Why are these Argentine parliamentary elections important?

Although they will only partially renew the Congress of Argentina, the midterm elections on November 14 will have a crucial impact on the Peronist presidency Alberto Fernandez because they will define governability for the second half of his term, analysts said.

The government suffered a setback in the mandatory primaries (PASO) in September when the ruling coalition Frente de Todos (center-left Peronism) obtained 33% of the votes at the national level, in what is considered a full-scale poll. The center-right coalition Juntos, of former president Mauricio Macri (2015-2019), obtained 37%.

The ruling party now seeks to prevent an adverse result from preventing it from obtaining a majority in the Chamber of Deputies or putting at risk the one it has in the Senate when Fernández has two years remaining in his mandate.

What is chosen and with what consequences?

The legislatures will renew a third of the seats in the Senate and half of the Deputies. Fernández does not risk his government in this election, but he does risk the possibility of governing with ample parliamentary support.

In the Lower House the ruling party has 120 of the 257 seats and in the Senate the absolute majority with 41 out of 72 legislators.

“If the results of the PASO were repeated, the ruling party could lose the majority it has in the Senate and not only would it not achieve a majority in Deputies but it would lose seats,” said Rosendo Fraga, director of the Centro de Estudios Nueva Mayoría.

Political analyst Gabriel Puricelli considered that “the composition of Congress that arises from these elections will determine the conditions of governance” until 2023, when Fernández’s term ends.

But they are also “a test of the viability of the two main coalitions as a vehicle for the next presidential elections,” he said, referring to the Frente de Todos ya Juntos.

Another factor to take into account “will be how much power the opposition will have in Congress. If he achieves blocking power, he will most likely use it, ”said Puricelli.

The political scientist Carlos Fara considered that a defeat “will put a brake on Kirchnerism in both Chambers and that may hamper institutional issues in the Senate, such as the appointment of judges.”

Can the government recover the lost vote?

The primaries opened a crisis in the ruling coalition. After public reproaches from Vice President Cristina Kirchner, Fernández renewed part of his cabinet. But even if it wins in the strategic province of Buenos Aires, the most populated with almost 40% of the national register, it will not be enough to repair the political damage, analysts stressed.

“It is possible for the government to improve the election, but not substantially”, considered Fraga.

In the opinion of this analyst “the central political problem will be, whatever the result, the division in the ruling party between the president and the vice president. This dispute will continue and may even escalate. It will be a problem for governance ”.

Mario Riorda, political scientist and academic at the Austral University, specified that “the Frente de Todos fell 19 points throughout the country since the presidential elections of 2019 and no longer has unbeatable nuclei”, while the opposition Juntos “has practically not moved from its last national figure ”.

The second half of the Fernández government will take place “in a highly complex balance of internal tensions that can jeopardize governance,” he said.

How much did the economy weigh?

Argentina will vote shaken by an inflation of 40% so far this year, one of the highest in the world. The government launched a price freeze for three months for 1,500 items in the basic food basket, in addition to social aid to tackle poverty that affects 40% of the 45 million inhabitants.

The defeat in the primaries was “a punishment for the management of Alberto Fernández,” said Fara, a consequence “of the economic impact that was generated between what he inherited (from the previous government) and what was produced by the pandemic.”

The country is seeking a new agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) that will replace the stand-by for US $ 44,000 million in 2018 and whose capital maturities of more than US $ 19,000 million begin next year.