2023-11-13 08:36:05
The die is cast. The candidates for the presidency of Argentina, the ruling party Sergio Massa and the libertarian Javier Milei, measured their strength this morning in a debate full of hard crosses, asked for the vote and met for the second electoral round, which will take place on November 19 .
The head of the Treasury Palace jumped to bite his adversary’s jugular from his first intervention, in which, instead of offering his proposals on the economy, he used his minutes to interrogate Milei, knowing that cornering the libertarian or removing him from the state moderate in which he started could tip the balance on his side.
«Javier, yes or no, I want to ask you: You said on (journalist Eduardo) Feinmann’s program that you are going to eliminate subsidies. Are you going to eliminate them yes or no? By yes or no, are you going to privatize (the) Vaca Muerta deposit (…)? Yes or no, are you going to dollarize the economy as you proposed in the letter you presented to the electoral justice? yes or no? By yes or no, are you going to privatize rivers and seas (…)? “Yes or no, are you going to eliminate the Central Bank?” Massa snapped.
Faced with this battery of questions, Milei became upset and told his rival that he was not going to “condition” him to answer “yes or no” and, after resolving some of the questions, he summarized that he was going to “end up with the Central Bank.” and with the “cancer of inflation.”
The Minister of Economy called Milei a “liar” so many times that the libertarian said: “If a liar says that someone is a liar, the one being accused is the one telling the truth. Because if you were Pinocchio, you would have already hurt my eye.
Few proposals and some flattery
Aware that the event could serve to capture the vote of those who elected other political forces in the October 22 elections and, above all, try to convince the undecided, both candidates aimed more at revealing the rival’s weaknesses than at offering their proposals.
Beyond the reiteration of his economic policies, Milei stated in international relations that he will go to “all diplomatic instances so that the Malvinas become Argentine again” and that he will promote closeness with “the United States, Israel and the free world”, as well as as a modification of the national security law.
In addition, he praised the security measures implemented by Massa when he was mayor of the Buenos Aires town of Tigre (2007-2008 and 2009-2013).
For his part, the official candidate set his goal of creating two million formal jobs and increasing exports, especially promoting relations with countries “that open arms and markets to Argentine work,” in addition to the installation of a ‘Argentine FBI’ in Rosario, a city hit hard by violence associated with drug trafficking.
Macri versus Cristina Fernández, always present
A fierce critic of Kirchnerism – a wing of Peronism linked to the deceased former president Néstor Kirchner (2003-2007) and the current vice president and former president, Cristina Fernández (2007-2015) -, Milei reproached Massa, who created Frente Renovador as a dissident current after being Fernández’s chief of staff (2008-2009) and now part of Unión por la Patria.
In this regard, the official candidate criticized the support of former president Mauricio Macri, a leader of Together for Change (center-right), whose candidate, Patricia Bullrich, was third in the October votes.
«It seems to me that you didn’t learn anything because you ended up going to ask Macri to please help you. And this is not from Macri or Cristina, I repeat again: you or me? Who is going to govern Argentina? “Who is prepared?” said the Minister of Economy.
Macri and Fernández have been two of the great protagonists of Argentine political life in recent decades and, although both gave up running for elections – among other reasons, due to the little support they expected to receive -, they continue to be leaders in their respective forces. .
However, the vice president has remained in a discreet background in the campaign, while Macri, especially after the October 22 elections and the crisis unleashed in his coalition due to the support expressed by him and Bullrich for Milei, had a strong leadership.
After confronting their ideas about the economy, Argentina’s relations with the world, education and health, production and work, security, and human rights and democratic coexistence for two hours, Massa and Milei asked Argentines to vote and were scheduled for the elections of the next Sunday. ‘Alea iacta est’.
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