As Argentina’s inflation exceeded 60% and the differences between centre-left President Alberto Fernández and his vice-president Cristina Kirchner seemed to be stronger than ever, the resignation earlier this month of Economy Minister Martin Guzman , was experienced as a thunderclap. Since then, Fernández and Kirchner have reconnected and suggest a way out of the crisis.
From our correspondent in Buenos Aires,
“ I love you, me neither… They hadn’t spoken to each other for months. Now they meet secretly. What’s going on between President Alberto Fernández and Cristina Kirchner, the vice-president who nominated him for the job? Contrary to appearances, this may not be a power struggle.
A miraculous phone call
“ They spoke ! ” Almost at the same time, all the continuous news channels in Argentina are giving the news on this evening of Sunday, July 3, with a lot of billboards ” Urgent », « Last minute », « breaking news “… The journalists reconstruct the sequence: “ It was he who called her, relatives eventually convinced him to do so, but he wanted to make sure that she would take him on the phone. ” Elsewhere, we add: “ She also had to be convinced, there were intermediaries, including Estela de Carlotto “. President of the Grandmothers of the Place de Mai, the latter would have “ played a big role » in the patching between « Him ” and ” She », hear the President of the Republic Alberto Fernández and the Vice-President Cristina Kirchner.
All the media (and the majority of Argentines) have been in turmoil since the surprise resignation, the day before, of the Minister of Economy Martín Guzmán, the man who renegotiated the $45 billion debt deal with the IMF. Saturday evening, and throughout this Sunday, Fernández received personalities at the presidential residence of Olivos. But he had not spoken, before the famous phone call which shook the editorial staff, with his vice-president. Why would he have done it anyway, since Fernández and Kirchner hadn’t spoken to each other for two months and Kirchner never missed an opportunity to publicly criticize the president?
In any case, the miraculous phone call, the result of many mediations, had some effect. After a day when there was talk of a major cabinet reshuffle but without decisions, two hours after the exchange between Fernández and Kirchner, Silvina Batakis, a renowned economist, a priori closer to the vice-president than to the president, succeeded Guzmán. (Provisional?) End of the government crisis.
Guzmán, a pupil of the Nobel Prize winner Joseph Stiglitz, yet venerated by Kirchner, had become the pet peeve of the Kirchnerists, who said ” sold at the IMF. Silvina Batakis is supposed to be of the “K family” (for Kirchner), therefore not suspected of treason to the doctrine, but, as soon as she took office, on Monday morning, she affirmed that she would continue the economic policy of her predecessor . As for Fernández and Kirchner, since that Sunday when the government swayed, they decided to meet regularly, but secretly. Nothing should filter out of these meetings which take place at the residence of Olivos and which therefore cannot be hidden, and whose respective entourages, instead of a possible joint press release, disseminate non-concordant information supposed to reflect their conversations. So it is with power in an Argentina still in crisis, where inflation exceeds the rate of 60% per year.
A political crumbling
To understand something, backtrack. Saturday May 18, 2019, in a long letter published on Facebook, Cristina Kirchner announces that she will not be a candidate for the presidency in the October elections of the same year. But that she will accompany in the ticket Alberto Fernández, nominated by her as a candidate on behalf of the entire Peronist current, then divided, in particular between Kirchnerists and non-Kirchnerists. This is a huge surprise, because few imagined that CFK (as it is called), president from 2007 to 2011, then from 2011 to 2015, after succeeding her husband, Néstor Kirchner (2003-2007), would not show up. Her possible candidacy would have suited the outgoing president, Mauricio Macri, of the center right: while having a capital of 25 to 30% of loyal voters, Cristina Kirchner not only divides Peronism but the whole of society Argentina. For many, she could not win. On the other hand, as vice-president, behind a moderate who never imagined playing the leading roles, she allowed the reunification of Peronism with a formula that could even seduce those disappointed with Macrism.
Stroke of genius, some have said. A successful operation in any case, since the Fernández-Kirchner duo won the presidential election with 48% of the votes in the second round. But who had won? For many, Cristina Kirchner was the leader of the coalition and, having appointed the president, the real holder of power. But the Argentinian system is presidential, American-style, and the chief executive has a very large margin of maneuver, the vice-presidency being, still as in the United States, largely symbolic, except with regard to the Senate. , of which she is the president. In addition, the presidential campaign demanded the formation of a real coalition bringing together the different Peronist currents. The Kirchnerists have their place there, but obviously also the “Albertists”, the supporters of Sergio Massa, President of the Chamber of Deputies, the governors, who are rather conservative, the trade unionists, etc. If CFK, as leader, and Fernández, as president, have an obvious preeminence, government and Parliament reflect this fragmentation. Especially since, for almost two years, the pandemic has frozen the positions of each other.
But since the return to a certain normality, relations have been strained between the Kirchnerists and the president. In September 2021, the main ministers close to Cristina Kirchner resign, triggering a crisis that is only resolved after an initial dialogue between the vice-president and Fernández. The agreement with the IMF, signed in January 2022 by Martín Guzmán with the support of Alberto Fernández, by which Argentina refinances the debt of 45 billion dollars contracted by the administration of Mauricio Macri, then arouses the criticisms of the kirchnerists, who affirm that the Minister of Economy gave in to the injunctions of the Monetary Fund (although all independent observers consider that this is a “light” agreement, rather favorable to Argentina). Kirchnerism, its leader at the head, thus arises in opposition to the government, while being part of the coalition in power. On purely rhetorical positions, intended for the hard core of their electorate, because CFK and his people have no alternative policy to propose.
In fact, Cristina Kirchner would not know what to do with a power that would fall to her if Fernández were to resign. But she would no doubt like to see him more active by her side when she criticizes justice and asks for changes to the Supreme Court. Because what concerns CFK the most is the risk of being condemned in corruption cases concerning her, the trials of which will begin soon. Failing to be able to avoid it, which she already accuses a Fernández of whom she would affirm in private that he betrayed his word, she prepares a “political” defense, comparing her fate to that of the Brazilian Lula Da Silva.