Buenos Aires, Feb 25 (NA) – The president of the Chamber of Deputies, Martín Menem, called the governor of his province, Ricardo Quintela, “a monkey with a hammer inside a crystal shop” and stated that “his darkest hour is approaching” with the 2027 elections on the horizon. “What Quintela is doing is lamentable from every point of view. He has had the province on fire since 2019 when they made him governor and re-elected him in 2023, and we know how La Rioja works—it's a power cooperative,” Menem stated. The legislator was responding to Quintela's remarks, who, according to the Argentine News Agency (NA), said yesterday in a radio interview that if President Javier Milei makes it to the end of his term in December 2027, “he will leave the country destroyed.” In response, Menem warned that “that's what a governor says who uses the province's plane to come to Buenos Aires to watch Boca Juniors. Running the province, he's a monkey with a hammer in a crystal shop,” he emphasized. By way of example, he mentioned that Quintela “built a 100-kilometer asphalt road just to get to one of his fields and increase its value” and asserted that La Rioja is “the most corrupt province in Argentina with 300 or 400 officials who cannot justify their standard of living.” Regarding whether he will run for governor in 2027, Menem said it would be “barbaric to talk about candidacies when there are two years left” for the elections, but he warned that La Libertad Avanza “will present a different, productive proposal for the province that will generate genuine jobs.”
