Next Sunday, August 13, Argentines have an electoral appointment: the Primaries, Open, Simultaneous and Mandatory (PASO), an appetizer for the October presidential elections. Just two and a half months before the general elections, Argentines will elect the candidates for the Presidency of each political party. The dispute is between 26 pre-candidates who aspire to compete for the Casa Rosada.
Argentina goes to the polls. The entire population of voting age and condition is called upon to exercise their right and duty, since in the country voting is mandatory.
The PASO will be the first national electoral date for Argentines in 2023. But what are these elections and what will they define?
Here are the main points to take into account to understand the operation of the PASO:
-
What are the STEPs and what are they for?
The Primaries, Open, Simultaneous and Mandatory (PASO) are elections that have two functions: to define who will be the candidates of each political party for the positions of president, deputies and senators. That is to say, the lists of each party, and make a sieve to define the political formations that will be able to present themselves in the elections. They have to reach at least 1.5% of the valid votes to run.
In the general elections next October, the citizens elect a new president and vice president for the next four years. In addition, they decide on the composition of the National Legislative Power with the renewal of 130 seats in the Chamber of Deputies and a third of the Senate, 24 of the 72 members. The STEP will define who can apply to fill all those positions.
The primaries define, for example, who gets each nomination if there are two candidates for a position. For example, representative or senator of the same party. The population decides which one they prefer between the two through their vote.
Therefore, the applicants in the STEP are pre-candidates and after the results, the winners will become candidates.
These are primary elections because the candidates of each party are defined, they are open because citizens can vote for the candidates of any political party, whether they are affiliated or not. They are simultaneous because they take place on the same Sunday throughout the country and they are mandatory because Argentine regulations define it that way for all registered citizens. If they fail to do so, they may face penalties such as fines.
The PASO are always held two and a half months before the general elections in Argentina. This year, they take place on the second Sunday of August because the general elections will take place on the fourth Sunday of October.
-
Electoral mechanism: this is how the PASO work
In the case of the presidential formulas -president and vice-president- those that can compete in the general elections are those that obtain the most votes in the PASO. A clear example is that of Mauricio Macri and Gabriela Michetti in 2015, that prevailed over the pairing of Ricardo Sanz and Lucas Llach in the Alianza Cambiemos. Macri ended up being the president of the nation after the general elections.
But when it comes to the lists of deputies or senators, things get more complex. The lists for the general elections result from the internal regulations of each political formation. The most common is to use the D’Hondt system of proportional distribution, which is used in other parts of the world such as Spain.
To begin with, all lists that do not exceed 3% of the electoral roll are excluded. Then, the total valid votes obtained are divided among the remaining lists according to the number of positions to be filled.
For example, in the city of Buenos Aires, 12 seats are renewed – out of the 130 in the Chamber of Deputies. All the lists that want to apply and exceed 3% of the votes must have at least 12 pre-candidates. Then, according to the D’Hondt system, the positions are distributed among the pre-candidates. In other words, the twelve who achieve the highest numbers will become the party’s candidates for the October elections.
-
The main faces of these elections
The most visible of the PASO are usually the results obtained by the presidential formulas, since they are used as a type of poll for the general ones. This 2023, 26 pre-candidates for president of 15 political formations, alliances and parties are presented.
Unión por la Patria, Peronist and left-wing option, has opted for the formula Sergio Massa, Minister of Economy, and Agustín Rossi, Chief of Staff of the Government, who will compete with Juan Grabois, social leader, and Paula Abal Medina, sociologist by profession , to get to be the presidential candidates.
Massa’s proposals are based on trying to straighten out the turbulent Argentine economy through “fiscal balance, trade surplus and state instruments for development with inclusion.”
“Those are my four premises,” Massa remarked in one of his rallies.
On the other hand, in Together for Change, the right-wing coalition, Patricia Bullrich, former Minister of Security, and Luis Petri, deputy of the Chamber, will compete against Horacio Rodríguez Larreta, mayor of Buenos Aires, and Gerardo Morales, governor of Jujuy .
Horacio Rodríguez Larreta, one of the favorites of Together for Change, has based his pre-campaign on combating “the Kirchnerist absurdities” and promoting private investment in Argentina.
The deputies Myriam Bregman and Nicolás Del Caño, for the Left Front and Workers Unity (FIT-U), and Javier Milei, the option of the extreme right La Libertad Avanza, together with Victoria Villarruel as pre-candidate, will also enter the ballot. to the Vice Presidency.
-
Why so much controversy around the PASO?
unnecessary. It is how many refer to the STEP. And it is that these elections sometimes work, but other times not. Because? On some occasions, political parties or coalitions present several presidential formulas, but on others, as happened in 2019, they do not. In this case, the only function of the PASO is to define which parties reach the quota of 1.5% of the votes to be able to compete in the general elections.
Before the PASO, the candidates were decided, as in most countries, through internal methods selected by each party. Among them, party congresses, leadership agreements or the decision of party elites.
However, in 2011 Peronism promoted its creation to guarantee national protection in the internal powers of each bench. In other words, that the law could guarantee “fairer” primaries.
However, many citizens consider that they are an unnecessary expense and their elimination has been on the table in recent years, without knowing if they would be held in 2023.
If they want to be officially eliminated, the measure should go through both chambers of the Argentine Congress, since presidents do not have the power to repeal them by decree, according to the Constitution. In addition, it would need an absolute majority to get ahead, something that would require a consensus on the issue that does not currently exist.
-
The backdrop of the PASO: insecurity and economic crisis
These primaries and the general elections in October are marred by the strong insecurity and the economic crisis that Argentina is going through at the moment.
Without going any further, the country said goodbye to an 11-year-old girl on Wednesday, August 9. Morena Domínguez died in a Buenos Aires hospital after two people assaulted her on a motorcycle to steal her phone. The minor was on her way to school and in the middle of a fight over her belongings, she received a “strong abdominal blow” that caused internal bleeding and, ultimately, her death.
It is not an isolated case, Argentina faces this type of situation on a daily basis. And, for this reason, insecurity has been one of the main issues in the electoral campaign.
“In the murder of Morena, all the ingredients of the failure of the State appear: an unprotected neighborhood, a victim with no possibility of defending herself and a group of attackers removed from any record of containment or surveillance,” points out the Argentine newspaper ‘Clarín’ in one of its editorials.
In the province of Buenos Aires the situation is especially delicate. Nearly 13 million people live there and an average of 277 daily robberies are investigated.
In addition, according to official data from the Ministry of Security, Argentina registered a rate of 4.2 intentional homicides per 100,000 inhabitants in 2022, a very high figure despite being 7.2% less than the previous year.
“We cannot continue living with so much anguish and fear. This is not enough. They have transformed Argentina into an unlivable country,” wrote Patricia Bullrich, pre-candidate for Together for Change, on social networks.
However, even more than insecurity – and despite the heavy-handed discourse of right-wing and extreme right-wing candidates – the economic crisis has been the great protagonist of these elections, being the main concern of Argentines.
According to the Opiania pollster, inflation is the greatest concern of citizens, since they directly suffer the consequences, such as the increase in prices, especially in basic necessities. Insecurity follows, followed by poverty and unemployment.
Just a few days before the PASO, the monthly analysis of LatinFocus, made up of 50 international banks and consultants, the economic forecasts for Argentina are not good. Analysts warn that average inflation this year will be 116.1% and 130.3% next year.
A situation that exacerbates poverty and that has become unsustainable for many Argentines. Some trust that their vote in the PASO and then in the general ones will be able to change this situation. Or at least improve it.
With local media
#PASO #elections #Argentina #key #points #13A #primaries