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República Argentina
Argentina News Alert – July 11th, 2011
Opposition Leader Mauricio Macri Close to Reelection in the City of Buenos Aires
Mayor of the City of Buenos Aires Mauricio Macri of the center-right PRO Party performed extremely well in the mayoral elections on
July 10: he defeated runner-up Daniel Filmus (a senator of the Peronist Frente Para la Victoria-FPV governing party) for 47.1 to 27.8
percent. Despite the difference of almost 20 points, a run-off between both candidates is scheduled by July 31, as none of them
reached the 50 percent required for a first-round victory. Macri will most likely win the second-round, especially since Filmus will
need the support of 93 percent of those who did not vote either for him or Macri in order to win. Macri’s victory is larger than his
victory in 2007, when he won with 45.76 of the vote. Although Macri’s victory in the second-round is nearly guaranteed, Filmus
announced he will step up to the challenge anyway.
Various politicians of the divided opposition began to show support for Macri after his victory. Figures that congratulated Macri’s
victory included Ricardo Alfonsín, presidential candidate for the Unión Cívica Radical (UCR), Elisa Carrió, that of the Coalición CívicaARI, Eduardo Duhalde and his running-mate Mario Das Neves of the Dissident Peronist Unión Popular, and Francisco De Narváez,
another dissident Peronist running for Governor of Buenos Aires as an ally of Alfonsín. All opposition members portray Macri as a
figure of the opposition that defeated the National Government and Cristina Fernández de Kirchner’s (CFK) Administration. Macri
expressed that after the second-round elections, he will initiate talks with opposition leaders to define his support in the presidential
elections.
Opposition members also discredited polls taken previous to the elections and used Macri’s victory as proof that the FPV and CFK
Administration are not “invincible”. Polls differed greatly on predicting the vote intention prior to July 10. For example, a poll by
Roberto Bacman predicted Macri’s victory with 37 percent of the vote followed by 31 percent for Filmus. Poliarquía published the
only poll that more accurately predicted the results, with 45.3 percent for Macri and 30.5 for Filmus.
Before launching his reelection campaign, Macri was to run for presidency. However, the PRO wields a very small national presence
despite Macri’s popularity within the city, a fact that was decisive in his decision to seek reelection in the city. Filmus on the other
hand, attempted to focus the campaign discussion on national issues, although CFK (who still receives good levels of popularity in the
city) was mostly absent in his campaign.
Despite the election results and the optimism of the opposition, CFK’s chances are still relatively high for the presidential elections in
October. The city of Buenos Aires was never a district that supported Peronism in general and the Kirchners in particular. In 2007,
although Filmus received only 23.75 percent of the vote in the first-round, and lost in the second-round, CFK was still elected
president. However, expectations this year were higher for the FPV, and this was clearly a defeat for the Government.
According to Juan Cruz Diaz, Managing Director of Cefeidas Group, a political and regulatory advisory firm, “while the prospects of an
easy reelection for CFK are high, the electoral results in the city and potential defeats in the provinces of Córdoba and Santa Fe could
open a window of opportunity to the opposition. The pace of the campaign will accelerate and both the current Government and
opposition need to gain momentum in order to, remain in the front line in the case of CFK, or become a serious challenge in the case
of the opposition.”
In any case, these results consolidate Macri’s leadership in the city and project him as a strong contender for the 2015 presidential
elections, something he considered when he stepped down as presidential candidate last May. The challenge for the PRO Party is to
develop a national structure and a more solid base of alliances that can improve their chances at the national level.
For more information, please contact Cefeidas Group ([email protected])