Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Argentinia to take back oil resources

Argentinian President Cristina Fernandez has tabled a draft Bill to take over the YPF oil and gas company in which Spanish transnational corporation Repsol has a major share.

President Fernandez has explained to the Argentinian people precisely why she is acting in this way.

She is unhappy that, 17 years after YPF was privatised, her country has become, "for the first time, a net importer of oil and gas with a total deficit of over $3 billion."

It is a sign of the times when ordinary Argentinians, like their counterparts in Venezuela, Bolivia and elsewhere, rejoice when they hear national leaders Fernandez, Hugo Chavez and Evo Morales reassert popular sovereignty over national assets.

Labour movements are beginning to demand that their governments take back the assets sold off to foreign companies that have so dismally failed to deliver for their people.

Venezuela was lectured by big business and the international financial agencies when it began to limit its dependence on the whims of capitalist "investors" and prioritised its own development. It has survived and thrived.

Argentina will be no different, having recognised that following the crazy economic prescriptions that lead to global finical crises hold no benefit for working people anywhere.

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