Posts from the Pampas
Dispatch #4 - Election Day
Look at this post carefully. At the end, there will be a test.
We got to experience Election Day in Argentina. It’s an offyear election. The Presidency is not at stake. Rather, voters got to choose their national, provincial and local officials. Nonetheless, there was a lot of activity. As in the US, the streets were lined with signs and banners for the candidates. Unlike the US, many of these were on public property — on street lights, strung across roads, etc. I posted two samples below. Note the one on the right. It’s a banner for the incumbents. It’s strung over the entrance to one of the two public parks in the pueblo of Santa Clara Buena Vista.
Might there be a conflict of interest here? This probably would not pass muster in the US. As it turned out, the local incumbents lost.
Many of the posters for the regional candidates also had a head shot of Mauricio Macri, the President of Argentina. Macri belongs to Cambiemos (Let’s Change), a party formed in 2015, when three national parties merged to form a unified right of center group. At the time, the sitting government of Christina Fernandez was swept up in a series of corruption scandals. My favorite one took place at our Lady of the Rosary of Fatima, a convent located outside of Buenos Aires. In the early morning hours, a man was spotted tossing black plastic sacks over the walls of the convent. He returned to his car and got out more black sacks, which the nuns took inside, and an automatic weapon, which he left by the door. The police were called by a concerned neighbor, appropriately named Jesus. Inside the convent they found Jose Lopez, the former public works secretary. Around him and the black plastic sacks were nuns in their eighties and nineties. What was in the sacks? Wads of plastic wrapped bills, jewelry and luxury watches totaling nearly $9 million dollars. I’m a church official, Lopez told the police. I thought it was food for the poor, one of the nuns later claimed. You’ve got to marvel that these octogenerians and nonagenerians (I had to look that one up) did not keel over in unison upon receiving such a generous donation.
There were not only billboards but also flyers and mailings. The one below was distributed in Franck, a pueblo of about 6,000 people. Nice. Quiet. No one locks their bikes (and there are thousands of them). Safe streets.
These candidates, from the Partido Democrata Progresista, took their cues from Donald Trump’s American Carnage speech, claiming that Franck was suffering from a rising wave of crime. “Our senior citizens and children don’t deserve to suffer from such traumatic events.” (In speaking with high school students in Franck, none of them ever complained to us about crime problems. They loved living there. The top thing on their wish list for the town? Getting a MacDonald’s).
The election took place on a Sunday. There is no early voting. We visited one polling place, which was located in a school. It seemed to be largely staffed by teachers and administrators.
The elementary schools in this area feature a central cement courtyard, surrounded on all four sides by classrooms and offices. Under the eaves were 10 registration areas, furnished with tables and chairs from the classrooms. Each one was staffed by about eight workers, who snacked on empanadas, pastries and pizza, washing it down with Sprite, Coke and flavored water.
Posted on the wall was a list of the local candidates, complete with the pictures of those heading each slate. (There were five competing parties).
In order to vote, you go to the appropriate registration table. The election staffers look up your name in oversized books containing the election rolls. You show your national ID, which has a registration number and a photo. Then you are given two ballots, a white one for the national candidates and yellow one for the local candidates.
You take the ballots into a closed room to mark them. Then you return to the registration tables and place your ballots in the appropriate cardboard boxes.
Supervision was provided by the school’s principal, the woman in sunglasses on the left below. It’s a casual atmosphere, save for the soldier in military fatigues, who slowly patrolled the area carrying a submachine gun. I thought he would make a great picture. He did not. I demurred. So instead I took the two pictures in the center and right below. Really exciting, aren’t they?
Turnout was great. There’s a reason for that. Voting is mandatory for those between the ages of 18 and 70. If you don’t vote, you are fined. And youths 16–18 can vote, if they wish, for the national candidates. Sort of like having a junior driver’s license.
Dogs, of course, wander in and out. People hang around and chat. This includes the candidates. What are they talking about? I don’t know, maybe last night’s asado (barbeque).
Okay, now for that quiz. How many of the pictured candidates do you see in the photos of the election workers and kibitzers? The answer will be in the next dispatch. I am sure you will be on the edge of your seats.
