ARGENTINA: Argentines gear up for legislative elections that will put President Nestor Kirchner's mandate to the test

Record ID: 448050

  • Title: ARGENTINA: Argentines gear up for legislative elections that will put President Nestor Kirchner's mandate to the test
  • Date: 2nd November 2005
  • Summary: EDUARDO DUHALDE AND HIS WIFE HILDA GONZALES DE DUHALDE GETTING OUT OF THE PRESIDENTIAL PLANE (2 SHOTS)
  • Embargoed: 17th November 2005 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Argentina
  • Country: Argentina
  • Topics: Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA4NET21T2M9ZY3QPD00KL9CFJW
  • Story Text: Argentina is gearing up for its first legislative elections under President Nestor Kirchner's government this weekend that are expected to put his mandate to the test. The left-wing president took power over two years ago, but with the weakest popular mandate in Argentine history. Now he hopes to shake off that reputation by clenching a convincing victory the coming elections.
    Polls show several leading candidates backed by the Argentine leader are expected to emerge as winners in the Sunday vote.
    That's welcome news for Kirchner, who has called the election a plebiscite on his rule and an effort to boost his standing as the leader of Argentina's deeply divided ruling party, the Peronists.
    According to analyst Graciela Romer, a good result for Kirchner will cement his leadership of the Peronist party.
    "A good election for Kirchner, above all in the province of Buenos Aires, leaves it clear who at this time can become the indisputable leader of a party that is in a very strong identity crisis, as was seen very clearly in the last presidential elections," she said.
    A former governor from a remote Patagonian province, Kirchner was catapulted into office in 2003 with just 22 percent of the vote after his Peronist rival, former President Carlos Menem, pulled out of the race.
    Since then, Kirchner has worked to strengthen his political base and Sunday's vote will prove the biggest test of his leadership.
    Kirchner has formed his own Victory Front party - a Peronist shootoff - and tapped several of his Cabinet members to run for key legislative seats.
    But his biggest contest will be in Buenos Aires province, Argentina's largest and wealthiest, where Kirchner has put forward his wife, Sen. Cristina Fernandez, to compete for one of the country's most powerful posts. Popular among Argentines, she faces the wife of former president Eduardo Duhalde, once a prominent Kirchner backer but now an avowed enemy in what is being widely seen as a battle for control of the Peronist party.
    Recent polls show Cristina Kirchner winning about least 35 percent of the province's vote, far ahead of Hilda Duhalde's 17 percent. Still, both are likely to win Senate offices under election rules awarding seats to the top three vote-getters.
    But a stronger showing by Duhalde could allow her and her husband to remain significant political players.
    Many Argentines, like office employee Daniela, are still undecided. "The truth is that up to now I don't really identify with any one in particular, so I don't know. I'm going to have to dig deep to study the subject and see where I am more inclined," she said.
    For Adela Carlevaro, now retired, a moderate majority for Kirchner would be the ideal outcome. "I don't like him to have a total majority because in that case a government can do whatever it wants, a majority with opposition would be positive for me," she explained.
    But some, like engineer Carlos Canel, are confused at the constant changes and party divisions and formations.
    "You can't understand anything, because there are no parties any more. You have to choose people more or less," he said.
    Political observers say Kirchner appears likely to win a positive verdict on his performance during Sunday's vote to renew half of the seats in the 127-member House of Deputies, a third of the 72-member Senate and hundreds of provincial offices.
    They say the election may also reveal possible leaders of what has been until now a fragmented opposition.
    Elisa Carrio, a leftist congresswoman, and Mauricio Macri, a businessman who leads Argentina's most popular soccer club Boca Juniors are expected to fare well in their bids for congressional seats in the capital, Buenos Aires. They are both up against Minister for Foreign Affairs Rafael Bielsa, the government candidate for the region.
    And Argentine diva Moria Casan has launched her own bid to win a seat in Congress. Casan, an independent candidate campaigning for women's rights who plays on her TV image as a racy bombshell, may be a longshot. But she stands out as one of the few newcomers in this nationwide vote, the first one for Congress since Argentina's economy collapsed in 2001 and left millions of Argentines destitute or impoverished.
    For Romer, the most important element of these elections will be the deals made between parties due to the increasing divisions and fragmentations of the traditional parties. "So we are facing a growing fragmentation of the political parties and therefore the need for agreements and alliances to sustain governability, and that is what is going to happen in parliament, I think, over the next period of time," she explained.
    The Peronists, the mixed-bag movement that has dominated Argentine politics for the last 60 years, are as strong and fractious as ever.
    If there has been one major political upset that came out of the crisis it was the near demise of the traditional opposition to the Peronists, the Radical Party, which was in power when the economy collapsed.
    The opposition is fragmented and although it can make some gains in key places, as a whole it cannot compete with the Peronists' sheer strength.
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