OAS observers for Paraguayan election; former bishop leads

[Judi Lynn]

Monday, March 10, 2008
OAS observers for Paraguayan election; former bishop leads

The Organization of American States, OAS, will be sending 50 observers to the coming Paraguayan general elections next April 20, announced on Sunday the head of an OAS delegation currently visiting the country.

Maria Emma Mejia, a former Colombian Foreign Affairs minister said that the OAS observers will be arriving in Paraguay before the elections and will remain until the official proclamation “of who ever is elected” as the next president of the country.

“The OAS delegation will monitor the elections and will later write a report”, said Ms Mejia after meeting with Paraguayan electoral authorities and the different presidential candidates. OAS observers will be located in the country’s main electoral districts.

On April 20th Paraguayans will be voting for president, vicepresident, Congress members, governors, regional authorities and members of Mercosur Parliament.

Three are the main candidates, a former Roman Catholic bishop Fernando Lugo, former teacher Blanca Olevar running for the ruling Colorado Party and an ex Army general, Lino Oviedo, once jailed for leading a coup attempt.

The latest public opinion polls published over the weekend in the capital Asunción showed the former bishop ahead with 34.8% of vote intention but Ms Olevar was closing in with 28.9%. Oviedo trails with 23%.

More:
http://www.mercopress.com/vernoticia.do?id=12850&formato=HTML

[Peace Patriot]

1. This is SO IMPORTANT--that Paraguay have a clean, transparent election!

And it makes me damn nervous that a Colombian is involved! That's kind of like here, where rightwing Bushite corporations 'count' all our votes with 'trade secret' code, ain't? Rabid foxes guarding the hen house. Don't know who she is. Need to find out.

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South American political alignment:

Leftist governments (goals of social justice and regional integration)

Core Bolivarian leftist governments:

Venezuela
Bolivia
Ecuador
Nicaragua
Argentina

Leftist governments (similar goals; often allied with the above)

Brazil
Uruguay
Chile

Center/right governments (some cooperation on issues of sovereignty and regional strength)

Peru (corrupt "free tradists"--a real leftist almost won the last election)
Paraguay (entrenched, corrupt power elite--but they joined the Bank of the South, a Chavez project, both because it's a good idea, and probably feeling the leftist wind across the continent)

Fascist government

Colombia (hopeless; brutal, murderous, cocaine-traffickers, Bushites, $5 billion in U.S./Bush military aid--it's no wonder they've had an armed leftist insurgency for over 40 years).

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The Bushites have suffered one electoral defeat after another, across the continent. They must be feeling starved of torture, murder and theft in the western hemisphere--and they just had to get them some dead communists by bombing Ecuador.

Ahem.

So one more government in the leftist column is something they very much want to prevent. And I'd sure like to know more about Maria Emma Mejia, "a former Colombian Foreign Affairs minister" who is apparently going to be monitoring an election of great interest to the Bush Junta. Colombia has many courageous human/civil rights workers and real democrats. But it's hard to believe that any such people would be associated with the Colombian government--having held such a high position. That is enough to make her a suspicious person. She says there will be 50 others, but what role will she play, and--if she is a Bush operative--where will she position herself, doing what? I know nothing about the Paraguayan voting system. I highly doubt that it is electronic (which would make the theft easy, if it's like our system--run on 'trade secret' programming, with virtually no auditing). She would only need to be in a central location, and have contact with one tech. But Paraguay is very, very poor--so they're probably using paper ballots. That means that her role (if she's an operative) would be to hide or downplay local intimidation of poor voters, and ballot box stuffing by the entrenched party. Paper ballot theft is harder to hide--but clever writing in OAS reports could be used to cover it up.

Fernando Lugo, when asked about his politics, said that Paraguay "is neither left nor right--Paraguay is POOR!" However, he is a leftist, and, really, what all leftists are, in South America, is MAJORITYISTS. They represent the vast, poverty-stricken, poor majority, forever excluded from politics and power until recently. They want democracy--fairness for all, the proper balance of society's interests, so everyone has basic human needs, education and hope. In this sense, "leftist" is not really the right word to describe what is a social justice and democracy movement all over South America. He is right to try to define things differently. He, is, though--in descriptions I've read--tasked with pulling together all of Paraguay's small, leftist and perennially squabbling political parties. And he would more than likely align with the Bolivarians--the most far-thinking and influential coalition as regards the region's future, and how to address decades and centuries of impoverishment and brutal repression aided and abetted by the U.S. "Free trade," slave labor, privatization of resources, indebtedness to World Bank/IMF loan sharks, and the murderous, corrupt U.S. "war on drugs" are not the answer. South American regional integration and development, local control of finances, social justice (bootstrapping of the poor) and self-determination ARE the best answers so far devised. The Bolivarians have organized many practical projects along these lines, which I'm fairly sure Fernando Lugo approves of, and would support and join.

[Peace Patriot]

2. Paraguay's beloved "bishop of the poor," Fernando Lugo, is the genuine article--

a "liberation theology" prelate who has spent his entire career living with, and working with, the poor. He is really a wonderful man--and the Vatican hates that he is running for president. They tried to stop him. They threatened him with excommunication (and being stripped of his priestly office). (He voluntarily resigned as bishop, I believe, before he announced his campaign for president--but he is still a priest.) They seem to have pulled back (to behind the scenes?) because he is so popular. I don't think they would dare excommunicate him. They could well lose half their members in Paraguay if they did it. And he is the ONLY political figure who can pull the country together, to face Paraguay's vast poverty. Really, they have got to align with the Bolivarians--which even the center/right government recognized, in joining the Bank of the South. The only resource they have is water (hydroelectric power), and they desperately need education, training and bootstrapping--which the Bolivarians are so good at. And, since the Bolivarian countries have strong goals of regional integration and cooperative economic/political strength, they would be apt to go out of their way to help Paraguay, if Paraguay had a better, more representative government.