Here is where Marcelo Iurcovich appears: according to an article published by journalist Santiago O’Donnell in the newspaper Página/12,1 his excellent relationships with the military government, especially with Brigadier General Osvaldo Cacciattore, by then the de facto mayor of the City of Buenos Aires, and with ship captain (later rear admiral) Carlos Alberto Lacoste, who was the head of the EAM 78,2 allowed Iurcovich get a very favorable loan from BANADE for the construction of a five-star hotel right at the center of the capital.
Research by O’Donnell points out that, after the death of Marcelo Iurcovich, his son Hugo became the public face of the group.
Those who know him say he maintains certain a rebelliousness in his manner and something of a hippie vibe, which was perhaps a product of the time he spent in Buzios setting up a megaresort. His friends say that Hugo felt at ease with celebrities, without abandoning the low profile that characterizes the family, which is perhaps why he turned his artistic vocation into business related to entertainment, as suggested by his participation in the boards of companies like Deporcor and Event Organizing, in addition to real-estate dealings through of the boards of Sedaguma and Suma.3
O’Donnell continues his precise description of the family Iurcovich businesses:
Raquel Kaliman, the wife of Marcelo and mother of Hugo, also dabbled in real-estate business through the Consultex firm, registered at the group’s offices at Corrientes 1500. She shared the directorate of Consultex with their accountant, Sterin, and with Alejandro Granillo Ocampo, a family member of the former multi-functionary of Carlos Menem’s government, Raúl Granillo Ocampo. It seems that Kaliman did not chose the most solvent member, since Alejandro presides over (and Raúl was in the directorate of) the a construction company based in La Rioja, Construnoa, which lists unrecoverable credits of more than 2 million pesos.
It also links the Iurcoviches, more recently, with real-estate businesses in Puerto Madero through the company Sycic, “a detached stockholder of the family business, Polytechnics,” and a shareholder in the JM Aragon, Dique 1 and Puerto Santo building companies. As for Polytechnics, it is a company dedicated to the maintenance of clinics and hospitals that became infamous on June 30th of 2005, in a episode in which two patients at the Santojanni Hospital died as a result of a mistake made during these maintenance tasks, as the newspaper Clarín put it.4
- Santiago O’Donnell, “The father, the son, and an unholy spirit,” in Página/12, 21 August of 2007.↩
- The attributions of the EAM 78 in reference to credits to private businesspeople are specified in Decree 1261/77, B.O. of May 27th of 1977.↩
- Santiago O’Donnel, ob. cit.↩
- “Five people accused of deaths at Santojanni hospital summoned for questioning,” in Clarín newspaper, September 11th of 2006. Recovered from http://www.clarin.com/ultimo-momento/citan-indagatoria-imputados-muertes-hospital-santojanni_0_Bklt9QkAKx.html↩