ERICA CANEPA FOR "M THE MAGAZINE OF THE WORLD"
ReportageDecades after their death, the ex-president and his wife Eva Duarte remain figures adored by many Argentines. A cult revived by the difficulties the country is going through and the election of the Peronist Alberto Fernández as head of state.
It's the same refrain every night. The rock in the background fades away, giving way to an old recording of drums and trumpets. In front of the astonished looks of some tourists, customers of the restaurant are breathless by clapping their hands: "Perón Perón, how tall you are! " "They find it hard to believe that we are so crazy!" " has fun Daniel Narezo Roig, the owner of Perón Perón.
The walls of his establishment are covered with portraits of General Juan Domingo Perón, elected three times President of Argentina (1946-1952; 1952-1955; 1973-1974), and his second wife, Eva Duarte, more commonly known "Evita" carried away by a lightning cancer at 33 years old, in 1952. In their wake was born a protean movement, a large current at the same time popular, populist and nationalist, the Peronism (or justicialism), which dominates the Argentine political life for more than seven decades and has just returned to power.
Tuesday December 10, 2019, the Peronists let their joy explode: " We are back ! " exclaims Alberto Fernández, freshly invested president. A few days later, one of the first decisions of the new government will be to relight the wall sculpture of Evita which appears on the facade of the Ministry of Social Development and which had been extinguished under the government of Mauricio Macri, president from 2015 to 2019.
That evening, at Perón Perón, the atmosphere is at its peak. "This is not a thematic bar, assumes Daniel Narezo Roig. The Hard Rock Café is thematic. The Perón Perón is a political bar, for doing politics and talking about politics. " The fifties, however, specifies that all trends are welcome here. “This place is a laboratory. I observe clients, especially those who are not Peronists. When we sing the march, we can see, deep down, that they are jealous, that they would like to be part of such a joyful movement. "
A warm welcome
A certain glee, a derecho al goce (“The right to pleasure”)… These are some of the values claimed by Peronism, an unclassifiable movement according to European standards, bringing together both the currents of directist (but not communist) left and conservative right currents. The Argentines themselves, deeply divided between Peronists and Antiperonists, struggle to define it. "The original elements of Peronism, which can still be found today, include a strong, powerful state, a sense of social justice (…) and great pragmatism ", analyzes Carolina Barry, political science researcher at the National Council for Scientific and Technical Research.
