Carlos Galván
05/22/2020 - 18:16
- Clarín.com
- Politics
It sounds like science fiction, but in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, the Casa Rosada is secretly working on a project to suspend the primary elections of August 2021 . The secrecy with which the Government carries out the initiative arises more from a matter of common sense - it has not even started June 2020 yet and it is assumed that all its attention is focused on the health emergency - than on a move to catch the government off guard. opposition.
In Together for Change, the main opposition force, they were not yet informed that Alberto Fernández evaluates the possibility of suspending the PASOs , but it is a scenario with which they work to precisely prevent any electoral modification from taking them "asleep", according to Patricia Bullrich, head of the PRO.
"No, it is not at all science fiction that they are thinking of canceling the PASO," said the former minister of Mauricio Macri.
Bullrich already told Alfredo Cornejo , head of the UCR, and lilito Maximiliano Ferraro that they should start evaluating what the three parties that make up Together for Change will do to settle next year's candidacies in case the PASOs are suspended .
Under the hypothesis that the primaries will be suspended next year, Interior Ministry officials began a round of consultations and prepared a project . There would be two arguments to justify canceling the STEP.
One: that it is uncertain how the health situation will be next year - will the coronavirus still persist? - and that in August it is cold, when a higher rate of infections can occur due more than anything to society's own habits.
Two: that the Alberto Fernández administration will have to face a sharp adjustment in the accounts next year after this 2020 of crisis and economic paralysis.
The PASOs of last year, according to estimates at the time from the Macrista administration, cost more than $ 4,000 million (about 87 million dollars at the time).
Although it seems early to deal with the matter, one of the problems is that the suspension of the PASO cannot be done through a DNU but only by law.
In its article 77, the National Constitution, in addition, establishes that "the bills that modify the electoral regime and political parties must be approved by an absolute majority of the total number of members of the Chambers" of Congress.
In the Senate, the ruling party has that special guaranteed majority (it has 42 senators and needs 37); in the Chamber of Deputies, it has 119 of its own legislators and the possibility of approving the eventual law is almost within reach (it needs 129). It would arrive with allies, although it will have to be seen whether Together for Change would also accompany the initiative.
According to the first drafts that are crossed in the Government, it seeks to make some of the institutional improvements brought about by the law that established the mandatory primaries, such as the prohibition of double and collector candidates , survive from an eventual suspension of the PASO .
STEP 2029. A girl from Mendoza, Lucrecia, votes with her grandmother.
It is also studying how to maintain a limitation -in STEP is 1.5% of the vote to prevent all political forces that register to participate in the general October 2021. There is talk of maintaining a threshold, although It is not clear if this would be established in the new law or directly in its regulatory decree.
For now, studying to suspend the PASOs in 2021, not directly repeal them. For some, last year's primaries had made almost no sense because no force had decided candidates.
In the ruling party they talk about setting some mechanism for the political parties to define their candidacies, be it through an internal election or a party congress.
The scheme of suspending the PASOs would be functional for the Front of All, where internal disputes over candidacies are not envisioned until at least 2025.
In Together for Change, where three more games coexist with the wing of Miguel Pichetto , bids are expected. With Marcos Peña completely diminished, no one appears as the sole owner of the pen. On top of next year, senators will renew several key districts, such as Córdoba, Mendoza and Santa Fe.
Will the radical Mendoza Alfredo Cornejo try to jump from Deputies to the Senate? Does the Cordovan Mario Negri remain in the House or seek a mandate as a senator?
On the PRO side, some already imagine that María Eugenia Vidal and Pichetto will be candidates for Deputies for the Province. And Mauricio Macri ? In your party, no one imagines that you will be excited to be a deputy again, but ...
Last doubt. The PASOs were established in 2009, on the impulse of the then President Cristina Kirchner . It is unknown if the now vice president agrees to suspend them.
Deputies of Mercosur
In October of last year, already on the edge of the presidential elections, the National Electoral Chamber ordered the Executive Power to call elections to elect Parlasur deputies . The ruling is in force and now the Alberto Fernández administration must comply with it. Or find a way around to avoid that choice.
One of the options being managed is to suspend, also by congress law, the election for next year and to hold it again only in 2023. One of the problems is that the Argentine representation would happen (the deputies for Argentina will expire the mandates in December).
Parlasur session.
Would their terms be extended, as some of the legislators themselves want? Would Congress or the Executive Branch directly designate them?
For political reasons, the government does not want the election to be next year either. It is that since some legislators are elected by single district, the result of that election could also be interpreted as a plebiscite of Fernández's administration. Therefore, the ideal for the ruling party is that the vote coincides with the presidential vote of 2023.