Miley became in many ways a protest candidate who positioned himself as a politician capable of challenging traditional elites.
Photo: REUTERS
Argentina has elected a new president. In place of the socialists who have ruled the country for the last four years, a new non-systemic candidate, Javier Miley, has burst onto the “throne”, who promises, if not to “destroy to the foundations”, at least to seriously shake the country . political and financial system.
According to Pais, after counting 99% of the votes, the “chainsaw economist” (Miley’s nickname after her shocking public appearance with said tool) received the support of 55.71% of the votes.
SOUTH AMERICAN TRUMP
In the elections, Miley fought against the socialist Sergio Massa, who was Minister of Economy of the current government and was the favorite in the electoral race. The truth that she opposed Massa was the fact that under his leadership, Argentina’s finances “sung romances.” Thus, hyperinflation wreaked havoc on the country: in the end it amounted to a terrifying 142%.
The key factor thanks to which Miley won was the support of former president Mauricio Macri (2015-2019). Although the former head of state can hardly be said to be a popular politician in Argentina, his call to vote for a libertarian helped the opponent of the current government to gain several percentage points, important to overtake Massa.
Miley, who is already called the “Argentine Trump,” positions herself as a libertarian or anarcho-capitalist, that is, a supporter of maximum freedom in everything, including the economy.
CHINA CRITIC
Miley has prioritized her campaign against the country’s political establishment, which she calls caste. Miley advocates abandoning the national currency, the peso, in favor of the US dollar and considers it necessary to completely abolish the Central Bank in order to successfully combat inflation. And in 2021, the opponent stated that she “would not trade” with China, but only with the “civilized part” of the world, that is, the West. In light of the latest statement, Argentina’s prospects as a member of the BRICS association (a club of developing countries whose founders are Russia, China, India and Brazil), which it was officially due to join on January 1, 2024, They seem extremely vague. . The candidate for Minister of Foreign Affairs, Diana Mondino, has already stated that this decision will be reconsidered. “We don’t understand what the benefit of BRICS is right now,” she said.
Argentina elected a new president
Photo: GLOBAL LOOK PRESS
In addition, the new head of state has several more radical ideas to combat many of the problems of Argentine society. For example, he is going to privatize the entire healthcare system and at the same time allow free trade in donor organs. As an effective measure to combat crime, the newly elected Head of State spoke of the need to liberalize weapons legislation and transfer the penitentiary system from the civilian to the military department.
AGAINST THE DAD
Surprisingly, Miley’s popularity was not affected even by an attack on the current Pope Francis, who is Argentine and very popular in his homeland. In 2017, the politician called the head of the Catholic Church “the messenger of Satan,” although he later apologized for his words.
Miley became in many ways a protest candidate who positioned himself as a politician capable of challenging traditional elites. Both the previous right-wing president Mauricio Macri and the current head of state Alberto Fernández could not find a recipe to get the country out of the economic crisis that has lasted for many years. Miley, on the other hand, is not associated with any of the traditional political forces, thanks to which she became a “new face” in these elections, promising to solve problems with new methods. “Everyone come out!” It was one of the official slogans of her campaign.
ECONOMIST AND SHOWMAN
At the same time, the biography of Miley, 53, is atypical for Argentina’s ruling elite. She spent most of her career teaching economics and research at universities before starting her own television show. In recent years he has made real progress in politics: in 2019 he created, together with young people, the Liberal Party, for which he was elected deputy in 2021. It is true that the result then was more than modest: only two parliamentary seats in the national legislative body, but it turned out that the main thing was to “get involved in the fight”, and then Miley was able to promote herself so much. that he finally won the presidential election.
