14 Facts About Jorge Obeid

Jorge Alberto Obeid was an Argentine Justicialist Party politician who was twice governor of Santa Fe Province and thrice a member of the Argentine Chamber of Deputies.

Jorge Obeid enrolled at the National University of the Littoral, in Santa Fe, and graduated with a degree in chemical engineering.

Jorge Obeid taught there from 1972 to 1976, and became a Peronist Youth activist at the time.

Jorge Obeid married Elba Ines Kemer, and they had five children.

Jorge Obeid remained active in Peronist politics after his return, and in 1987 was elected to the Santa Fe City Council.

Jorge Obeid became President of the Council in 1989, and when Mayor Carlos Aurelio Martinez resigned later that year, he succeeded him as mayor.

Jorge Obeid was elected mayor in his own right in 1991, and later served as President of Argentine Federation of Cities and as representative for Santa Fe Province in the 1994 Constitutional Convention.

Jorge Obeid was elected governor of the province for the first time in 1995, winning an election that was fraught with problems, including a breakdown in the computer system counting the ballots that forced a recount to be done by hand.

Jorge Obeid was declared the winner after 37 days, subsequent to charges of fraud and manipulation.

Jorge Obeid served until 1999, when former Governor Reutemann was returned by voters to a second four-year term.

The provincial constitution of Santa Fe does not allow for reelection of a governor, and Jorge Obeid was elected to the Argentine Chamber of Deputies in 1999.

Jorge Obeid was then returned by voters as governor for a second, non-consecutive term in 2003.

Jorge Obeid served one more full term as Congressman from 2007 to 2011, and returned to Congress in 2013.

Jorge Obeid died the following month of a pulmonary embolism; he was 66.