Carlos Sylvestre Begnis

Carlos Sylvestre Begnis (30 August 1903 – 22 September 1980) was a medical doctor and politician, born in Alto Grande, a village near Bell Ville, Córdoba province in Argentina. He was a rural physician and worked as a surgeon in hospitals of the city of Rosario, province of Santa Fe.

He entered politics through the Radical Civic Union. In 1958 he was elected governor of Santa Fe , following a period of de facto military rule (after the Revolución Libertadora, which had ousted president Juan Perón three years before ). He became a part of the Intransigent Radical Civic Union (UCRI), and then formed part of the leadership of the Movement for Integration and Development (MID). His term was ended by a federal intervention.

In the 1970s, Sylvestre Begnis moved to the Justicialist Party (Peronism), and was elected governor again in 1973 that started the dictatorship of the National Reorganization Process. He died of acute leukemia in 1980, at the age of 77.

His son Juan Héctor, whose nickname was Canchi, also a politician, was a candidate for vice governor and served the Justicialist government of Jorge Obeid as Minister of Health, and is a national deputy for the Front for Victory. He chairs the Health Committee of the Argentine Chamber of Deputies. In 2007 he campaigned to be mayor of Rosario.