Rio Gallegos, 1950 – El Calafate (Argentina), 2010

By María Seoane

He was born on February 25, 1950, in Rio Gallegos, the capital of the Patagonian province of Santa Cruz. The son of Néstor Carlos Kirchner and María Ostoic, he attended primary and secondary school in public institutions. Since his teenage years, he was involved in the Peronist Youth, a movement that represented the left wing of Peronism. In 1975, he married Cristina Fernández, whom he met at the Faculty of Law of the National University of La Plata, and with whom he shared political militancy. In 1976, he graduated as a lawyer. The brutal repression of the dictatorship accelerated his return to his home province. There, he began practicing law. In 1977, his first child, Máximo, was born, followed by his second child, Florencia, in 1990. Thus, the Kirchners spent the years of the 1976-1983 military dictatorship in Santa Cruz, where the couple set up a law office.

In 1982, as the dictatorship was nearing its end, Kirchner entered public life with a provincial government position in Rio Gallegos. With the return of democracy, he was appointed president of the city’s Social Security Fund, a position he held until July 1984. In 1987, he was elected mayor (intendente) of the capital of Santa Cruz, and the success of his administration opened the doors for him to become governor of Santa Cruz, a position he held from 1991 to 2003, in three consecutive terms. When Kirchner assumed the governorship, his province was immersed in a severe economic crisis. His government promoted major investments to stimulate productive activity, the hiring of workers, and consumption, positioning himself as a strong opponent of the neoliberal model being applied by President Carlos Menem at the national level. Kirchner was a Peronist, center-left governor, critical of neoliberalism.

In 1990, he condemned the pardons that Menem had granted to the leaders of the dictatorship. However, his governing style was not without criticism. The opposition accused him of being populist and authoritarian. In 1994 and 1998, for example, he deliberated on the reform of the provincial constitution to allow indefinite re-election of the governor. In 1992, he was elected Secretary of Political Action of the National Justicialist Council and president of the Justicialist Council in Santa Cruz, and also became the head of the Federal Organization of Hydrocarbon-Producing States (OFEHI). In 1994, he and his wife were elected as constituent delegates for the reform of the National Constitution that took place that year. Two years later, he activated the Peronist Current, an internal faction of justicialism.

In 1998, Kirchner aligned himself with the governor of the province of Buenos Aires, Eduardo Alberto Duhalde, in opposition to Menem’s official policies and against Menem’s re-election ambitions. While Argentina was undergoing one of the most severe crises in its history, during the government of Fernando De la Rúa (1999-2001), Santa Cruz was among the best-managed provinces, with the lowest unemployment rates in the country. When the crisis of December 2001 erupted, with the freezing of bank accounts, and later in 2002 with the devaluation of the peso, Kirchner made a bold move for his province: he withdrew more than 500 million dollars from the provincial treasury, originating from the payment the State made for oil exploration, and deposited them in the Federal Reserve in the United States and in bank accounts in Switzerland and Luxembourg.

In late 2002, as the race to succeed Duhalde, the interim president appointed by the Legislative Assembly in January of that year after the institutional crisis of December the previous year, began, several justicialist governors entered the competition. Among them was Kirchner, who soon received public support from Duhalde. The elections took place in April 2003 and were unusual. Most of the candidates were from Peronism, and among them were two former presidents: Menem (1989-1995 and 1995-1999) and Adolfo Rodríguez Saá (December 22-30, 2001). Other candidates with a better chance were the orthodox economist Ricardo López Murphy – Minister of Defense and Economy during the Alliance government (1999-2001) – and former radical Elisa Carrió, candidate for the Association for a Republic of Equals (ARI). In the first round, the most voted candidates were Menem (24%) and Kirchner (22%). Preparations for the second round began, which, more than a presidential election, seemed like an internal election of the justicialism movement. But Menem – who, according to polls, would lose by more than 70% of the votes – withdrew from the race. As a result, Kirchner – with Daniel Scioli as vice-president – was confirmed as president with the lowest percentage of votes in Argentine history.

He assumed the presidency in May 2003. During his time as president, Kirchner imposed his own style of government, often breaking protocols. His human rights record was the most revolutionary in the country’s history. On March 24, 2004, when the coup d’état marked its 28th anniversary, he announced the creation of a Museum of Memory – in the building that housed the Navy Mechanics School (ESMA), the most emblematic concentration camp in the history of the dictatorship – and ordered the removal of portraits of dictators from military schools.

Economically, his administration adopted a form of neo-Keynesianism to reactivate the economy and give the country a productive profile. Argentina grew about 8% per year during his presidency, and unemployment rates dropped sharply. Kirchner succeeded in reducing the external debt by renegotiating with creditors and resuming payments to the IMF. The president positioned Argentina as a significant player in negotiations with multilateral credit organizations. At the same time, he strongly defended Mercosur, as well as strategic alliances with other Latin American countries. By 2004, he had achieved the highest and most consistent approval ratings for a president in nearly thirty years. He was succeeded by his wife, Cristina, who was elected president in 2007, in the first round.

Kirchner died from a heart attack on October 27, 2010. He was at his summer home in El Calafate, in the province of Santa Cruz, his political birthplace.