Cristina Kirchner, the most influential Argentine politician in recent decades, decided to step aside for the 2023 elections after be sentenced to 6 years in prison and disqualification to hold public office for a corruption case.
(Also: Cristina Kirchner: what comes now after the sentence to 6 years in prison?)
“I am not going to be a candidate for anything, neither for president, nor for senator. My name will not be on any ballot.” It was the unexpected announcement by the former president (2007-2015) and current vice president of Argentina in the address she gave from the Senate office this Tuesday, as soon as the sentence was known.
(In context: Cristina Kirchner, sentenced to 6 years in prison for corruption in Argentina)
And although for the opposition to the government of the Peronist Alberto Fernández the ruling was a triumph of Justice, the image that Cristina showed during her presentation was the furthest away from someone defeated, after the Prosecutor’s Office had requested 12 years in prison for her last August.
The judges, however, acquitted her on charges of alleged illicit association for which she was also accused.
(You can read: Cristina Kirchner sentenced: a verdict of high political impact in Argentina)
In this process, irregularities were judged in the concession of 51 public works to firms of the businessman Lázaro Báez during the governments of the late Néstor Kirchner (2003-2007) and Cristina Kirchner (2007-2015) in the southern province of Santa Cruz, political cradle of Kirchnerism.
In addition to sentencing Cristina, the court also imposed various prison terms on Báez and seven former public officials, but acquitted four other defendants, including Julio De Vido, Argentina’s Federal Planning Minister between 2003 and 2015.
I am not going to be a candidate for anything, neither for president, nor for senator. My name will not be on any ballot.
Faced with those days, in which there were massive reactions of support in the streets, this Tuesday there were few mobilizations, the previous silence of The Camporathe movement led by Máximo Kirchner, son of the vice president and the late former president Néstor Kirchner (2003-2007).
(Keep reading: Who is Cristina Kirchner, the powerful political leader convicted in Argentina?)
In the recent imagination is the massive event in the Buenos Aires city of La Plata, in which Cristina, in campaign mode, spoke to some 60,000 people on the achievements of the Kirchner governments and opening a window to the future, although without revealing it.
“The elections, it has been shown, can be won, but the conditions are so serious and deep that they have left us that it will require that all Argentines, or at least the majority, all pull together in the same direction,” said that November 17, Peronist Militancy Day.
That night, before the cries of “Christina President” of the public, she quoted the historical leader Juan Domingo Perón: “As the General said, everything in its measure and harmoniously.”
(Of interest: Alberto Fernández defends Cristina Kirchner: “An innocent woman has been convicted”)
A political bomb
It is undeniable that the figure of Cristina is enormously influential in the Peronist spectrum, so his participation in the 2023 campaign was almost certainif not as a candidate for president, then at least as a candidate for senator, a position that also allowed her to maintain immunity in the event that Tuesday’s sentence is ratified by the Supreme Court.
However, based on what was expressed this Tuesday, Kirchner does not want to harm the Frente de Todos – the name with which President Alberto Fernández won the 2019 elections – being, in his words, the “condemned candidate”.
Furthermore, no one is unaware of the current situation of the Argentine Executive, with the image of the president increasingly weakened by the economic crisis, with inflation close to 90% and 43.1% of the population below the poverty lineand the tensions in the ruling party, which draws a very complicated picture for Peronism.
(See also: Cristina Kirchner after corruption ruling: “I will not be a candidate for anything”)
Without knowing if President Fernández will stand for re-election and with the proximity of a powerful figure such as the Minister of Economy, Sergio Massa, of international relevance and weight in the ‘establishment‘ local, At the moment there is no other safer movement than the ‘no’ of the vice president.
On December 10, 2023, the Executive resulting from the October elections will take office, in which, as he said this Tuesday and as he did in December 2015, when the mandate of the center-right Mauricio Macri began (2015-2019), Cristina will return to House.
But the decision to step aside in any type of political inspiration “moved the fragmented arch of the government.” This is how Mariano Spezzapria, a political journalist from The nationwho tells that “a majority had already embarked behind a possible candidacy of the head of Kirchnerism for the 2023 presidential replacement”.
“Of course I was surprised,” a close associate of the vice president admitted to that Argentine newspaper, who was trying to gauge the consequences of the announcement in the corridors of the Senate.
Despite the sentence, Kirchner will not go to prison for having privileges. Even the first instance decision it also opens a long appeals course that can last years and during which you could run for public office. However, it has a strong political impact in a country polarized between the ruling Peronism and the right-wing opposition.
“In the allegations I absolutely proved that I did not manage the budget. I do not legislate, Congress does it. None of the lies were proven. It is a parallel State, a judicial mafia that sentenced me,” said the Argentine vice president in a long speech broadcast on the networks.
The sentence has a strong political impact.
“The sentence has a strong political impact,” analyst Rosendo Fraga told AFP. But “the possibility of her being arrested for this conviction is non-existent.” The sentence without effective imprisonment is “a disappointment for the anti-Kirchner sectors,” he pointed out.
Another version that is discussed is the possibility that Fernández could pardon her. In this regard, the majority doctrine understands that it is, but there are constitutionalists who maintain that it is not possible because corruption crimes cannot be pardoned.
The pardon would not require waiting for the sentence to become final. Despite the fact that there are constitutionalists who warn that it is not appropriate, in Argentina the Court endorsed the pardon even for defendants. And it is not necessary for the beneficiary to accept it. It was the case of Graciela Daleo, who rejected Menem’s pardon and the same was applied to him.
Before assuming the presidency, Kirchner ruled out a similar decision regarding his vice president. “Anyone who thinks I’m going to come to the Casa Rosada to grant a pardon is stupid, I don’t believe in pardons. Presidents are not here to forgive anyone,” he said.
Impact on the opposition
Spezzapria says that, for the opposition, especially the one grouped in Together for Change (JxC), Cristina’s “resignation” could also have a strong political impact.
Until now, explains the political journalist, “the preparations for a possible candidacy of Cristina had been feeding back, in a ‘mirror effect’, the speculations around a return of Mauricio Macri as the main candidate for the coalition that makes up the Pro, the UCR , the ‘lilitos’ of the Civic Coalition and the Republican Peronism of Miguel Pichetto”.
In his analysis to the daily The nation, The analyst adds that “Cristina’s early departure from the electoral scene and her replacement by candidates who would compete for the votes of the center of the political arc –Massa, Eduardo De Pedro in ‘white hope’ mode- could also generate movements in JxC, which It has leaders such as the Buenos Aires mayor Horacio Rodríguez Larreta or the radicals Gerardo Morales and Facundo Manes – who will go to a party internship next March – who cultivate a similar political style”.
Beyond the inmates of JxC, in the opposition coalition they understand that despite their “resignation”, Cristina will not give up in her attempt to control the Judicial Council and will sharpen the conflict of powers between Congress and the Court.
INTERNATIONAL WRITING
*With information from Concepción M. Moreno (EFE), AFP and La Nación (Argentina) / GDA
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