IPS-English ELECTIONS-PARAGUAY: Change - Catchword and Reality? Date: Fri, 18 Apr 2008 15:37:30 -0700 David Vargas ASUNCIÓN, Apr 18 (IPS) - Sunday's elections will mark a watershed in the history of Paraguay, where the ”bishop of the poor” is front-runner in the polls and the ruling party is at risk of losing its hold on power for the first time in six decades. ”We are looking at an unprecedented race in which there is a real possibility of change, a prospect that has shaken things up in structures that have governed for so long,” sociologist Alejandro Vial commented to IPS. ”Real competition exists in democracy, and that is the novel aspect of this campaign. After so many years, people finally have in their hands a chance to exercise that power,” he added. The poll favourite is former Catholic bishop Fernando Lugo, representing the centre-left Patriotic Alliance for Change (APC) in the fifth elections held since the collapse of the 1954-1989 dictatorship of General Alfredo Stroessner, who died in exile in Brazil in 2006. Lugo, 56, decided to leave the priesthood and run for president in December 2006, after a decade of work as bishop of the northern province of San Pedro, one of the poorest regions in this impoverished country of 6.7 million people. However, the Vatican denied his request for laicisation and instead suspended him ”a divinis”, which means he cannot exercise certain priestly functions, but is not relieved of his clerical obligations. Close on Lugo's heels in the polls is former education minister Blanca Ovelar, the first-ever female presidential candidate of the National Republican Association, better known as the Colorado Party, which has governed Paraguay for 61 years. In third place is former general Lino César Oviedo, leader of the National Union of Ethical Citizens (UNACE), who served just over three years of a 10-year prison sentence for a 1996 attempted coup against president Juan Carlos Wasmosy (1993-1998). Oviedo emerged as a presidential candidate after the Supreme Court annulled his conviction, clearing him to take part in the elections. Critics say his release from prison formed part of a political strategy by President Nicanor Duarte aimed at dividing the opposition. Several other candidates are running for smaller parties, including conservative businessman Pedro Fadul. More than 2.8 million Paraguayans are registered to vote on Sunday, to elect the country's president and vice president, 45 senators, 80 members of the lower house, 17 governors, 214 provincial lawmakers, and 18 members of the Mercosur (Southern Common Market) Parliament. The winning presidential candidate will be sworn in for a five-year term on Aug. 15. But this notoriously corrupt country has a long history of election fraud, the spectre of which hung over the country in the last week of the campaign, which has been unusually effervescent. President Duarte claimed that a group of ”social agitators” from Ecuador and Venezuela had travelled to Paraguay to incite violent protests if Lugo lost. Since the former bishop launched his political career, he has been discredited by his opponents as a mere ”pawn” of Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez, and because of his supposed alignment with leftist leaders Evo Morales of Bolivia and Rafael Correa of Ecuador. The opposition has downplayed the significance of the allegations and said they formed part of a campaign to scare voters and prevent high turnout, which analysts say is essential for Lugo to win. But the former bishop, who is backed by a heterogeneous coalition that ranges from the country's second-largest party, the Authentic Radical Liberal Party (PLRA), to small centre-left parties and grassroots political movements, warned his supporters ”to be on the alert during the elections Sunday, to prevent fraud.” Lugo's coalition and other opposition parties say two of the three members of the Supreme Electoral Court are allies of the governing party. According to observers, the Court has historically favoured Colorado Party candidates in its decisions. ”The Colorados are investing money in the campaign as never before, because the fear of losing the elections is growing,” political analyst Milda Rivarola told IPS. ”Lugo will only win if attempts at fraud are deterred -- if the parties and movements that support him are able to place trained, honest observers at the nearly 14,000 polling stations,” she added. Large landowners and other sectors see Lugo as a ”dangerous leftist.” Known as ”the bishop of the poor,” Lugo is strongly influenced by liberation theology, a school of thought that took shape in the Catholic Church in Latin America in the 1960s, challenging the Church to assume a special obligation to defend the oppressed and the poor and work for social justice. But he has insisted in his campaign that he would govern the country ”for everyone, with the help of all,” including the ”Colorados,” with the exception of the ”mafioso circle,” as he refers to groups that have had a grip on power for decades, and who he blames for the country's high levels of poverty and other serious problems. Ovelar, for her part, hopes to somehow benefit from the fact that female candidates were recently elected in neighbouring countries: Michelle Bachelet in Chile and Cristina Fernández in Argentina. In her campaign speeches she has lashed out at corruption, pledged strict budgetary discipline and promised to make the fight against poverty her main priority. According to official figures, 2.2 million Paraguayans are living in poverty, around 700,000 people -- 13 percent of the economically active population -- are unemployed, 600,000 children are malnourished, 80 percent of the population lacks basic health care, and five out of 10 Paraguayans are illiterate. Although Paraguay is one of the world's top five exporters of soy and is a leading producer of beef, 40 percent of the rural population lives in poverty, and land distribution is among the most unequal in the region. Agricultury Ministry statistics show that one percent of landholders own 77 percent of the country's farmland, while 350,000 peasant farmers have no land of their own. For all of the candidates, even the governing party's Ovelar, ”change” has been the catchword. One central issue in the campaign has been the call by all three leading candidates to renegotiate the treaty with Brazil that governs the giant binational Itaipú hydroelectric dam, which was signed in 1973 during the Stroessner regime. Half of the dam's 20 turbines belong to Paraguay, but because of the country's low energy consumption rate, it only uses the electricity produced by one of the turbines, and sells the rest to Brazil's Electrobrás company for 300 million dollars a year. The Brazilian state-owned utility then turns around and sells Paraguay's surplus energy for two billion dollars a year. Lugo has put the greatest emphasis on renegotiating the Itaipú treaty. ”In the absence of a fair price between a more powerful country and a weaker country, conflict prevails,” he warned. ***** + Q&A: ‘Barring Electoral Fraud, the Opposition Will Triumph' in Paraguay (http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=40961) + ELECTIONS-PARAGUAY: Indigenous Woman on Course for Senate (http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=42028) + ELECTIONS-PARAGUAY: Women Unimpressed by Female Candidate (http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=41940) + PARAGUAY: The Dark Side of the Soy Boom (http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=39972) (END/IPS/LA IP IF DV MX MD/TRASP-SW/DV/DM/08) = 04190017 ORP001 NNNN