BUENOS AIRES — Argentine Vice President Cristina Fernández repudiated the historic court ruling that sentenced her to six years in prison on Tuesday and announced that she will not compete in the 2023 general elections, refuting the hypothesis that she would seek privileges to protect herself of justice.
The vice president said that the sentence is due to a “judicial mafia” in reaction to the decision of a three-judge court that considered that she committed fraud against the State during her two terms as president between 2007 and 2015. The sentence also included her perpetual disqualification to hold public office.
But the 69-year-old former president said she does not plan to fight for a position after leaving the vice presidency at the end of 2023.
“On December 10, 2023, I will no longer have privileges, so they will be able to give the order to put me in jail… I will not be a candidate for anything, neither for president, nor for senator. My name will not be on any ballot. I finish on December 10 and I go back to my house, ”said Fernández with a strong tone through her YouTube channel.
The conviction can be appealed and will remain final when the Supreme Court of Justice so decides, a process that could take years. Politicians and analysts said that, until then, the vice president could run for any popularly elected office – from a seat in Congress to the presidency, as established by law – and thus obtain privileges that prevent her arrest.
The former president also affirmed that the judges who ordered her perpetual disqualification from holding elective positions seek to remove her from the political scene.
This is the first time that an Argentine vice president has been sentenced while in office. The ruling had a strong impact, since Fernández is the most relevant political figure of the last 20 years. She was a legislator and president for two consecutive terms and now vice president, in addition to being the leader of a center-left sector of Peronism with a great capacity for mobilization in the streets.
Fernández was found guilty of defrauding the State of close to 1,000 million dollars through the irregular awarding of 51 road works with national funds to Lázaro Báez, a related businessman, during his two terms.
President Alberto Fernández maintained on Twitter that the vice president is “innocent” and that her sentence is “the result of a trial in which the minimum forms of due process were not taken care of.”
Lately, attention has revolved around whether the Peronist leader would compete again for the first magistracy, something that her close circle encourages.
“Cristina always surprises, she will continue to fight, she puts herself in the place of the fight and says that she is not going to shield herself (in the privileges). “Come pick me up” is raised ….. If they give her house arrest, her home will become a mecca for persecuted Peronism,” Roberto Bacman, director of the Center for Opinion Studies, told The Associated Press. public.
The analyst pointed out that it will be necessary to see if the sector of Peronism that Fernández represents pressures her to review her decision.
The vice president also referred to the attempted attack she suffered on September 1 and maintained that “they want me dead or imprisoned.” For this fact, three young people who have expressed themselves on social networks as anti-Kirchnerists are being arrested and prosecuted.
Fernández continues to have a highly mobilized sector of supporters. Hundreds of them gathered around the federal courthouse to support the former president when the verdict was read. The building was surrounded by fences and heavily guarded by police.
The court also handed down prison sentences for other defendants, such as Báez and former Secretary of Public Works José López – who are already serving prison sentences for corruption. Three of the 13 defendants were acquitted or dismissed for lack of evidence.
Patricio Giusto, director of the consultancy Diagnóstico Político, told AP that Fernández will deepen his “strategy of victimization and of aligning himself” with Luiz Inácio Lula Da Silva, the leftist leader who has just been elected president of Brazil after the court annulled his prison sentence for corruption.
During the judicial process, the vice president considered herself a victim of “Lawfare” and characterized the Judiciary as a pawn of the opposition media and the conservative Mauricio Macri, who succeeded her as president (2015-2019) and today is one of the leaders of the opposition.
This is Fernández’s first trial and the first sentence he has received. Other judicial investigations have been closed and several for different crimes are still open.
During the trial, prosecutors argued that Báez’s company was a structure created to extract funds from the State through the irregular allocation of public works and that when Fernández’s term ended, it disappeared. They also claimed that several highway projects registered cost overruns and many were never completed.
They pointed out that this corruption scheme was also in force during the presidency of Néstor Kirchner (2003-2007), husband and predecessor of the vice president and who died three years after leaving power.
The vice president’s defense maintained that there were never budget items that were intended to benefit a particular contractor and denied that the former president directed economic resources in favor of Báez.