Opposition eyes PASO repeat in November – and 45% of national vote
Juntos por el Cambio’s leaders had the image they had been waiting for: all the opposition candidates for national senators and deputies from across the country together in one frame, showing a united face.
With the fights in the ruling coalition serving as a useful contrast, opposition leaders are setting their sights on their objectives: winning the midterms, stripping Kirchnerism of its majority in the Senate and emerging strengthened for the presidential election in 2023.
Nevertheless, the tumultuous scenes seen Tuesday near the hotel in the centre of Buenos Aires hosting the meeting served as a wake-up call, underlining the difficulties that lie ahead on the road to 2023. Thousands of demonstrators from social movements and left-wing groups were milling around the nearby Plaza de Mayo for a large mobilisation, snarling traffic and delaying arrivals.
City Mayor Horacio Rodríguez Larreta and his former deputy Diego Santilli, now a candidate for national deputy, walked in together on foot, camouflaged by hats that prevented some advisers from recognising them. Ex-president Mauricio Macri entered the hotel with his vehicle, avoiding the streets.
Inside, around a hundred candidates listened to the leaders of the three parties that make up the coalition: the Radicals, PRO and Coalición Cívica.
Patricia Bullrich was one of the most enthusiastic speakers, calling on the opposition to look ahead to 2023. “In November, we have to get 45 percent of the votes, because that puts us in a position to be able to reach the presidency without a run-off in 2023,” she declared.
National deputy and Coalición Cívica ARI Chair Maximiliano Ferraro agreed: “The government has not listened and has locked itself up in factional coups.”
Rodríguez Larreta, more measured in his tone, highlighted the value of unity, stressing for “it is the first time that Peronism has governed against a united opposition” since the return of democracy. He said he was convinced that they would win again in November, yet he warned that they must not “underestimate those who are in front of us for a second.”
For now, all the coalition’s leadership disputes are on hold – or at least that’s what Mauricio Macri’s key allies are saying. The contrast with tensions in the Frente de Todos coalition is today what unifies the opposition’s discourse even greater. Alfredo Cornejo noted as much in his opening speech: “Alberto and Cristina
are two hugely irresponsible people, who have shown that they only came together for power, without a plan of basic agreements. They have structural differences, and not nuances like we have.”
The same thoughts were reflected in the document released by the coalition at the end of the event. “The economic, health, social and political mismanagement of the government has stripped it of its ‘friendly’ and ‘inclusive’ façade,” it read, concluding: “The defeat showed them as they are: a disorderly, improvised government, without evidence, with flimsy structures leaning on an archaic and old apparatus and clientele that impede the prosperity of Argentines.”
One of Tuesday’s main objectives was to show unity after the PASO. Facundo Manes sat with Santilli and talked about joint work they can conduct together, while Ricardo López Murphy with María Eugenia Vidal did the same (they had dinner together the night before).
López Murphy won a large applause with his take. “It seems that now the pandemic is over, showing us that the September 12 vaccine was very effective. Let’s work so that the November 14 vaccine ends this nightmare.”