In the final stretch of the campaign that took him this Sunday to his re-election, Governor Sergio Ziliottodid not want his management to suffer the ballast of the national situation. The resort to provincialize the electoral contest in La Pampa to the maximum was warned in a comedy step that took place last week: although it had already agreed with the Casa Rosada the landing of the President, its officials denied it until the last moment.
Alberto Fernández finally traveled on Monday, as planned, as part of the Frente de Todos strategy of trying to capitalize on local victories, despite the fact that they were characterized by a strictly territorial debate, and assured that Peronism "is not dead."
With the inauguration of the first "Integral Territorial Center for Gender and Diversity Policies" in the province as an excuse, Fernández arranged in advance his arrival in Santa Rosa the day after an election in which even the most optimistic opponents admitted the favoritism of the provincial government.
There, Fernandez highlighted to the Pampeans who "have known how to choose very well" and raised the discursive line that they already repeat from different official sectors: "We are at a time where all the preaching is that we are dead, that we have no chance of winning," he said ironically. And in a message in a national code, he asked them to repeat it in the face of the presidential election: "Now it remains to choose the destiny of the country. Please don't hand over the country to liars, to those who say they know how to solve inflation in five minutes."
He took Javier Milei to the ring, calling him energetic: "A character has appeared who says barrabasadas; wants to privatize city streets; give freedom to each one to sell his organs and live on that money; that says that we must collapse the Central Bank and dollarize the economy," he questioned.
Fernández's trip to La Pampa was only the first step: in Balcarce 50 they work to close the week with visits to two other districts in which the FdT won comfortably: Salta, where the massista Gustavo Sáenz won re-election by a wide margin; and Tierra del Fuego, to raise his hand the radical K Gustavo Melella, who took advantage of the fragmentation of Cambiemita and also renewed for four years.
The dispersion of the opposition is one of the axes that they have been following with attention and a certain expectation in the ruling party. Despite the impact implied by the 8.4% inflation in April, and that the perspective of the development of the economy for the rest of the year is far from the forecasts made by Minister Sergio Massa, in the different terminals of Frente power there is a warning about the need to lower the internal confrontation and unify discourse to take advantage of the fierce crosses that do not stop at Together for Change.
In the massismo they maintain that in part that is what the Tigrean pointed out when he considered that "not one more quilombo enters" and reiterated the need to avoid "sterile internals."
In Balcarce 50, where Fernández dislodged even his own with his crossing to Massa, because they had been working on the idea of closing ranks to polarize with Milei and confront the Supreme Court of Justice to "cover" the progress of the economy from the public agenda, they understand that the results in the provinces change the climate and that an opportunity was opened for the FdT. And that the electoral strategy, regarding the convenience of competition in the PASO, should not be a fighting factor.
In that sense, they emphasize that, despite the fact that in his speech on Saturday at the closing of the Buenos Aires PJ Congress, the leader of La Cámpora, Máximo Kirchner, pointed against Fernández, he did not close the possibility that there are several candidates as some leaders of his troops and the Renewal Front have been asking for.
"The score must be a good government program that, either by PASO or by synthesis, is fulfilled from December 2023," said the deputy, who expects a definition of Cristina Kirchner not only for the operative clamor for it to be presented, but around the internal.
Especially because, through her bishops, the vice president made some moves in recent days to snub certain leaders linked to La Cámpora who had let it be known that Cristina's candidate is Massa.
"Máximo did not reinforce the single candidacy and Wado himself (De Pedro) said (this Sunday) that 'most likely there will be PASO'. It is clear that competition contains everyone and narrows differences," they returned close to the President.
And they agreed with the analysis of the vice president's son. "Alberto always proposed to discuss and agree on a government program and that the people then choose the best candidate," they excused themselves.
They see that what happened in the provincial elections (out of a total of eight, there was only one triumph of JxC, in Jujuy) is a sign that "the national election is open."
"It is another sign that Peronism is competitive and that preventive defeatism should not beat it. Many colleagues end up buying the operation that the election is lost and begin to point out things to later be able to say that they warned. And the polls have been saying something else," insisted a man of extreme confidence of Fernández, hours before the president's speech.
In the Senate, although it always transpired that Cristina was one of those who took for granted a defeat in the national contest and that she only aspired to retain the province, Juliana di Tullio, a leader with close ties to the vice-president, also promotes a change of discourse. "Put all the judges you have, spend everything on TV, radio, portals and newspaper journalists. Also hire many troll farms to build the reality you like, but then you have to count the votes, "he challenged.
There were those who in this context refloated among chats of the ruling party a tweet from June of last year by the Minister of Public Works, Gabriel Katopodis, a reliable interlocutor for both Fernández (he accompanied him to La Pampa), and for Máximo Kirchner (he was by his side on Saturday), in which he claimed to analyze what was happening in the provinces to counteract the opposition discourse.
"What if we leave Palermo and move away from these forty blocks and walk the country a little? Argentina is bigger than what happens around the media. We had a country stopped by (Mauricio) Macri and today all cities and towns are on the move," he launched in a message that sought to question Peronism. Today it seems to have had an echo.
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