2023-08-14 02:45:17
Voting early on Sunday, Milei told reporters that members of the “privileged caste of politicians” are trying to stigmatize him.
AP | In the primaries, the candidates to occupy 24 seats in the Senate and 130 in the Chamber of Deputies of the National Congress are also defined.
Far-right Javier Milei was the most voted presidential candidate in Argentina’s primary elections on Sunday, according to the official count.
With 61.21% of the votes counted, the Ministry of the Interior indicated that the former Security Minister, Patricia Bullrich, won the primaries of the opposition coalition Juntos por el Cambio while the ruling Peronism ranked third with the Economy Minister Sergio Massa as a candidate.
Milei, from La Libertad Avanza, obtained 32.57% of the votes. The candidate proposes to dollarize the economy and close the Central Bank. An admirer of Jair Bolsonaro and Donald Trump, he unites the vote of the outraged with the traditional parties, especially among the youngest.
Voting early on Sunday, Milei told reporters that members of the “caste of entrenched politicians” are trying to stigmatize him and that Argentina has a chance to change following decades of failure.
Meanwhile, Bullrich stood with 17.0% and Massa with 20.64%. In total, Together for Change reached 27.57% of the votes and Peronism 25.48% -taking into account the votes of its other candidate, Juan Grabois-.
With delays at several polling stations in the capital, Argentines voted to elect presidential candidates for October’s general elections in a country plagued by one of the world’s highest inflation rates and rising crime.
More than 35 million people were summoned to participate in the Open, Simultaneous and Mandatory Primaries (Paso) that function as a kind of electoral test to gauge the possibilities of the political forces and their pre-candidates for the presidential elections on October 22.
The primaries also define the aspirants to occupy 24 seats in the Senate and 130 in the Chamber of Deputies of the national Congress, in addition to the candidates for mayor of the City of Buenos Aires and the government of the province of the same name, among other positions. Voting is mandatory.
Several pre-candidates called on citizens to participate fearing that, due to disappointment with the political class, abstention would be higher than in other primaries held in the past.
President Alberto Fernández, who is not seeking re-election due to the drop in his image in the polls, stated that “we have been democracy for 40 years and today should be a day of joy for the elections… let’s all go vote because it is the way to exercise our rights.”
He also hinted that the electoral process is tinged with uncertainty by predicting that the next president will possibly be elected in a second round of elections in November.
The anger of the population following years of inflation – the last measurement in June gave 115% year-on-year – which threw 40% of the population into poverty, added to insecurity and other chronic problems of the economy – such as the shortage of dollars and indebtedness – have marked the pulse of an electoral campaign with an open ending.
María del Carmen Antonio, a 65-year-old travel agent who was waiting to cast her vote, told The Associated Press that in these elections “a lot is defined. The country needs a change, we cannot continue like this”.
For his part, the conservative former president Mauricio Macri (2015-2019) -a political reference for Together for Change- called on Argentines to mobilize “to leave behind an era that has led us to much damage and sadness.”
To install a candidate in the presidential race, the political forces must reach at least 1.5% of the validly cast votes in the Paso.
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