Graciela Fernández Meijide

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

In this
marital name
is Fernández Meijide.
Graciela Fernández Meijide
Minister of Social Development and the Environment of Argentina
In office
10 December 1999 – 12 March 2001
PresidentFernando de la Rúa
Preceded byAlberto Mazza
Succeeded byMarcos Makón
National Deputy
In office
10 December 1997 – 10 December 1999
ConstituencyBuenos Aires Province
In office
10 December 1993 – 10 December 1995
ConstituencyBuenos Aires
National Senator
In office
10 December 1995 – 10 December 1997
ConstituencyBuenos Aires
Personal details
Born
Rosa Graciela Castagnola de Fernández Meijide

(1931-02-27) 27 February 1931 (age 93)
Alliance
(1997–2001)
SpouseEnrique Fernández Meijide
ProfessionForeign language teacher and human rights activist

Rosa Graciela Castagnola de Fernández Meijide (born 27 February 1931), better known as Graciela Fernández Meijide, is an Argentine teacher, human rights activist and politician. She came to prominence by investigating the

FrePaSo
party.

Biography

Graciela Castagnola was born in Avellaneda just south of Buenos Aires, where she met her husband, Enrique Fernández Meijide, at a young age. They had a daughter and two sons, and she worked as a French language teacher. In 1976, her 16-year-old son, Pablo, was taken by the authorities in a night-time raid on the family apartment, along with his girlfriend, María Zimmermann, in what appears to be a case of mistaken identity (the girl's former boyfriend was a student activist also named Pablo). They were not seen again by their families.

Fernández Meijide campaigned for the rights of the families of the

National Commission on the Disappearance of Persons
(CONADEP).

Political career

Although Fernández Meijide was approached by several parties after her high-profile work, it was not until the creation of the centre-left

Ley de Punto Final) that effectively ended further prosecution for those responsible for human rights abuses during the National Reorganization Process dictatorship (1976–83). She stood as a candidate for the Argentine Chamber of Deputies
in 1991 on the center-left Broad Front ticket, albeit without success.

Fernández Meijide was first elected to

party list to a majority in the Lower House in the 1997 mid-term elections
.

Ahead of the

1999 elections, Fernández Meijide ran in the Alianza presidential primary against UCR Senator Fernando de la Rúa, to whom she lost despite having been the front-runner in many polls.[2] She declined to be de la Rúa's running mate and instead announced her candidacy for Governor of Buenos Aires Province; she lost to Justicialist Party nominee Carlos Ruckauf
by 7 points, however.

De la Rúa, on the other hand, was elected President, and he appointed Fernández Meijide to his cabinet as Minister of Social Development and Environment.[3] She was unable to put many of her social plans into action, however, due to lack of funds, and her popularity waned as the public's impatience grew. In a 2001 cabinet reshuffle brought on by economic and social crisis, the president made her chief of cabinet; she however resigned after a few days in protest at the government's economic policies. De la Rúa's government and the Alianza subsequently collapsed in 2001, after which both the UCR and FrePaSo backed the congressionally-appointed presidency of Eduardo Duhalde to remedy the country's economic crisis. Fernández Meijide afterward retired from active politics. Her Intimate History of Human Rights in Argentina was published in 2009.

See also

  • List of former Argentine Senators

References

  1. ^ Gabetta, Carlos (December 1997). "Are Menem's days numbered?". Le Monde diplomatique. Retrieved 21 July 2008.
  2. ^ "Argentina". Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 21 July 2008.
  3. ^ "Argentina". Guide to Women Leader.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Graciela_Fernández_Meijide&oldid=1189147188"