A new episode of political violence shook the Buenos Aires National College, where a teacher and a municipal employee were identified as responsible for assaulting a group of underage liberal students who were carrying out militant activity on public roads.
The incident occurred on the way out of the establishment, when young people from the Bases group —linked to La Libertad Avanza— had set up a stand to distribute brochures and talk with other students. The activity was proceeding normally until two adults began to aggressively rebuke them
.
As seen in the videos released, the situation escalated rapidly. One of the men, a teacher identified as
Walter Escobar, advanced intimidatingly against a 16-year-old student, “if you become an adult I'll break all your teeth,” he said, generating a
moment of strong tension.
At the same time, a second aggressor, Bruno Esteban Balestieri —former member of the Council for the Rights of Children and Adolescents during Larreta's administration—, who also has a place in front of the Buenos Aires National School, was singled out for threatening students at the institution and treating them as “jerks” for not fighting him.
The seriousness of the incident lies not only in the aggression itself, but in the role of those involved. These are adults with functions linked to the public sphere — one in the education system and the other in the municipal administration — who were the protagonists of a situation of
harassment against minors.
Far from being an isolated crossing, the episode is part of a series of recent events where young liberals were the target of aggression by teachers and left-wing groups. At the National University of Lanús, libertarian militants were attacked by a group led by a teacher, while at the Faculty of Medicine of the UBA there were violent expressions against the president and physical assaults against a teacher
.
The repetition of these cases begins to outline a worrying scenario in educational settings, the political intolerance of the left and Kirchnerism escalating to physical aggression. Instead of promoting debate and the plurality of ideas, some sectors choose intimidation and violence against those who think differently in places that should be spaces
for dialogue.
