Victoria Villarruel remembered Cristina Kirchner on Peronist Loyalty Day, a date that remembers the founding of Juan Perón’s party almost 80 years ago in Argentina. The vice president This Thursday he uploaded photos to his social networks of a meeting he had last week in Madrid with María Estela Martínez de Perón, Isabelitathe widow of the former president. “On a day like today, where loyalty is talked about, I want to vindicate his figure,” said Villarruel. Isabel, he added, was “the first constitutionally elected female president of Argentina,” a merit that Cristina Kirchner reserves for herself. He got so fully into the internal of Peronism, that celebrates its fractured anniversary among Kirchner’s followers and those seeking a renewal in its leadership after the electoral setback that in 2023 ended with the far-right Javier Milei in the Casa Rosada.
The visit took place within the framework of the tour that Villarruel made last week through Spain, where he met with the president of the Spanish Senate, Pedro Rollan. Afterwards he had a meeting with Andres Allamandthe Chilean politician who presides over the Ibero-American General Secretariat. Before leaving for the Vatican for a private visit with Pope Francis, He approached Isabelita’s apartment. He kept the meeting secret until this Thursday, so that the dissemination of the photos would have all the possible political impact within Kirchnerism. “Vice president like me and a well-born Argentine,” he wrote on social media. “What the fuck is this, Vicky?” a user reproached him. “National unity. And the recognition of the first female vice president and president, although others have believed that,” Villarruel responded, making it clear that the recipient of the photos was Kirchner.
With Isabel Martínez de Perón, the first female president of the world and of Argentina constitutionally elected. Vice president like me and a well-born Argentine.
On a day like today, where loyalty is talked about, I want to vindicate his figure pic.twitter.com/NA7Aw6k1DT
— Victoria Villarruel (@VickyVillarruel) October 17, 2024
Isabelita Perón is 93 years old. In 1974 she became the first woman to become president of a country, after succeeding her husband, who died that same year. In 1976 she was overthrown by the military and imprisoned until 1981, when she went into exile in Spain. There are few times that he returned to his country, the last in 1994, to participate in an official mass for Independence Day with the president. Carlos Menem (1989-1999). He had already visited Menem as soon as he took office in 1989, which was his return to the country after the visits he made in 1988 and 1984 to the radical Raúl Alfonsin, the president of the transition. Little is known about his life in Madrid, where he lives a life away from the public sphere. In 2002, he authorized by letter to the president Eduardo Duhalde to begin the works to move the remains of General Perón to the San Vicente villa, the rest residence of the soldier and his wife Eva Perón. That letter was Isabel’s last political act.
The Argentines heard about her again in 2007, when she was detained in Madrid at the request of an Argentine court that wanted to try her for crimes against humanity committed during her presidency, between 1974 and 1976. Isabelita had to answer for the actions of Triple A, a far-right paramilitary group controlled by the strong man of his Government, José López Rega. The Triple A was the germ of what would later become state terrorism applied by the dictatorship. The Spanish justice system declared the crimes statute barred. She made a brief appearance in 2017 to say goodbye to an Argentine trade unionist she was friends with. Last April, a photo circulated in which he posed with the award given to him by the Preserve Association of Spain. This Thursday, he returned to the public scene along with Villarruel.
The photos show Isabelita in the living room of her house, sitting in an armchair next to Villarruel, whom she holds by the hands, a detail that the vice president especially highlighted. The choice of the date and the character was surprising because of what Villarruel thinks of Peronism. As the daughter of soldiers, she is a denier of state terrorism and vindicates the actions of the generals who overthrew Isabelita in 1976. That is why the impact was immediate. “Villarruel always said that what Argentine Peronism does is erase from history the people who cause him some discomfort. Since Isabel Perón was the first Argentine president, and not Cristina Kirchner, he wanted to remember her as vice president and president,” explained a source close to the vice president.
Later, Villarruel published a video where he vindicates the role of Isabel Perón in years that he considered to be “extreme tension, marked by the growing tension of guerrilla groups.” “Isabel Perón’s mandate reminds us of the importance of loyalty and firmness in leading the country,” says the video, in a reading of history that contradicts the consensus on the former president’s weakness in the face of pressure from the right. Peronist and the military on the one hand and the guerrillas on the other.
Peronism is divided between those who defend Cristina Kirchner as the only one capable of ordering it after the defeat against Milei and those who seek new leadership, such as that of the governor of Buenos Aires, Axel Kicillof. The commemorative events of Loyalty Day are the thermometer that measures the level of internal confrontation. Nobody expected Isabelita’s appearance.
Subscribe here to the newsletter THE COUNTRY America and receive all the key information on current events in the region.
