Little remains of the original assembly of Javier Miley. While outlining his presidential candidacy, the liberal builds his federal space and forges alliances with the consent of his sister, Karina, and in the shadow of a political operator that many accuse is responsible for a large part of their problems: Carlos Kikuchi, “the Japanese”.
At 60, he is the only one on Milei’s small table with a career and political contacts, and yet he is the one who accumulates the most controversies in the assembly of La Libertad Avanza. There are not a few who refer to Kikuchi as responsible for the removal of several former space allies. And, even worse, they point to him as the one in charge of having run to the liberal youth to make agreements with former political leaders.
“Let him go do business elsewhere. You have to destroy it”, asked Carlos Maslatón in the middle of the year. Finally, he left. The militant of La Libertad Avanza completed a long list of those expelled from space: Emmanuel Dannan, El Presto, Marcos Urtubey and Álvaro Cicarelli They are some of those who were going for the 2023 race and ran out of space.
To make matters worse, inside the country those confirmed have little to do with the original idea. At the end of October, in Salta there were news: Milei moved away from the son of the former governor Urtubey to approach the controversial Alfredo Olmedo.
It was not the first agreement full of unknowns for the Liberal: last month he closed an electoral alliance in Tucumán with Ricardo Bussi, son of the repressor Antonio Bussi. And in Córdoba, through the direct negotiation of Kikuchi, he agreed with a historic leader, Rodolfo Eiben, President of the National Democratic Party of that province. Far from the renewal that the first referents of the space imagined.
“Milei, for saying yes to everyone, ended up surrounded by the environment, which is made up of Carlos Kikuchi and sister Karina, who blocked all the political militancy that led him to success last year. That formation of young liberals were marginalized,” he said. Maslaton to Jorge Fontevecchia in “Modo Fontevecchia”, before leaving space.
The owner tries to avoid controversy with the excluded. In his social networks he records each of his agreements. That’s why he held the bomb that he detonated in Together with Carlos Kikuchi, despite the fact that the owner of La Libertad Avanza proudly shows his past as a spokesman for the former minister. Cavallo says they met on a radio show.
Even though many of his deals are leaking, Kikuchi wants the wow effect to kick in. For this reason, he had a party statement drawn up in which he assures that “in a timely manner we will make known the candidacies for governor of La Libertad Avanza and they will be officially communicated by Javier Milei.” Everything is under his control.
SHADES. “The Japanese” It does not have records of jobs in a dependency relationship. He has a degree in Social Communication, graduated from the University of Salvador, and hosted radio programs on a Buenos Aires FM and on Nacional Rock: many of the interviews he conducted with Javier Milei remain from that experience, and that is how they met. He calls himself a former campaign manager for Domingo Cavallo, although those around the former minister deny it: they only place him as his spokesperson in the ’90s.
It’s not even clear when he got to Milei’s small table. While they assure that it was at the beginning of the year, a Buenos Aires operator affirms that the liberal economist was about to put him on the list of candidates for Buenos Aires legislators in 2019. What is verifiable is that, since he entered, the scenario has changed in the space.
Little adept at interviews, the Kikuchi’s voice it is known only to those with whom it interacts in each locality in which it lands. Inquire among the leaders and make sure that there is a floor of at least 10% of possible voters to advance with a candidacy. If they pass the first tests, the demands begin: no forming alliances with Together for Change, not even at the local level. Nothing that involves radicalism, the Civic Coalition or the “doves” of the PRO. “The cambiesocialistas”, as he calls them.
In less than a year, Kikuchi became Milei’s top point guard. He will be one of those responsible for what happens: the father of success or the “traitor” who will lead him to failure, as the excluded predict.
