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He never made a campaign speech. His name did not appear on the ballot. Barred from running for the presidency, rebuffed and all but humiliated by the present military regime of General Alejandro Lanusse (TIME, Nov. 27), he waited patiently in Madrid, nearly 7,000 miles away, while the votes were cast and counted. When it was all over, there was no doubt that Juan Domingo Peron, once the fascistic strongman of Latin America, now a weary exile of 77, had been returned to power in Argentina.

Peron's chosen instrument was an obscure politician named Hector Campora, an ex-dentist who unabashedly describes himself as Peron's "obsequious servant." Campora swept last week's presidential elections, the first held in Argentina in ten years, with 49% of the vote. Radical Party Leader Ricardo Balbin finished a distant second with 21.2%. Although Campora failed to get an absolute majority and therefore should have faced a runoff, General Lanusse unhappily pronounced him victorious.

It was a remarkable victory. The Peronista campaign slogan--"Campora in government, Peron in power"--had so angered Lanusse that he had tried, unsuccessfully, to have Peoon's powerful Justicialist Liberation Front legally banned. He did succeed in barring Peron from the country until after the new government is installed on May 25, but Peoon ignored the slap, preferring to let Argentina's working class descamisados (shirtless ones) speak for him. This they did, resoundingly. Even after 17 years of Peron's exile (broken by a brief visit last November during which he spent most of his time in seclusion), they still remembered him and his late wife Evita as charismatic figures who had challenged "the system." The vote was, in addition, a rejection of seven years of inept military rule.

What does Peronism mean today? The Justicialist Front has promised a program of land reform--"the land must be for those who work it"--but this probably will involve the redistribution of unused land, rather than widespread expropriation of existing farms, as was done in Chile. The Peronistas say they will nationalize all bank deposits (currently some $4 billion) and take over all foreign trade. Also to be nationalized are industries that "imply monopolistic power and/or strategic decisions," but it is not yet clear which industries are involved.

In foreign policy, Campora says that he will revive Peron's old, somewhat vague concept of a "third position" between East and West. The new government has already decided to establish relations with Cuba, North Viet Nam and North Korea, but it will most likely remain in the "U.S.-dominated" Organization of American States.

Despite the government ban on Peron's returning to Argentina, he stays in regular touch and says he will return immediately "if they need me." Campora may indeed need assistance and sooner than he expects. Under Peron, the labor unions were a powerful political force. It is entirely possible that workers will demand huge wage increases. If denied, there will be a dangerous friction. If granted, the demands could lead to an even more rapid and damaging spiral of inflation (already the third highest in the hemisphere after Chile and Uruguay), and intervention by the still powerful military.

A lackluster politician who has worked for Peron since the mid-1940s, Campora was imprisoned after his hero was overthrown in 1955, escaped to Chile a year later, and returned to Argentina under a 1959 amnesty. Since then he has made numerous trips to Madrid for inspiration and instruction, but he is by no means another Peron. As President of the Chamber of Deputies from 1948 to 1952, he is best remembered for his proposal that the principal square of every city and town in Argentina be renamed either "Juan Peron" or "Eva Peron."

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