The Government ordered the intervention of Edesur for 180 days

The Minister of Economy, Sergio Massa, announced the intervention of the Edesur company in the midst of the power outages that affected the AMBA. It will be for 180 days and will serve to monitor compliance with the works and the improvement in the company’s service, the official explained.

Also read: Power outages: the Government will denounce Edesur for embezzlement, fraud and abandonment of person

As detailed, from the ENRE and the Ministry of Energy will launch the intervention. Jorge Ferraresi, close to Kirchnerism, will be in charge of overseeing this decision on the energy company.

“Over the last 15 days we have experienced situations that hit and hurt us all. Clearly, seeing businesses having to throw away merchandise, homes without electricity and water due to the lack of electricity in the Edesur concession area were the images that somehow marked the agenda of the last few days, especially in the Buenos Aires Metropolitan Area. Aires,” Massa said. “We understand that situations like this cannot be tolerated anymore,” she said.

“ENEL’s imminent decision to put the Edesur company up for sale appears as a situation that generates uncertainty regarding the provision of the service,” he continued. And he explained that after a series of non-compliance with maintenance and construction service, it was decided to intervene in the firm for 180 days. Likewise, Massa explained that the Ministry of Energy is going to proceed to inform the Stock Exchange in terms of the detected breaches.

The intentions of removing the concession from Edesur are not new. In fact, days ago, the Government confirmed that it would advance in a complaint before the distributor for embezzlement, fraud to the detriment of the public administration and abandonment of person, due to repeated deficiencies in the service.

Also read: Thousands of users continue without electricity and there were protests from neighbors due to the lack of service

Last week, when in the AMBA, more than 110,000 users were without electricity and protests were widespread in different parts of the City and the suburbs, the Secretary of Energy, Flavia Royón, met with the ENRE controller, Walter Martello; the head of the Buenos Aires Cabinet, Martín Insaurralde, and the mayor of Quilmes, Mayra Mendoza.

After that meeting, it was announced that progress will be made in the criminal complaint against the directors of Edesur, while Energía demanded that the ENRE submit the report to the Bicameral Follow-up of public service providers in order to advise if appropriate. terminate the concession of the electricity distribution company.

Martello, ENRE controller, said on several occasions that the company’s situation “is unsustainable” and the suburban mayors themselves have been pressing for a long time to speed up the company’s exit.

The Buenos Aires Ombudsman’s Office, headed by Guido Lorenzino, had already filed a criminal complaint against Edesur on February 14. Meanwhile, the ENRE announced on Tuesday that it will send to Congress a report with an audit on the quality of the service and the alleged noncompliance of the company.

At the end of 2022, the Italian Enel – the company that manages the Edesur concession – announced its departure from the country and announced that as of March it would begin the process of selling its main asset in Argentina through the Santander bank.

Also read: Alert about a new virtual scam that takes advantage of the heat wave and power outages to empty accounts

Edesur has 2.6 million clients and supplies electricity to seven million people in the south of the metropolitan area of ​​Buenos Aires (12 communes of the City and 12 districts of the province).