Adolfo Rodríguez Saá (born 25 July 1947) is an Argentine politician who was interim president of Argentina... for all of a week in 2001.
Born in a family that was highly influential in the history of the San Luis Province (his grandfather, also named Adolfo Rodríguez Saá, had been its governor), he became the province's governor in 1983 under Peronism's Justicialist Party, after the end of the National Reorganization Process military dictatorship. He was re-elected in successive elections, remaining governor up to 2001.
When Argentine president Fernando de la Rúa resigned in that year, amid the December 2001 riots, Provisional President of the Senate Ramón Puerta was in charge of the presidency in a caretaker role, and Congress convened to elect a new president, Rodríguez Saá was selected, with instructions to call for elections the following March, with the victor set to complete de la Rúa's term of office, being sworn-in in April.
That was the easiest part.
Rodríguez Saá still had to deal with the economic crisis that caused his predecessor to resign and the civil unrest that resulted from it, the latter which only reignited when he announced his cabinet, as it included as Chief of the Cabinet of Ministers one Carlos Grosso, a very unpopular former mayor of Buenos Aires. As a result, Rodríguez Saá threw away his whole designed cabinet before they could take office. He also declared a sovereign default on the Argentine national debt, the highest sovereign default in history, which was celebrated by the Chamber of Deputies, but was resented by the leaders of the Justicialist party.
The straw that broke the camel's back was when Rodríguez Saá called for a meeting with all of the country's governors at Chapadmalal Residence (the presidential summer house), but out of the twenty-three governors, only six attended, with at least one of those who withdrew his appearance stating he suspected that Rodríguez Saá had plans to cancel the elections and stay as president up to 2003.note Facing a clear lack of support and with civil unrest not slowing down (there was in fact a protest right outside Chapadmalal when the reunion was supposed to take place), on 30 December he returned to San Luis and resigned. Provisional Senate president Ramón Puerta would have to have been interim president again, but at this point the presidency became such a political live grenade that he resigned as provisional Senate president to not have to deal with it again, so Eduardo Camaño, president of the Chamber of Deputies, was appointed interim president instead. After new deliberations, Eduardo Duhalde was elected as president, this time with a mandate to fill the remaining time of de la Rúa's mandate.
Rodríguez Saá would eventually present himself on the 2003 presidential elections, but ultimately ended up fourth. After being elected senator in 2005, he would run again in the 2015 presidential elections, but would end up in sixth and last place in the first round.
During his tenure as governor, Rodríguez Saá was involved in a bizarre incident in 1993 where he was kidnapped, taken to a room and forced to perform in a sex tape, and after being forced to pay a ransom of 3 million dollars, was left in the trunk of a car. The video has never been made public, though rumors about the specific activities he performed in them (including a specific one) became a sort of urban legend. After the kidnappers were captured, the woman who appeared with Rodríguez Saá in the video claiming that she had been his mistress for eight years also led to accusations that the sex tape was consensual and the whole kidnapping had been fabricated to obfuscate any potential release of it.
Works featuring Rodríguez Saá
Music- He is one of the Argentine presidents mentioned in Bersuit Vergarabat's "La argentinidad al palo", saying that he is "disfrazado de emperador romano" ("dressed up as a Roman emperor"), likely in reference to his aspirations of remaining in power during the 2001 crisis, and mentioning him having "un pepino en el orto" ("a cucumber up his ass"), a reference to the alleged acts in his sex tape.
