“Nothing could be resolved”: the letter from the last official ejected from the Government of Javier Milei

In the run-up to the march that will take place this Wednesday in defense of public universities, a key official for the sector presented her resignation and wrote a letter in which she points out that she had to deal with obstacles to manage. “In practice, nothing could be resolved,” admits Alicia Caballero.the now former head of the R&D&I Agency, which has links with more than 70 national and private universities. Official sources anticipate that the funds will now be released.

“After more than six months in office I submitted my resignation. During this time I had the opportunity to interact with scientists, innovative companies and entrepreneurs. This has only reaffirmed my opinion about the level of excellence of the Argentine R&D system”Knight said.

Then he relates: “I accepted the position to try to contribute something to this country that I love. “I assure you that I did everything within my power, but the decisions were made at another level.” and argues that “in practical terms, nothing could be resolved since the proposed board was never approved.”

Caballero’s resignation comes after a harsh conflict between the Government and the scientific community and educational due to the lack of disbursements to finance the research projects that are already being carried out and also the new calls that were to be carried out this year and were put on standby.

Management paralysis

Various sources consulted by this medium indicated that the political decision to stop disbursements and drastically reduce budget execution for Science and Education always came “from above” and that Caballero had come into office with the idea of ​​reactivating some of the paralyzed programs.

The recognition that the management is paralyzed by a brand new former official of Javier Milei, occurs a few hours after a new march in defense of the public university. Although the Agency that the former official was in charge of is within the orbit of Science and Technology, it has a very close relationship with the world of universities. because it provides support to more than 70 educational institutions.

The institution is in charge of executing the Scientific and Technological Research Projects (PICT), which are the most relevant instrument for the sector. About 3,200 applications are received and about 1,500 grants are granted, of which 500 are from universities. This year, it could not be finalized and this was one of the main points of conflict.

This week elDiarioAr published an investigation in which it reveals that There are at least US$53 million contributed by international organizations to finance scientific programs that have been paralyzed since December 2023. This information clashes with the official mantra that “there is no money.”

Official sources told Ámbito that The new head of the Agency, Natalia Avendaño, is working on the administrative procedures to execute the disbursements of the 2022 Research Projects. They indicate, it could be finalized in the coming days.

According to data from the Ibero-American Center for Research in Science and Technology, budget execution for the sector fell in real terms by 32.9% compared to the same month of the previous year. The report also anticipates that “the evolution of this variable suggests that year-on-year execution will continue at this critical threshold until the end of the year, and may even be below the current level.”