MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Former CFK Trade Secretary handed down 3-yr sentence

“After 14 years the Judiciary says Indec's public statistics are correct,” Moreno underlined

Former Argentine Domestic Trade Secretary Guillermo Moreno was sentenced to three years in jail and imposed a six-year disenfranchisement. According to local media, he was found guilty of rigging the data published by the National Institute of Statistics and Census (Indec) between 2006 and 2007 under then-President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner (CFK).

 The maneuver allowed the government to boast inflation and Gross Domestic Product (GDP) achievements better than they actually were. However, Moreno explained that the sentence was based on other charges and therefore the Indec data was accurate.

In Argentina, every prison sentence of up to 3 years does not entail automatic mandatory incarceration, due to which Moreno is to remain free, albeit on probation. Moreno is also on trial in other cases but none of his convictions are final because the chains of appeals have not been exhausted.

“Crucial indicators such as the [Consumer Price Index] CPI were altered, which affected poverty measurements, and these manipulations have led to widespread distrust of official statistics. Inflation did not have to exceed 10% and they achieved this by lying,” Prosecutor Diego Luciani argued in his summation before Justices Néstor Costabel, Rodrigo Giménez Uriburu, and Jorge Gorini.

Moreno was charged with “abuse of authority,” “violation of secrets,” “destruction of records and documents,” and “ideological falsification of public documents on seven occasions.”

Also convicted Wednesday was then Indec's CPI Director Beatriz Paglieri, while rank-and-file workers Marcela Filia and María Celeste Cámpora Avellaneda were acquitted.

In his closing argument, Moreno claimed it was all an “academic” trial in which there was no evidence. He stood by the methodology applied back in the day and ironically congratulated Luciani for his performance.

“My training is as an economist, but I have had some subjects in law. There is an old saying that goes something like facts, evidence, and law,” Moreno stressed while insisting that “no evidence emerged” during the investigation. “No one can say whether something is false or true if there is no proof,” he added.

“You have to recognize that the prosecutor's plea was intelligent. He had no evidence. So he appealed to an academic trial. Now, as you know, academic judgments can be made by peers, it is not the prosecutor's power,” Moreno went on.

“All the governments that succeeded ours have ratified the good performance of Indec,” he added. “Facts, evidence, and law. There was no evidence, I rule out that there will be [any] law,” he closed.

In a TV interview later Wednesday, Moreno pointed out that he had been “sentenced for abuse of authority but not for tampering with Indec statistics” and announced he would file an appeal. He also noted that he had committed the alleged abuse of authority over Indec workers who were by definition not under him.

“They spent 17 years saying that Peronism cheated the Indec statistics” but “after 14 years the Judiciary says Indec's public statistics are correct,” Moreno underlined. “The statistics were accurate, true,” he also stressed. Moreno was also convicted for the destruction of public documents.

The rationale for Wednesday's sentence is to be released on Sept 4, it was also reported.