In the last stretch of the presentation of electoral fronts on June 14 and in line with the demand raised by the PJ governors, Axel Kicillof and a group of Peronist mayors of the Conurbano agreed on Thursday to move forward with a scheme of single candidacies of the Frente de Todos in the province of Buenos Aires to overcome a PASO of the ruling party.
"It can be interpreted as an authorization to the effort for the unity list" that the Peronist governors demanded this Wednesday at the meeting at the CFI, admitted to Clarín a couple of mayors summoned to the meeting in the Governor's Office.
"It has to have as a common factor among us a process of intensification of unity. A format of unity and avoiding confrontation is proposed," summarized Kicillof himself, who is betting on his re-election at the head of the Buenos Aires government. And he added: "The intention is to make the best proposal. We will not do anything that is inconsistent with the national strategies" of the Frente de Todos.
This Wednesday, thirteen PJ governors installed the unifying demand with the purpose of offering certainties where, so far, only the imbroglio persists.
With the same urgency, the community leaders of the first and third electoral sections of Greater Buenos Aires, which concentrates 67% of the Buenos Aires electorate, arrived in La Plata with the intention of revealing whether they will have to attend the election with a single official ballot for the Province or with two. And, in substance, whether the presidential candidate of the space will be unique or the official offer will be fragmented.
The talk was informal, according to the reference, because the reason for the meeting was to adjust details of the works plan for that region of the AMBA. Although a substitute, it had its importance. Not so much because of the conversation with the governor, but among the twenty mayors who, unlike decades ago, do not have the power of the bloc to impose minimum criteria when defining candidates.
Apparently, according to the sources consulted, it is better for them to limit the possibility of internal competition as much as possible. That is defined as a unit list. Diversity would not contribute to the arming in the districts, which is, ultimately, the most important thing for their interests.
They are in line with the demand raised by the governors at Wednesday's CFI meeting. The lawsuit was for an exclusive list that avoids inward dispute in the PASOs.
It is a position similar to the essay of Economy Minister Sergio Massa. Shared by Cristina Kirchner and Máximo Kirchner (president of the Buenos Aires PJ). Also from Kicillof.
His chief of staff, Martín Insaurralde, who was at Thursday's meeting, acts as an ally of Maximo. Both promote uniformity. They claim to express the absolute will of the mayors. A totality that breaks the mold days before the election, when trends are defined and mayors accommodate their movements in self-defense. Some, certainly in the most restricted clandestinity, even study where the channels of Javier Milei's possibilities will walk in the three urban belts of the Conurbano. In case, of course, that the presidential candidate of the FdT or its variant in the label, does not move the ammeter.
Anyway, in every precarious globe, there are always leaks. The mayors of Esteban Echeverría, Fernando Gray, and of Hurlingham, Juan Zabaleta, have just expressed support for the candidates to settle in the PASO.
Then, any scheme acquires the precariousness of its actors and the context.
Alberto Fernández, running for re-election, hints at momentary firepower with the promotion of members of his cabinet in the electoral fight. Intermediaries Daniel Scioli and Agustín Rossi in the national one, and Victoria Tolosa Paz in Buenos Aires.
For Massa the plane is more linear. He wants a "single list." Different in the constitution of that intended as a unit. Unique because he would represent the electoral artifact as a synthesis of the candidacy.
The minister hinted at something in the one-on-one conversation this Wednesday with the president, at the Casa Rosada. He presses with that option, at the risk of emigrating from the government in the face of the failure of the attempt. It was a preview of the proposal that he will present on Saturday at the congress of the Frente Renovador. It will be in Malvinas Argentinas and will have almost the character of a political threat.
At what point does Massa's format join that of the governors? The leaders say: "We demand the construction of a unity list with federal integration." Is this that they decide on the presidential candidate or that they only limit themselves to putting the vice-president?
Although Kicillof shares criteria with his colleagues, he starts from a political conditioning that limits his decisions. He is subordinate to Cristina, to the point that the vice president has not yet removed him from the grid of candidates to succeed Fernández. And that he could not even advance the nomination of Veronica Magario as his running mate in the Province. He announced it and within 24 hours he had to relativize the advance.
As baqueanos in discovering this kind of limitations, the Peronist mayors who were with the governor did not rush to ask for definitions. They will wait for the call of the tandem Máximo-Insaurralde, and the ringing of the last bell of Cristina to determine the course of the actions.
Meanwhile, they support the only visible candidate of Kirchnerism in the presidential campaign, Eduardo Wado De Pedro. The interior minister even visits opposition districts. This Thursday he was shown in the company of Kicillof and the president of Argentine Water and Sanitation (AySA), Malena Galmarini. He was in Tres de Febrero inaugurating works.
Almost simultaneously, in Escobar, Massa, announced improvements in the scales for the monotributo with Insaurralde, and local mayor, Ariel Sujarchuk.
It is a proselytizing caravan, with several lanes, which included Fernández himself. He was in the Whirlpool appliance plant, in the Buenos Aires district of Pilar. He remained accompanied by Daniel Scioli in the front row. A sign of persistence. "Don't go back, bet on the future. As Flaco Spinetta says: 'tomorrow is always better,'" the president promised.
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