A few days before the runoff that will define who will be the next president in Argentina, NEWS celebrated 40 years of democracy. She did it in Congress of the Nationn, where he honored relevant personalities for the consolidation of the republican system.
Within the framework of Magazine’s 34th birthday, the event featured the participation of politicians and celebrities from different fields. The lyrical singer Leonardo Estévez sang the Argentine National Anthem, prior to theThese are the words of the director of NEWS, Alejandra Daiha, and the co-founder of Perfil, Jorge Fontevecchia.
After the reception, the presentation of the distinctions began. Representing the protagonists of the Trial of the Military Juntas in 1985which marked a milestone in Argentine history with international significance, were honored León Arslanian and Luis Moreno Ocampo. In addition, Lucas Palacios, Carlos Somigliana (son), María del Carmen Tucci, Sergio Delgado and Javier Scipioni, members of the youth team created by prosecutor Julio César Strassera to collaborate with the investigation of the trial and who managed to gather, in just four months, the evidence that proved the avalanche of complaints of human rights violations that allowed the former commanders to be convicted.
Then they honored the Forensic Anthropology Teamfor their efforts in finding and identifying the remains of people who disappeared during the dictatorship, a mission that continues to this day. Mariella Fumagalli receivedcoordinator of the unit responsible for planning and carrying out searches for clandestinely buried bodies.
NEWS distinguished Martín Balza, chief of the Army Staff between 1991 and 1999, for condemning the actions of the armed forces during the last dictatorship, pointing out repression, disappearance and identity substitution as criminal practices. And for their collaboration so that the new members of those forces understood their duty to respect the laws of the Republic.
Also distinguished were the promoters and creators of laws that transformed the lives of Argentines in the last four decades. The law of shared Parental Power, passed in 1985, which recognizes the rights of women with respect to their sons and daughters, lawyer Nelly Minyersky received the diploma, who played a prominent role in the conquest of that and many other laws. The National Education Law, passed in 2006, sought to solve the problems of inequality in access to good quality education. The then Minister of Education and current Minister of Science, Daniel Filmus, was key in the articulation of the executive branch with the legislative branch to convey the new norm.
Since 2008, Argentina has a standard known as “Human Trafficking Law”, a result of the actions of different social actors. Susana Trimarco, mother of Marita Verón, a young woman from Tucumán kidnapped on April 3, 2002 by a network that forced her into prostitution and still keeps her missing, became a tireless activist, whose efforts resulted in the Trafficking Law that today seeks update. News distinguished the persistence of her fight.
In 2010, Argentina established the right to marry people of the same sex. It was the first country in Latin America to recognize that right. The senator, former deputy and current Secretary of Legal and Technical, Vilma Ibarra, was a relevant figure in the debate of the Equal Marriage Law.
The last tributes were to the Justina Law, of 2019, in memory of Justina Lo Cane, a 12-year-old girl who died in 2017 while waiting for a heart. From there, anyone over 18 years of age is an organ or tissue donor unless they expressly state otherwise. Finally, it was recalled Micaela Law to train all levels of the State with a gender perspective. Micaela García was kidnapped, raped and murdered in April 2017 by a repeat criminal who was on parole. The case was taken as a banner of the #Niunamenos movement that promoted this norm.
Finally, those who worked in the reform of the Constitution that has governed us since 1994. A rare example of debate between the different political parties that resulted in consensus and allowed new rights, norms and control bodies to be incorporated into the Magna Carta for the defense of democracy. Representing that plurality, they took to the stage Horacio Rosatti, Juan Carlos Maqueda, Jorge Yoma, Eduardo Valdés, Horacio Massaccesi, Elva Roulet, Enrique Paixao, Eduardo Barcesat, Graciela Fernández Meijide and Juan Pablo Cafiero.
It was an event full of leaders, journalists, celebrities and other social actors who sought to vindicate the plural politics that consolidated democracy.
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