Buenos Aires
Argentine President Alberto Fernández criticized the country’s Supreme Court on national television this Wednesday (10) after the court decided to suspend two provincial elections that would be held next Sunday (14). In both cases, Peronists were the preferred candidates.
Fernández explained that the court “shows an antidemocratic character and disrespect for the federal regime” and “holds democracy hostage to a group of judges who do not adhere to criteria of justice” and who “have become the operative arm of the opposition”.
He linked the court’s decision to his opponent, former President Mauricio Macri. “It strikes me that the decision was made just after Mauricio Macri was treating as ‘fiefdoms’ the northern provinces where his political space predicted defeat.” Both gave up their candidacy for president in the next election.
In the almost tenminute program, Fernández also called for a reform of the judiciary, which is “one of the great debts of democracy” in Argentina. “We need to get the necessary majorities to move this forward. We need legislators determined to fight against the Republic’s subjugation.”
The statement aired a day after the country’s Supreme Court ruled to suspend elections in the provinces of San Juan, on the border with Chile, and Tucumán, in the northwest of the country. The court postponed the election at the request of the opposition until the situation of two candidates was assessed.
In the two almost identical decisions, three judges considered that the situation of government candidates Sergio Uñac, running for governor in San Juan, and Juan Manzur, candidate for lieutenant governor in Tucumán, contradicted the periodicity of the positions envisaged could by the constitution, according to the newspaper La Nacion.
Uñac is aiming for his fourth consecutive term he was once lieutenant governor and later twice elected governor. Manzur, on the other hand, is aiming for his fifth straight term he was lieutenant governor twice and then governor twice more.
On Tuesday (9), the Supreme Court requested reports to be submitted within five days for the Attorney General’s Office to then issue its opinion. Only then will the court receive the case back to rule on the matter, according to the Clarín newspaper.
In his televised speech, Fernández sharply criticized the timing of the decision: “It was taken after they had dealt with the matter for a long time, proceeding from a competence of dubious legitimacy and when the judicial authorities of each of these provinces had already confirmed the decision’s legitimacy of the elections,” he said.
“When the country’s highest court does not respect liberty between powers, coercively subjugates federalism and provincial autonomy, and violates one of the highest rights of citizens in a democracy, namely the popular vote, then that is justice.” Republic is demoted,” he continued.
After the broadcast, the opposition reacted. Patricia Bullrich, former president of Macri’s Progressive Party and presidential candidate of the Juntos por el Cambio coalition, wrote on social media that “those who break the law always have problems with the judges” and republished Fernández’s video.
“President, total and lasting change involves you stopping attacking the divisions between powers. Here the only hostages are the Argentines, hostages to their inability to govern,” wrote Buenos Aires governor Horacio Larreta, also a presidential candidate of the same rightwing alliance.
Despite the suspension of elections in both provinces, voting in the provinces of Salta, Tierra del Fuego and La Pampa is still scheduled for this Sunday. Last Sunday (7) municipal elections were also held in Jujuy, Misiones and La Rioja.