The President toured the works of the first entirely Argentine power reactor / Télam
“Cristina today cares more about the ‘pen’ than winning,” says an Executive official who does not echo the new sigh of the so-called “operative clamor” and maintains that the Vice will once again try to become the “great electorate” and take over the assembly of national lists to be able to maintain strength in Congress, being aware of the difficulties that the ruling party has to go through the electoral process in the midst of an economic-financial crisis, which has been eroding the income of the population.
The versions of a supposed Vice President’s candidacy that circulated last Friday were focused on restoring centrality to the former president in the midst of the dance of pre-candidates for the presidency, but more than anything on the search for influence in the discussions that will take place in the Congress of the PJ Nacional, on May 16 at the Ferro micro-stadium, as the designation of the proxies that on June 24 will formalize the candidacies and the integration floors of the different lists of the Frente de Todos. But today nothing indicates that the leader born in Tolosa is going to look for a new turn at the Casa Rosada.
Many times the simplest explanation is the one that counts. If in 2019 Cristina could not lead the FdT formula in parallel to the economic collapse of Cambiemos, why would she do it in 2023, being a substantial part, although she denies it, of a government that brought inflation and poverty to higher levels than those of the macro stage. To the raw data of reality are added her own statements when last December, at the time of learning of her sentence, she denied any candidacy and what she has slipped in the master class of the Teatro Argentino, on April 27 past.
PROVINCIAL ELECTIONS
Before the Peronist Congress, there will be elections in eight provinces. For some leaders there will be no substantial definitions until these results are known. One would not be waiting for some leader with the possibility of projecting himself at the national level, but rather for “real numbers”, not surveys, that give an account, even if it is not district-wise, of the feeling of a society disappointed with the political class.
It was a week in which different actors from the ruling party demanded a prompt meeting between the President and the Vice President to agree on the way in which the FdT presidential candidate will be designated. Today there is no dialogue between the two and the differences persist: while the president insists that there be a STEP, the ex-president prefers a candidate who emerges by “consensus”, as long as it is the one she has previously proposed. The chosen one would be Sergio Massa, with whom he maintains a strategic alliance that allows him to surf contradictions such as tolerating the highest interest rates in 20 years, concessions to the countryside or the inefficiency in the fight against inflation.
THE INFLATION INDEX
Next Friday, INDEC will finally report the indicator for April, which could border on 8%, and in May the forecasts are even worse because it would impact the chaos in prices that triggered the exchange rate run. Why does Cristina also promote the candidacy of the Minister of Economy? For fear of an institutional collapse, product of the lack of dollars and an eventual spiraling of prices. Ultimately, Massa arrived at the Palacio de Hacienda as helmsman of the so-called “Plan to arrive”.
It did surprise the support that the CGT gave him in his “frayed” act for Labor Day, in which there was no criticism of the Government for the economic performance but there was a somewhat “light” claim for the historic “union dues” in building lists. Also overshadowed by the onslaught against Javier Milei and the “PRO hawks”, the document they had released in advance, entitled “We are on time”, which called for a broad consensus of the entire political class to agree on “ten measures” that allow the country to get out of the deadlock.
A union leader, who cannot be accused of being a Kirchnerist or a Massista, accepted that high inflation will transform Massa “into a moving target” in an eventual electoral campaign for the presidency but conceded that “when you play cards you have to fix yourself with the ones that touch you in your hand”.
The strange thing about the case is that until almost 2 months ago, Daniel Scioli was the presidential candidate with the highest number of supporters in the labor movement. Apparently, some “asados” held at the Tigrense’s house would have made more than one weight unionist change their position.
During the speeches delivered at the Defensores de Belgrano stadium, there was no criticism of Horacio Rodríguez Larreta and other leaders of the most armed opposition. The triumvirate Héctor Daer, together with his peers from a small table, received the mayor of Buenos Aires last week at the Health Union with the excuse of a debt that the social works maintain with the public hospitals of the City of Buenos Aires from the stage of the pandemic. There, the presidential candidate confirmed his negotiating profile and maintained that he will try to ensure that the reforms are carried out within the framework of collective agreements or through laws agreed upon in Congress.
THE RESIGNATION OF VIDAL
The resignation of María Eugenia Vidal to compete for the presidency definitely put Larreta and Patricia Bullrich in the center of the ring. The ex-governor then showed herself with both contenders but previously gave Cristian Ritondo a free hand to join the grid of candidates for the Governorate that orbits around the former Minister of Security.
The “family photo” that the PRO leaders had taken on Friday, April 28 at Jorge Triaca’s house, in San Isidro, seemed to age prematurely. Tensions between the two “camps” continue to rise. Bullrich persists in his nods to the libertarian Javier Milei in contrast to the harsh criticism of the mayor of Buenos Aires. The big question is whether Mauricio Macri will “walk” the campaign together with the former president of the PRO beyond discursive coincidences and continue surrounding her with leaders of his extreme confidence.
VIRULENT INTERNAL
In radicalism they observe the virulence of an internal PRO that will not be defined until the results of August 13 are known. Gerardo Morales, who today would seek to capitalize on the victory in the Jujuy elections of his pupil Carlos Sadir, continues to be close to Larreta, with whom he coincides in questioning dollarization and the extreme positions of the libertarian candidate.
Both in Together for Change and in the FdT they pay attention to how the surveys give the histrionic economist, but they are aware of the lack of structure of La Libertad Avanza. For example, this force would go to the elections without candidates in large provinces such as Santa Fe and Córdoba. The “letter” of Buenos Aires, apparently, would be played on the brink of closing the lists, but there is a coincidence that this precarious structure would prevent it from having enough candidates at the district level and with adequate control to “defend” the ballots during the elections. .
In the absence of a new meeting of its National Board, JxC leaders brought together economists from the different parties. Facundo Manes arrived with the heterodox Marina dal Poggeto and Martín Rapetti, who are located far from the ideological spectrum, for example, of Macrista Luciano Laspina. The synthesis of a proposal that overcomes the current crisis undoubtedly constitutes a real challenge for the opposition coalition with a view to the beginning of the electoral campaign.
