Argentina ready to choose next president

Argentina ready to choose next president

Amid rampant inflation, Argentina will celebrate 40 years of democracy when the new president to be elected on Sunday, Oct. 22, takes office. Although five candidates made it through the Aug. 13 Open, Mandatory, and Simultaneous Primary (PASO) elections, only three of them are considered to have a real chance to succeed Alberto Fernández.

 SERGIO MASSA

The current Economy Minister, a 51-year-old law graduate, pledged to focus on reducing the fiscal deficit strengthening reserves, and betting on the domestic market if elected.

Regarding the South Atlantic, Massa insisted during his campaign that “the Malvinas were, are and will be Argentine and the blood of our heroes is not negotiable,” in a tone highly critical of the stances adopted by his two main contenders.

JAVIER MILEI

This 52-year-old economist representing La Libertad Avanza (LLA), a Congressman since 2021 with no prior activity in politics, was the most-voted candidate in the PASO.

He promised to dollarize the economy, do away with the Central Bank, and eliminate the Ministry of Women’s Affairs to balance the current deficit and thus curb inflation, which currently nears 140% per annum.

The Libertarian candidate feels confident he can win in the first round on Sunday, for which he needs 45% of the votes, or 40% with a difference of 10 points ahead of the second-placed candidate.

Milei has insisted that for Argentina to recover the Malvinas/Falkland Islands there must be “an agreement with England” and to reach that understanding “the position of the people who live” in the archipelago since 1833 cannot be disregarded.

“The Malvinas Islands are Argentine. Sovereignty is not relinquished. There was indeed a war in which we lost. Now we are proposing a solution so that the islands return to Argentina and go to an agreement with England as China did with Hong Kong,” Milei has said at the price of being booed by war veterans and the rest of the political spectrum. Milei is also a confessed admirer of former British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.

PATRICIA BULLRICH

The former Security Minister under President Mauricio Macri seems short of plans of her own in case of winning Sunday’s elections. Her decision to summon Buenos Aires Mayor Horacio Rodríguez Larreta and his team to join her administration in case of victory would point in that direction. Bullrich defeated Larreta in the PASO but it remains to be seen whether it was due to voters supporting her or wanting Larreta out of the way.

Bullrich made the headlines during the Covid-19 pandemic when she said Argentina could hand over the Malvinas to Pfizer as collateral for the purchase of vaccines against the disease.

“Pfizer did not ask for a change in the law or anything else, the only thing it asked for was a surety insurance as it was asked to all the countries in the world, which is something reasonable,” she said on TV. “It did not even ask for the continental ice or… Well… We could have given them the Malvinas,” she added leaving people speechless.

Bullrich has also spoken about military officers “unjustly imprisoned” for their crimes during the fight against leftwing guerrillas in the 1970s and early 1980s, which she promised to solve.

Her friendly approach to the armed forces stemmed from her belief that “Argentina, which has an important geography, its borders, and Antarctica as a geostrategic objective, cannot think of being Costa Rica” and needed to be ready “for any conflict.”

In the August primaries, Milei won 30% of the votes, Bullrich’s Juntos por el Cambio (JxC) finished second with 28.3%, and Massa’s ruling Unión por la Patria (UxP), came in third with 27.3%.

There are 35.8 million people registered to vote. In case a runoff is needed, it is scheduled for Nov. 19. Juan Schiaretti, a dissident Peronist, and leftwing candidate Myriam Bregman are expected to account for as much as 5% of the valid votes between the two of them.