Overview
- The executive branch issued Decree 687/2026 that legally removed the nearly 60-year-old Coro Nacional de Niños from the structure of the Secretaría de Cultura and kept only the Coro Polifónico.
- The decree, published Thursday, instructs the Secretaría de Cultura to create a Programa de Formación Artística for children and adolescents intended to broaden federal access to training.
- Officials justified the change by citing administrative 'incompatibilities' related to minors in the national public employment regime and said the Secretaría worked with the Secretaría de Empleo Público on a new model.
- The decree offers no start date, participant numbers, funding plan or named director, and coverage reports that staff were suspended in April, the choir found its building closed and its roster had shrunk from 40 to about 20 members.
- Cultural figures and the choir's former director María Isabel Sanz have criticized the move for erasing institutional continuity and raising immediate risks to the children, the choir's heritage, and how the new program will be run.