Javier Milei, during the presidential debate on October 8 in Buenos AiresAgustin Marcarian / POOL (EFE)
Eight former Latin American presidents from conservative backgrounds, a Spaniard and a Nobel Prize winner in literature have expressed their support for Argentine presidential candidate Javier Milei, a radical right-winger and economic liberal, in the second round of elections on November 19th. “[Milei es] “A new candidate in politics with whom we undoubtedly have many differences, but who believes in the ideas of freedom and has a very precise diagnosis of the country’s economic problems,” says a text written, among others, by the Chilean Sebastián Piñera was signed. the Mexican Felipe Calderón, the Colombian Iván Duque and the Spaniard Mariano Rajoy, who are also joined by the Nobel Prize winner for literature Mario Vargas Llosa. The information disseminated on social networks by the ultra-Argentine party La Libertad Avanza was confirmed to this newspaper by the team of former President Piñera, it is said Rocio Montes.
“The only way out for Argentina is through political and economic freedom, respect for the rule of law and private property, as well as the rules of liberal democracy, the social market economy, social justice and modernity,” the statement said. This is also followed by the Argentinian Mauricio Macri, who has already publicly expressed his support for the Ultra; the Bolivian Jorge Tuto Quiroga; Puerto Rican Luis Fortuño; the Colombian Andrés Pastrana; the Mexican Vicente Fox; the Peruvian Álvaro Vargas Llosa, son of the Nobel Prize winner, and the Argentinian Gerardo Bongiovanni, founder of the Libertad Foundation. “Javier Milei (…) today represents the hope for change in the face of the continuity of the Kirchnerist model,” the letter says.
We thank former presidents Mauricio Macri, Felipe Calderón, Iván Duque, Mariano Rajoy, Jorge Quiroga, Sebastián Piñera, Vicente Fox, Andrés Pastrana, Luis Fortuño and Nobel laureate Mario Vargas Llosa for supporting the presidential candidacy of Javier Milei. pic.twitter.com/XMN55YPvRB
– Advances in Freedom (@LLibertadAvanza) November 12, 2023
The signatories consider the candidacy of the other presidential candidate, the Peronist Sergio Massa, a “threat” and represent “the continuity” of a model that they consider “failed”: “Kirchnerism, a political space that is practically hegemonized.” Life of Argentine Politics in the 21st Century, seeks a fifth term in office.” “The price of these perverse economic policies has been rampant inflation, widespread poverty and the economic hardship of millions of Argentines whose living standards are collapsing daily,” the text says, an initiative of the Freedom and Democracy Group, whose founding members are presidents and former presidents who want to “defend and promote freedoms and democracy” on the continent, as Piñera told EL PAÍS in an interview.
Massa, economics minister in the current government, under whose term inflation has doubled to the current 140% and poverty has exceeded 40%, tried in the last election campaign to make clear his differences with Kirchnerism. However, the statement published this Saturday by several former presidents says: “Massa’s project is nothing other than the original project of Néstor and Cristina Kirchner: to achieve political hegemony through budget and punishment of the opposition.” “The signatories are of the opinion that “A new mandate from the Kirchnerist space would bury the fragile defenses that Argentina still has against economic populism, political authoritarianism and corruption, as well as the corporatist pact,” the text continues.