Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner trounced opposition contenders on Sunday in the country’s first-ever nationwide primary election for presidential candidates. With more than 96 percent of votes counted, Fernández de Kirchner won slightly more than 50 percent of votes cast—38 percent more that the second-place candidate Ricardo Alfonsín of the centrist Radical Civic Union party. The third place finisher, Eduardo Duhalde, won 12 percent.
Under the primary rule system, candidates receiving less than 1.5 percent of votes will not be eligible to run in October’s first-round election. For analysts, this weekend’s results mean that the president is in a good position to win re-election in the fall elections.
For a candidate to win in the general elections, he/she must receive at least 45 percent of the total vote, or 40 percent of the vote with a 10-point lead over the second place finisher.
Following yesterday’s victory, Fernández de Kirchner vowed to maintain the status quo, “This is a recognition of all the work, the effort, everything that has been accomplished in the past eight years, but also for what we still need to do…My only promise is to keep working for everything we still need.”
