Two weeks ago, in a meeting with union and political sectors, where the Fuegian Executive Branch gave its version of the reasons for the national intervention in the Port of Ushuaia and guaranteed in writing the salaries of the sector's workers, the Vice Governor of Tierra del Fuego, Mónica Urquiza , uttered a phrase that should have immediately triggered alarms in the justice system and oversight bodies: "Even in the Macri administration they put it out to tender (the expansion of the dock), they awarded it, they gave a financial advance and the money disappeared," she said in the presence of some 30 people , including several members of the provincial cabinet.

These words don't belong to an opponent or a journalist; they come from the second-highest authority in the Province . However, what Urquiza presents as a critique of the past is, in reality, the death certificate of transparency in his own administration.

Six years of complicit silence

The analysis of this statement raises an inevitable question: If the government of Gustavo Melella and Mónica Urquiza knew that a multi-million dollar financial advance destined for the Port of Ushuaia "vanished" eight years ago, why did they not file the corresponding criminal complaints in 2019, upon assuming power?

THE ROUTE OF THE “FLYING MONEY” (2017-2026)

In September 2017, then-Minister Guillermo Dietrich and former Governor Rosana Bertone announced with great fanfare what they called "the country's largest port investment": $400 million to extend the dock by 251 meters . It was supposed to be completed by May 2019, but according to Vice Governor Mónica Urquiza , the project never materialized. Now, eight years later, she admits that "the money vanished" after an advance payment.

The fact is devastating: Gustavo Melella 's administration has been in power for six years, aware of this alleged embezzlement, without filing a single criminal complaint. This omission transforms Urquiza 's "anecdote" into an admission of administrative complicity . If the money disappeared and the port was abandoned, the current government is the guarantor of that impunity for failing to audit or prosecute the whereabouts of those national funds .

Having lived with the certainty of embezzlement of public funds without activating official channels to recover those funds or punish those responsible (whether national officials from the Dietrich era or local officials from the DPP at that time) makes the current administration responsible by omission . The "money" doesn't just disappear; it travels through files, signatures, and bank transfers that the current government should have audited and reported six years ago .

Administrative disorder as a state policy

Urquiza's revelation comes at the worst possible time : when the province has lost control of the port due to a national intervention based precisely on administrative disorder and a lack of transparency.

It is incomprehensible that the vice-governor is trying to boast of good administration and transparent management of the Port, using as a shield an alleged past theft that her own government never bothered to investigate in court . This logic of "the previous administration stole and I didn't say anything" is what has led the province's most strategic asset to its current state of vulnerability.

The questions the Vice Governor must answer:

1.    Where are the files? How much money in pesos or dollars was allocated to that financial advance that, according to him, disappeared?

2.    Which companies benefited? Why were their insurance policies not enforced or why were they barred from contracting with the State?

3.    Why only now? Why use this information in a union meeting and not in a federal court?

The end of the "Autonomy" narrative

The intervention in the Port of Ushuaia is not merely an advance of Buenos Aires centralism or a plan by the Southern Command . It is, fundamentally, the consequence of a local leadership that admits to knowing where public funds have been lost, but prefers to use it as a political anecdote rather than as legal evidence.

Dr. César Lerena was clear in pointing out Melella's extreme inefficiency in port administration. Urquiza 's statement about the money that "disappeared" is the final proof that, for this government, the Port of Ushuaia was never a strategic priority, but rather a cash cow they only remember when they lose it. If the money disappeared and no one reported it, the responsibility lies with Melella and Urquiza, not Milei.