The World - News from July 10, 1988

In its first primary election ever, Argentina’s opposition Peronist party chose a flamboyant populist, La Rioja Province Gov. Carlos Menem, as the party’s candidate in next year’s presidential election. Menem, 58, won 53% of the vote, compared to 46% for Buenos Aires Province Gov. Antonio Cafiero. Both are leaders of the reform movement within the worker-based party founded by the late Juan D. Peron and known formally as the Justicialist Party. Menem, who advocates a moratorium on repaying Argentina’s $55-billion foreign debt, will run against Cordoba Province Gov. Eduardo Angeloz, the nominee of President Raul Alfonsin’s center-left party, the Radical Civic Union, in the mid-1989 election.