Electoral debate focuses on chances of Scioli-Zannini ticket winning in the first round
By Sebastián Lacunza
Editor-in-Chief
Some analysts, politicians and pollsters are making risky predictions about the August primary either way.
Given that the ruling Victory Front (FpV) came third in the three main districts electing governors this year (Córdoba, Santa Fe and Buenos Aires City) and alternated wins and defeats in medium and small provinces, many believe that FpV hopeful Daniel Scioli has slim chances of becoming president.
Such a forecast carries high margins of error. An automatic transfer from those provincial results to the national level clashes with the empirical evidence of the last three presidential elections. Even if the provincial results so far are not identical to those throughout 2011 (when CFK ended up being elected with 54 percent of the national votes), they are quite similar.
Excessive optimism among opposition leaders has its flipside in the immoderate confidence displayed by Kirchnerism once the presidential ticket Daniel Scioli-Carlos Zannini was announced. Voices from the ruling party assumed that the combination of president CFK (undeniably represented by Zannini on the ballot) and the BA province governor’s high approval ratings would ensure a victory.
There are no valid reasons for such expressions of self-confidence. It has been widely proved that results at the ballot box are not always linked to approval ratings, which vary in time and emphasis. Chile’s Michelle Bachelet left office in 2010 enjoying huge popularity ratings which did not prevent a landslide victory for the conservative Sebastián Piñera over the president’s ally Eduardo Frei. Similarly, Luiz Inácio “Lula” da Silva failed to transform all of his enormous support into votes for Dilma Rousseff that same year.
When re-elected in 2011, CFK made an impressive recovery from the 2008-2009 downturn, but today’s situation doesn’t look like that. In the 2003-2011 period, the Argentine economy grew like very few others in the world. In addition, the first CFK administration had implemented high-impact policies for millions of Argentines, both in terms of purchasing power (Universal Child Allowance), new rights (gay marriage) and symbolic values (Broadcast Media Law).
Two years later, the government tried to win the election basing its campaign on the same arguments — and failed. Kirchnerite vote counts ended nearly 20 percentage points behind the 2011 achievement, something not so unusual for midterm elections. But the economic cycle had changed and Argentina passed from its outstanding performance to failing to grow in the way that most of its neighbours did.
Poverty (of around, say, 15 percent) and highly precarious employment levels have remained more or less at the same since 2012, so if those factors are supposed to have an influence in the upcoming vote, they play against the ruling party.
Facing a stagnant economy, CFK reacted by expanding income transfer programmes to more recipients as the child allowance and pensions outpaced inflation up to last year. The government also extended a significant programme aimed at encouraging youngsters to finish their studies.
Another side of the relatively high presidential approval ratings can be attributied to the conflict with the “vulture” funds. Financial gangsters and the notorious arbitrariness of New York City Judge Thomas Griesa gave the Pink House the opportunity to be on the right side. As for the opposition, many leaders managed to be, more than once, on the wrong side.
Even if it seems to be a very different issue, the government may have taken advantage of the complaint against CFK and other officials for allegedly covering up the perpetrators of the bombing of the AMIA Jewish community centre — a writ which was proven to be extremely weak or even fraudulent by a federal judge and two appeals courts. Prosecutor Alberto Nisman’s mysterious death, an issue which hardly appears today in the media that overestimated the seriousness of his complaint, didn’t seem to harm CFK, either. The government should explain why it had worked so close to Nisman for eight years, applying all of those uncontrolled tools provided by the Intelligence Secretariat. Once again, the opposition voices which tried to transform Nisman into a hero, in the end, strengthened the government.
Regarding security policies, no real differences can be seen among the candidates. Scioli, Mauricio Macri and Sergio Massa agree on the heavy-handed approach. Meanwhile, corruption broadly remains at usual levels for Argentine politics, as other key policies — like the anti-trust mandates of the Broadcast Law — have been almost forgotten, and no candidate is likely to revive them.
Both this chiaroscuro and the failures widely exposed by pollsters show that it is hasty to pretend to behave as fortune-tellers in the face of the upcoming elections. Perhaps the predictions help to bury other issues in the campaign.
@sebalacunza
Given that the ruling Victory Front (FpV) came third in the three main districts electing governors this year (Córdoba, Santa Fe and Buenos Aires City) and alternated wins and defeats in medium and small provinces, many believe that FpV hopeful Daniel Scioli has slim chances of becoming president.
Such a forecast carries high margins of error. An automatic transfer from those provincial results to the national level clashes with the empirical evidence of the last three presidential elections. Even if the provincial results so far are not identical to those throughout 2011 (when CFK ended up being elected with 54 percent of the national votes), they are quite similar.
Excessive optimism among opposition leaders has its flipside in the immoderate confidence displayed by Kirchnerism once the presidential ticket Daniel Scioli-Carlos Zannini was announced. Voices from the ruling party assumed that the combination of president CFK (undeniably represented by Zannini on the ballot) and the BA province governor’s high approval ratings would ensure a victory.
There are no valid reasons for such expressions of self-confidence. It has been widely proved that results at the ballot box are not always linked to approval ratings, which vary in time and emphasis. Chile’s Michelle Bachelet left office in 2010 enjoying huge popularity ratings which did not prevent a landslide victory for the conservative Sebastián Piñera over the president’s ally Eduardo Frei. Similarly, Luiz Inácio “Lula” da Silva failed to transform all of his enormous support into votes for Dilma Rousseff that same year.
When re-elected in 2011, CFK made an impressive recovery from the 2008-2009 downturn, but today’s situation doesn’t look like that. In the 2003-2011 period, the Argentine economy grew like very few others in the world. In addition, the first CFK administration had implemented high-impact policies for millions of Argentines, both in terms of purchasing power (Universal Child Allowance), new rights (gay marriage) and symbolic values (Broadcast Media Law).
Two years later, the government tried to win the election basing its campaign on the same arguments — and failed. Kirchnerite vote counts ended nearly 20 percentage points behind the 2011 achievement, something not so unusual for midterm elections. But the economic cycle had changed and Argentina passed from its outstanding performance to failing to grow in the way that most of its neighbours did.
Poverty (of around, say, 15 percent) and highly precarious employment levels have remained more or less at the same since 2012, so if those factors are supposed to have an influence in the upcoming vote, they play against the ruling party.
Facing a stagnant economy, CFK reacted by expanding income transfer programmes to more recipients as the child allowance and pensions outpaced inflation up to last year. The government also extended a significant programme aimed at encouraging youngsters to finish their studies.
Another side of the relatively high presidential approval ratings can be attributied to the conflict with the “vulture” funds. Financial gangsters and the notorious arbitrariness of New York City Judge Thomas Griesa gave the Pink House the opportunity to be on the right side. As for the opposition, many leaders managed to be, more than once, on the wrong side.
Even if it seems to be a very different issue, the government may have taken advantage of the complaint against CFK and other officials for allegedly covering up the perpetrators of the bombing of the AMIA Jewish community centre — a writ which was proven to be extremely weak or even fraudulent by a federal judge and two appeals courts. Prosecutor Alberto Nisman’s mysterious death, an issue which hardly appears today in the media that overestimated the seriousness of his complaint, didn’t seem to harm CFK, either. The government should explain why it had worked so close to Nisman for eight years, applying all of those uncontrolled tools provided by the Intelligence Secretariat. Once again, the opposition voices which tried to transform Nisman into a hero, in the end, strengthened the government.
Regarding security policies, no real differences can be seen among the candidates. Scioli, Mauricio Macri and Sergio Massa agree on the heavy-handed approach. Meanwhile, corruption broadly remains at usual levels for Argentine politics, as other key policies — like the anti-trust mandates of the Broadcast Law — have been almost forgotten, and no candidate is likely to revive them.
Both this chiaroscuro and the failures widely exposed by pollsters show that it is hasty to pretend to behave as fortune-tellers in the face of the upcoming elections. Perhaps the predictions help to bury other issues in the campaign.
@sebalacunza