The former Secretary of Mining of the Government of Alberto Fernandez with a fleeting step through the management of Javier Mileilast made headlines in the national media when he submitted his resignation in February of this year. What have you done since then? A simple dive through the news portals of Salta, the province where she is from, shows that she remained linked to the world of mining, especially the lithium industry, coordinating a working group called “lithium table”, made up of the governors. of the three main provinces that exploit lithium in the country, Gustavo Sáenz from Salta, Raúl Jalil from Catamarca and Carlos Sadir from Jujuy. His main sponsor at that table is Saenz.
According to AFIP records, since he left the Ministry of Mining, his new employers are the Government of the Province of Salta and the Chamber of Senators of that same province. But he also added two activities in the private sector that could collide with the interests of the people of Salta, in April of this year, created the consulting firm Minencowith which she advises mining companies and was also appointed to the board of Zelandez, a technology company for lithium extraction in Latin America. An unavoidable question is: Do you attend the meetings of the Lithium Table as a representative of the public sector or the private sector?
Another known case of politicians who have companies linked to lithium is that of deputies Emilio Monzó and Nicolás Massot and Entre Ríos governor Rogelio Frigerio, who in 2021 created the consulting firm Ronialem. The name was built from the names Rogelio, Nicolas, Alejandro (Massot) and Emilio. In 2022, Frigerio and Monzó They made a transfer of shares in favor of Massot.
Royón also joins the select list of former officials who acquire phenomenal knowledge of an industry from the State and then jump to the public sector to capitalize on that experience. A case in point of this is Miguel Galuccio who after presiding over the state oil company YPF founded his own oil company and became a relevant actor in Vaca Muerta.
Royón’s business leap occurred almost immediately upon his departure from the Government. After leaving the Ministry of Mining in February, in March he traveled to Toronto to participate in the Prospectors & Developers Association of Canada, the largest mining fair in the world. She was no longer a civil servant, she had gone as an entrepreneur.
In communication with NOTICIAS, Royón maintained that the labor relations that appear in the ARCA database are due to a technical error, and that he currently does not receive any type of remuneration from the Salteño State. He confirms his link with Zelandez and clarifies that the company does not have mining concessions. Regarding his consulting firm, he did not comment and stressed that he does not lobby either, although the sector sources consulted by NOTICIAS maintain the opposite.
