The Argentinian economy minister Hernan Lorenzino has gone on the war path after Columbia claimed that it has overtaken his country as the second biggest economy in South America.
Lorenzino took to social media to express his annoyance, using Twitter to scoff the Columbian claims. He boasted that data from the International Monetary Fund shows that Argentine, with a smaller population, has a GDP greater than $100 billion larger than Colombia’s.
The argument erupted after Colombia’s former finance minister Juan Carlos Echeverry and Fernando Mejia, the head of macroeconomic policies at Colombia’s finance ministry, recounted how their staff had ‘crunched some numbers’ and came to the conclusion that Argentina’s status as the regions second biggest economy was under threat. Before stepping down from his post, Echeverry boasted that the Andean nation’s economy was $15billion bigger than Argentina’s.
Talk about petty.
“That affirmation isn’t only inaccurate but also intentionally harmful,” Lorenzino wrote on Twitter, after Echeverry repeated his argument in column published by the Financial Times. Here’s one of his tweets; “With all due respect, it is wrong to say that Columbia’s GDP is bigger than Argentina’s…We can say that the affirmation is not only inexact but intentionally damaging to our country.”
Echeverry responded saying; “This large difference between market rates and official rates means that calculations of the dollar value of Argentine GDP using the official exchange rate are biased upwards, The evidence points towards an indisputable fact: Colombia has managed to place itself in the leading pack of the region in terms of economic growth, size and long-term potential.”
Backing her minister Argentinean president Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner took her typical stance of blaming everyone else except her government for the nations weakening economy. She blames the International Monetary Fund for pushing her country into the 2001 financial crisis and since 2006 hasn’t allowed the organisation to review the nation’s finances since 2006.
Ironically Echeverry could become the IMF’s Western Hemisphere director in charge of monitoring the Latin American and Caribbean economies and this latest pat will do little to put the nation back into the IMF’s good books. The organisation recently put Argentina on formal watch and the country faces the prospect of sanctions if it improves its inflation and GDP numbers by December 17th. The Argentine government has posted a number of suspicious data reports which many in the international community believe to have been made up and IMF data has been dismissed as wrong or lies.
It seems arguing with organisations and nations that are in the right to hide its own economic weakness and to divert public anger away from the president are a common theme with Argentina. Delusional leaders and ministers are sure to harm the nation’s economic prospects in the future and due to the untrustworthiness of its government the world is more likely to believe Columbia’s claims.
As of 12:40pm
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