Martina Jaureguy The federal justice ruled that Mothers of Plaza de Mayo University rector Cristina Caamaño “lacks the authority” to represent the university and dropped from an ongoing lawsuit the institution is carrying out to reverse a government intervention that began in February 2024.
This means that Caamaño, who was replaced by a government-appointed “organizing rector” and was trying to get reinstated, is no longer part of the legal proceedings as she is not legally considered to be the university’s top decision-maker.
The Mothers of Plaza de Mayo Association rejected the decision, saying in a public statement that President Javier Milei “has appropriated the university.”
Caamaño said that this decision equals the judiciary “steamrolling university autonomy”.
“I was elected by the university’s superior council,” Caamaño told the Herald, adding that she will now appeal the decision to the Supreme Court.
The decision comes after months of litigation as Caamaño and the university aimed at putting an end to the government takeover that halted university operations in February of last year.
The legal resolution, which says that Caamaño currently “lacks any authority that grants her power to act representing the National University of the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo,” means that Eduardo Maurizzio has been officialy acknowledged as the top authority.
Mauizzio was named “organizing rector” in July 2024 when the government took over university management. He was tasked with auditing and “normalizing” the institution following accusations that the university had failed to comply with requirements.
The university’s current situation
The university is not currently operating. It stopped receiving its budget in February 2024, when the Human Capital Ministry ordered it to stop its operations as it placed it under revision, along with four other recently-created universities.
The institution was formally made a national university by Congress in 2023. It was originally created as a “popular,” informal university in 2000 and recognized as a university institute in 2014. It offers five undergraduate degrees — law, social work, communication, history, and political sciences.
A few months after the government take-over, the police blockaded the university, briefly preventing students and staff from entering the building. In November, intruders broke in and stole documents. The current university authorities emptied and left the building, located in the San Telmo neighborhood, on January 31, 2025, Caamaño told the Herald.
During 2024, former staff and authorities continued to give informal classes in the San Telmo building and, since January, they have been operating informally in the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo Association’s headquarters. Caamaño said that professors, who are no longer under a contract with the university, have been teaching “for free” for the past year and a half, since the institution stopped receiving its budget.
“We can’t go on as a national university, because we would be overrunning a judicial decision, it’s illegal,” Caamaño explained. The ruling leaves students in limbo over their academic futures, and those of their university community. “We can carry out cultural and educational activities as long as they aren’t academic. We will resist, because this government won’t last forever.”
