The ex-president Mauricio Macri confirmed this Sunday, after playing mystery for months, that he will not be a candidate for president in this year’s elections. “I want to ratify the decision that I will not be a candidate in the next election. And I do it convinced that we have to enlarge the political space for the change that we started and that we have to inspire others with our actions,” he said in a recorded video.
The ex-president’s message, lasting more than 6 minutes, begins with an analysis of the current situation that, true to his style, does not include any self-criticism. “We are adrift. Millions of Argentines are afraid of being out of work, of needing help for health and not getting it, that retirement will not be enough, that they will rob us, that our children will leave the country,” says the Ex leader.
And he wonders: “How did we get to be like this?” The answer, again, does not go through his years as President: “Almost 80 years ago, an important part of Argentine society chose to believe in messianic leaders.characters that would supposedly save us and lead us to a better life”, a type of leadership that “ended up being very harmful to the country”.
This “paternalistic leadership”, continues the former president, “discouraged Argentines to assume their own responsibility for the changes they wanted for their lives, and that subordination brought us here, to a country with more than half of the poor Argentines, with the economy devastated, increasingly stalked by drug trafficking.
Immediately afterwards, he highlighted the importance of teamwork and used the Argentine team in the last World Cup in Qatar as an example. “The selection opted for team leadership, as a whole, bet on the sum of individuals behind a goal, even having the best player in history on the court. But the rest didn’t expect him to be the one to ensure victory.” said Macri, who in 2015 claimed to have “the best team of the last 50 years” and ended up putting the country in debt and leaving millions of people in poverty.
About the end, after affirming that Together for Change “is the team that Argentina needs to start the new cycle,” he confirms that he will not be a candidate for president in this year’s elections. And he clarifies: “I am going to continue defending freedom, democracy and the values we share as I have always done. And I will always do it by your side, with the certainty that we Argentines have matured and we are not going to let ourselves be trampled on anymore.” for populism.”
“I am very confident in the learning of these years, I trust that they will choose who best represents us and that this person will have the support of all. We will never again have a puppet as president”he concludes.