Argentina votes right

The Guardian reports:

Hours after Argentina’s political landscape underwent a tectonic rightward shift, president-elect Mauricio Macri announced a series of radical changes that will realign his country’s place in the world.

Following Sunday night’s narrow election victory that marked the first change of government in 12 years, Macri said he would tear up Argentina’s memorandum of understanding with Iran, seek Venezuela’s exclusion from the regional free trade association Mercosur and ease away from a fixed exchange rate with the dollar.

This is the “change of an era”, he declared at a press conference that was itself a sign of greater openness compared to the largely one-way media approach of his leftist predecessor Cristina Fernández de Kirchner. “We need to be in the world.”

Another elections in which polls under-stated support for the centre-right candidate.

Fernández focused on social programs to address inequality, conducted a centralised economic policy, sought closer trade ties to China and Iran, and aligned herself regionally with like-minded leftist leaders in Venezuela, Ecuador and Bolivia.

Macri, by contrast, has a more global market-orientated stance and looks likely to strengthen links with the United States.

He said his priority would be economic rejuvenation, tackling inflation – currently at around 30% – and encouraging investment.

30% inflation – pity the poor on fixed incomes.