Without batting an eye and with a discursive fluidity that defies any documented record, the governor of Tierra del Fuego , Gustavo Melella , took to the podium during President Javier Milei's national address. Through a post on his official social media accounts, the Fuegian leader celebrated the "change of position of the national government," called for the formation of "a united political and institutional front," and demanded that the announcements translate into "decisions, budgets, and deadlines" with the mandatory participation of the Province.

The proclamation sought to present him as the guardian of the southern cause: "There cannot be a national policy on the Malvinas that is built without Tierra del Fuego (...) The Malvinas were, are and will be Argentine. And they were, are and will be Fuegian," Melella declared.

As Governor of Tierra del Fuego, Antarctica and the South Atlantic Islands, I highlight the change in position of the national government regarding the cause of our Malvinas Islands.

There are causes that transcend any political differences. The Malvinas/Malvinas is one of them. That's why…

However, this narrative clashes head-on with the record of his own administration. The patriotic fervor displayed on social media contrasts sharply with a sustained pattern of procedural passivity, administrative complicity, and commercial integration with the very British interests he now pretends to repudiate.

Procedural desertion in the 2015 case

When Melella now calls for "deepening the international legal strategy" and "strengthening the tools to prevent illegitimate exploitation," he omits a central fact that shames the institutional history of Tierra del Fuego:

The red carpet for Harbour Energy in the Southern Ocean Basin

The greatest point of political inconsistency lies in domestic hydrocarbon policy. While the governor proclaims in the media the unrestricted defense of sovereign resources, in the concrete realm of provincial hydrocarbon concessions, his government authorized and validated the incorporation of the British company Harbour Energy as a strategic partner in the Southern Marine Basin 1 Consortium (CMA-1) .

As publicly acknowledged by the operator TotalEnergies itself on its official website for the Fénix megaproject, the London-based corporation holds no less than 37.5% of the gas and oil concessions operating in the Hidra, Kaus, Carina, Aries, Vega Pléyade and Fénix fields, processing the gas in the Río Cullen and Cañadón Alfa land-based plants.

The corporate link makes the position of the Tierra del Fuego Executive untenable: