organization that does not accept state social plans and food is the small, radical autonomist group MTD La Matanza from the suburb of the same name in Buenos Aires . Instead, it has managed to acquire donations from home and abroad in order to set up productive projects, and takes in foreign "piquetourists" to finance a kindergarten.
Today, however, there is hardly anything left of the original goals of party independence and direct democracy: Many piquetero groups are now in the hands of, in particular, socialist and communist parties, or the left parties have founded their own piquetero organizations. Examples are the Polo Obrero , which belongs to the Trotskyist Partido Obrero , or the Movimiento Territorial de la Liberacion (MTL) from the Partido Comunista (PC). But also the established parties, especially the Peronist Party (PJ), but also the Unión Civica Radical (UCR) often try to recruit demonstrators and voters in slum areas through their intermediaries, punteros, by paying or giving food. This practice of political clientelism has a long tradition in Argentina . So it is not surprising that piqueteros are often only perceived as a tool for the parties. But there are still independent piqueter groups who do not want to accept the help of parties and who take an autonomous approach, for example the MTD Solano or the alliance Frente Popular Darío Santillán .
Since unemployment insurance in Argentina is only valid for twelve months and only for employees previously subject to social security contributions, joining a piquetero organization is one of the few options for many unemployed people from the lower classes, in addition to going to the Peronist (regionally also to other) punteros to get little support from the state. The official application without intermediary of a social plan is no longer possible today, the registration period for the most extensive plan Jefes y Jefas de Hogar ended in May 2002. Of the almost 1.6 million Jefes plans still today , the piqueteros manage around 10 to 14 percent , while 51 percent of these social plan recipients are party members. Other people, on the other hand, try to earn money as cartonero (rubbish collectors) or in informal trade , for example .
history
The movement originated in 1996 in the city of Cutral-Có in southern Argentina ( Neuquén province ), where unemployed people blocked rutas nacionales (highways) to protest against the closure and rationalization of Repsol YPF (a large Spanish-Argentinian oil company). This movement expanded rapidly: as early as 1997 there were over 140 "piquetes", and in 2002 , the most eventful year, even over 2300 road blockades. For a long time, the rural regions of the province of Salta in northwest Argentina were the center of the piqueteros , today the piqueteros are mainly active in Buenos Aires .
The piquetero movement became known through the great looting and unrest at the end of 2001 shortly before the resignation of President Fernando de la Rúa . People shaken by the economic crisis, including piqueteros, wandered through the city and the suburbs of Buenos Aires for days , violently looting supermarkets and other shops, in some cases even private houses. However, the looting was not limited to everyday necessities. Since it was shortly before Christmas, entire decorated Christmas trees, televisions, stereos, expensive high-proof alcohol and other things were taken away. Even if these so-called saqueos were mostly committed by neighbors who came together spontaneously, the piqueteros were mainly blamed for them. Nevertheless, at the time of the uprising, with the cooking pot demonstrations ( cacerolazos ) at the height of the 2001/2002 crisis , the piqueteros experienced a great deal of solidarity from the middle-class demonstrators, who expressed themselves in the slogan " Piquete y cacerola - la lucha es una sola " (road blockade and saucepan - the fight is the same) manifested. With the cacerolazos , however, the understanding for the protest of the piqueteros also disappeared; today they are receiving a lot of criticism from the middle class, above all because the road blockades and demonstrations hinder traffic.
Many piquetero organizations call themselves MTD (Movimiento de Trabajadores Desocupados, movement of unemployed workers). This abbreviation does not say anything about the political positioning of the group, but is a general term. There are now a large number of different piquetero groups, for example 174 different organizations with which projects are carried out were registered with the Ministry of Social Development in 2005 . The total number of people organized in the Piqutero groups cannot be precisely quantified; the estimates are between 200,000 and 500,000 people.
After the presidential elections in 2003 , the movement split into two main streams in 2004 : on the one hand, groups such as the FTV ( Federación Tierra y Vivienda ), MTD Evita or Barrios de Pie , led by Luis D'Elía , support Néstor Kirchner's government , while on the other hand, organizations like the group led by the radical socialist Raúl Castells (who was briefly arrested in 2004 for occupying a casino in Resistencia ) group MIJD ( Movimiento Independiente de Jubilados y Desocupados ), the Polo Obrero , the Maoist CCC ( Corriente Clasista y Combativa ) or the two wings of the Autonomous MTD Aníbal Verón militantly and remain on the course of opposition to the government.