Hermes Binner

Hermes Binner ( born June 5, 1943 in Rafaela ) is an Argentine politician and President of the Socialist Party. Between 2007 and 2011 he held the office of Governor of the Province of Santa Fe. His ancestors had migrated from the Valais village of Bürchen.

Career

Binner closed in 1970 to study medicine at the Universidad Nacional de Rosario from and worked as a doctor in Rosario. Already as a student he was politically active, at age 18, he joined the Socialist Party. 1972, during the final phase of the military dictatorship Revolución Argentina, he took an active part in the founding of the Partido Socialista under the name Partido Socialista Popular.

He was elected to the City Council of Rosario in 1993. After a failed election of the Vice- Governor of the Province of Santa Fe, he was elected mayor of Rosario in 1995. During his tenure, he decentralized the municipal institutions and improved the health infrastructure. He managed to gain re-election in 1999.

In 2003, he took up the post of governor of the province, but narrowly failed against the Peronists Jorge Obeid, though he could unite the most votes. Reason was a special feature of the electoral law in the province (Ley de Lemas ), which allowed more than one candidate per party and the voices of the result summed, which is why the socialists total of PJ subject. He was elected deputy for his home province in 2005.

In the 2007 election, when the electoral law had been changed, he was elected with 48.6 % of the vote for governor of Santa Fe. This was the first time that reached a socialist such a high office in Argentina.

In 2011, he stepped up to the presidential elections as a candidate of the Broad Front Progresista electoral alliance, the regional party GEN from the province of Buenos Aires, the Partido Nuevo from the province of Córdoba and other small left parties involved besides the Partido Socialista. He reached 16.81% in second place, well behind the winner, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, who won an absolute majority of votes.

Political Position

Binner is considered moderate socialist or social democrat. He was influenced in his thinking in his youth of Leninist authors, but is committed to market economy.