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From Our Own Correspondent: Argentina goes back to the future

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Photo of Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner on a flag held by supporters

02/11/2019 GMT

Argentina goes back to the future

BBC World Service - From Our Own Correspondent, Argentina goes back to the future

The return of Peronism, plus reform in Rome, feeding Kenya and meeting a people smuggler

The return of Peronism, plus reform in Rome, feeding Kenya and meeting a people smuggler.

The return of Peronism: Pascale Harter introduces this and other stories from reporters, writers and correspondents around the world. 

After Argentina’s election, a sense of deja-vu: The victory of Alberto Fernandez and his running mate Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner represents a victory for the decades-old – and uniquely Argentine – political phenomenon known as Peronism. Yet the president-elect’s jubilant supporters think it’s just the tonic for a country mired in economic crisis. Taking the nation’s pulse as the results emerged in Buenos Aires was Katy Watson, who found many voters believing a glorious episode in Argentina’s history is about to repeat itself.

Meanwhile in another vote, held in Rome, Catholic bishops have recommended overturning history – a thousand years of it, no less: They want to allow married men to become priests in the Amazon region, where there are few existing candidates. Previously, the church has always insisted that almost all its clergy remain celibate. David Willey, who has lived in Rome and followed Vatican events for over forty years, detects a seismic shift within the church, as the reformist Pope Francis prevails against traditionalists.
 
Few people outside West Africa will have sampled fonio, a cereal crop that’s popular in the region. However, if one woman from the other side of the continent gets her way, it could be coming to a table near you. BBC Africa Health Editor Anne Mawathe is Kenyan, and grew up all too familiar with food shortages. Since then, she has championed a foodstuff that she says can withstand drought and thus save lives in arid regions like her own. There’s just one problem: Getting members of her family to share her taste for it…

And, what it’s like to come face to face with a people trafficker. Owen Pinnell describes an awkward meeting in Conakry, Guinea, where his team from BBC News Arabic were on the trail of smugglers who use smartphone apps to sell people into modern slavery. As he discovered, those who engage in illegal and highly abusive activities can sometimes appear to be perfectly charming individuals.   

Producer: Michael Gallagher


(Image: Photo of Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner on a flag held by supporters. Credit: Juan Mabromata/AFP via Getty Images)

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