BUENOS AIRES, ARGENTINA – AUGUST 24: President of Argentina Mauricio Macri (R) greets people marching from Obelisco monument to Casa Rosada to support him, in Buenos Aires, Argentina on August 24, 2019. (Photo by Muhammed Emin Canik/Anadolu Agency
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By Mark P. Jones
On September 29 the Argentine province of Mendoza will elect its governor and renew one-half of its bicameral legislature. Mendoza is Argentina’s fifth most populous province, and one of only five provinces (out of 24) currently governed by a member of President Mauricio Macri’s Together for Change alliance. A Together for Change victory in Mendoza would provide a glimmer of optimism for a dignified loss by Macri in the October 27 presidential election against Peronist Alberto Fernández (and against Fernández’s vice presidential nominee, former president Cristina Fernández de Kirchner) as well as provide hope for some Together for Change down ballot success in congressional races. In contrast, a defeat would foreshadow a potential shellacking on October 27 and demoralize the Together for Change forces even more than they already are.
Mendoza is the most important of the three provinces currently governed by the Radical Civic Union (UCR), the principal junior partner of President Macri’s Federal Proposal (PRO) in the governing Together for Change coalition. Governor Alfredo Cornejo (UCR) is unable to seek re-election due to Mendoza’s ban on immediate re-election. Cornejo selected Rodolfo “Rody” Suárez, mayor if the city of Mendoza, as his preferred successor, and Suárez easily won the Change Mendoza Front primary in June to become the alliance’s gubernatorial candidate.
Suárez’s principal rival is Senator Anabel Fernández Sagasti, an acolyte of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner. Fernández Sagasti captured the I Choose Mendoza Front gubernatorial nomination in a narrow June primary victory over the more centrist and pragmatic Peronist mayor of Maipú, Alejandro Bermejo.
The two other gubernatorial candidates, neither of whom has any hope of victory, are José Luis Ramón of the Mendoza-based Protector Political Force and Noelia Barbeito of the far-left Workers Front.
Suárez was initially a strong favorite to win the gubernatorial election. And, while he remains the favorite, after President Macri’s dismal performance in the August 11 PASO primary elections, Suárez finds himself in a dogfight, where Fernández Sagasti has a realistic prospect of victory.
In addition to providing a morale boost for Together for Change at the national level as it approaches the October 27 presidential and congressional elections, a Suárez victory would give Together for Change control of a pivotal province as the Together for Change forces transition from government to opposition at the national level on December 10 after an all but certain victory by the ticket of Alberto Fernández and Cristina Fernández de Kirchner over Macri on October 27. On December 10, the current members of Together for Change will only control three provinces (other than Mendoza), two of which are quite small and economically weak (Corrientes and Jujuy) and only one of which is sufficiently populous and economically vibrant (the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires) to provide a substantial political base for opposition to the incoming government of President Alberto Fernández. A Mendoza victory would double the number of powerful districts controlled by the opposition as well as provide the UCR with a powerful district under its control to balance the PRO’s control over the City of Buenos Aires, which (barring a black swan event) will continue to be governed by Horacio Rodríguez Larreta for four more years.
Mendoza ranks as Argentina’s fourth most important petro-province, accounting for 14% of petroleum production and 3% of natural gas production. Two of the country’s principal production basins cover portions of Mendoza territory, the Cuyana and the Neuquina. The latter represents the northern edge of the Vaca Muerta, which is located within the borders of the southern Mendoza department of Malargüe (where Peronist José Barro is well-positioned to be elected as the department’s next mayor on September 29).
A Suárez victory would convert Mendoza into the one petro-province controlled by a governor who is an unabashed opponent of the Fernández-Fernández administration, setting up Mendoza to potentially have the most conflict-ridden relationship of all of the petro-provinces with the federal government during the 2019-23 period. In contrast, a Fernández Sagasti victory would lead to a governor closely aligned with the Fernández-Fernández administration, and a context within which one could expect both positive relations between the provincial and federal government as well as the pursuit of energy policies by the two that are relatively in sync.
Note: This is the thirteenth entry of the Baker Institute’s Center for Energy Studies series on the 2019 Argentine elections.
Previous entries in this series are:
The 2019 Presidential and Petro-Province Elections in Argentina. January 22, 2019.
The Battle for the Future of the Vaca Muerta: Neuquén’s 2019 Gubernatorial Election. February 27, 2019.
Houston, We Don’t Have a Problem: Pro-Development Candidate Wins The Battle for the Vaca Muerta. March 11, 2019.
South of the Vaca Muerta and Shaken: Elections in Argentina’s Río Negro Province. April 2, 2019.
Provincial Elections in Río Negro: A ‘Glass Half Full’ Evening for President Mauricio Macri. April 8, 2019.
Increased Clarity for The June Gubernatorial Election in Chubut, Argentina’s No.2 Petro-Province. April 11, 2019.
Argentina’s President Macri Could Find Some Partial Relief in La Pampa on May 19th. May 14, 2019.
The June 9 Provincial Election in Chubut, Argentina’s No.2 Petro-Province. May 30, 2019.
Provincial Elections at the End of the World in Argentina’s Tierra del Fuego Province. June 11, 2019.
Recap of the 2019 Petro-Province Elections (so far) in Argentina. July 7, 2019.
Provincial Elections in Santa Cruz: Home of the Kirchner Clan. July 29, 2019.
The Argentine Petro-Provinces and the Incoming Fernández Administration. August 19, 2019.
Mark P. Jones is the Joseph D. Jamail Chair in Latin American Studies and the Director of the Center for Energy Studies’ Argentina Program at Rice University’s James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy.
