Minister links predecessor Lousteau to Larreta; Massa picks another economist for lawmaker
Economy Minister Axel Kicillof, appointed last Saturday as the top Victory Front (FpV) candidate in Buenos Aires City for the Lower House of Congress, yesterday made its debut in the local electoral battle by expressing strong criticism toward mayoral hopefuls Horacio Rodríguez Larreta (PRO) and Martín Lousteau (ECO).
“It’s been a long time since we said that the candidate was the political project, and that was embodied in the lists,” said Kicillof, who has been described by President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner as her “right-hand man” and “best adviser.”
The Kirchnerite official will be heading the Kirchnerite lists for lawmakers in the City. He is followed by former Security Minister and current ambassador to the Organization of American States (OAS) Nilda Garré, La Cámpora’s secretary-general Andrés “Cuervo” Larroque, and Victoria Montenegro, daughter of two activists disappeared and killed by the 1976-1983 military dictatorship.
In conversation with Nacional Rock, Kicillof denied that he would be running for the seat aiming at not taking office at the Lower House of Congress in December, though he also suggested he would be willing to change his mind to occupy another seat where he is “most needed.”
“I feel very excited. I am part of a collective political project. The decision (to run in the City) was not an individual choice, it was a collective one. There is a clear leadership exercized by the President, and I am now a candidate and I will take office if elected,” Kicillof told reporters yesterday.
As for the July 5 local elections to succeed Mayor Mauricio Macri, Kicillof reiterated his support for the head of Aerolíneas Argentinas Ma-riano Recalde and his criticism toward Recalde’s main challengers, Rodríguez Larreta and Lousteau.
“It is very clear, crystal clear, that Martín Lousteau stands for basically the same as Horacio Rodríguez Larreta. That is to say that they belong to one project that is part of Mauricio Macri’s political space”, he said.
Hours later, the Economy minister listed a number of social achievements by the Fernández de Kirchner government that, he said, should survive the current administration, including Aerolíneas Argentinas, the state-run YPF oil company, the state takeover of the AFJP pension funds and the Universal Child Allowance (AUH).
Names on the table
Sergio Massa’s Renewal Front was one of the last political forces to disclose its candidates list. Guillermo Nielsen, Massa’s former mayoral candidate, will run for the regional parliamentary body Parlasur. Nielsen, who failed to muster enough backing for his FR candidacy in the City to reach the threshold during the recent PASO, is an economist by training, and previously served — like Massa — under President CFK and the FpV as ambassador to Germany between 2007 and 2010.
Also running for the FR, as national lawmakers in BA City, are environmental journalist Sergio Federovisky and Marco Lavagna, the son of renowned economist Roberto Lavagna, who will head the list. Federovisky is a broadcast journalist who has his own ecological show on cable television.
Meanwhile, the party led by Macri confirmed an already known list that will be competing on the August 9th against the radical and the Civic Coalition’s lawmakers candidates.
There will be three parties within the Cambiemos (Let’s Change) alliance — the PRO will be running with Patricia Bullrich, Pablo Toneli, Marcelo Wechsler and Cornelia Schmidt, while Mariano Genorvesi, Juan María Farizano, Cristina Guevara, and Sabrina Bartolo will be competing for the UCR lists; and Hernán Reyes, Mariana Stilman, Claudio Congolani and Facundo Del Gaiso for the Civic Coalition (CC).
Herald staff with DyN, Télam, online media
Source: Buenos Aires Herald