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Latin America’s Latest Marxist Leader Takes Power in Paraguay
Fernando Lugo won a dramatic victory in Paraguay, taking power from the conservatives who have run the country for six decades — and a hearty congratulations from his new best friend Hugo Chavez.
Paraguayan elections flew under the media radar — and, perhaps, Washington’s as well — this past weekend as Latin America got its latest leftist leader in Fernando Lugo.
Reports feted Lugo — a Roman Catholic bishop suspended by the Vatican for his political aspirations (his 2006 resignation request was denied) resting on Marxist “liberation theology” — as turning power away from conservatives for the first time in more than six decades, and reiterated his reputation as a man of the poor in a country where 32 percent of residents live below the poverty line.
But the real story was captured on the Web site of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, where a bold headline led the home page: “President Chavez congratulates the new president of Paraguay, Fernando Lugo.” Since Hugo Chavez doesn’t offer such warm tidings to everyone — he likely wishes leprosy upon presidents Alvaro Uribe of Colombia or Felipe Calderon of Mexico, for instance — one immediately pays attention.
But are they just brothers in populism, or staunch allies-in-waiting?
The story on Chavez’s Web site said that Chavez had hopped on the horn for a “friendly telephone conversation” to congratulate Lugo. Chavez’s communique lauded “brother” Paraguay for its “political maturity,” words that wouldn’t have escaped his lips if Blanca Ovelar of the ruling conservative Colorado Party had won.
A simple majority was all that was needed to win the election. Lugo, who takes office Aug. 15 and is called the “Red Bishop” by foes, had more than 40 percent of the votes when Ovelar, the first woman to compete for the Paraguayan presidency, conceded with about 30 percent of the vote.
Chavez’s communique continued to say that both he and Lugo were eager to “meet as soon as possible” to map out plans for their “cooperation.”
In speaking with McClatchy Newspapers, Lugo voiced the same kumbaya sentiments about Chavez: “We have to get to know each other sometime. So many things have happened, and we’ve never met. He wants to meet me, and I want to meet him.”
But proving that Chavez isn’t the only cog — just the squeakiest — in the Marxist turn of Latin America, Ecuador’s president jubilantly busted out some Fidel-speak to hail Lugo’s election.
“The triumph of comrade Fernando Lugo is … yet another stone in the foundation of this new Latin America that is just, sovereign, independent — and why not, socialist,” Rafael Correa said as Argentina’s leftist President Cristina Fernandez visited. Fernandez, the wife of the last leftist Argentine leader, Nestor Kirchner, got off to her own socialist start by
decreeing dramatic increases in export taxes for soya beans — and got a crippling farmers’ strike in return.
Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega waxed poetic about “the feeling that today we Latin Americans share, of counting on one more brother in building this alliance of the people for true democracy and independence.”
If Lugo — who has told the Associated Press he wouldn’t be “submissive” to Washington or others — has publicly shied away from the tango with Chavez and clan up to this point, the courtship is about to begin in force. And if you’re known by your fan club, one expects nothing less than Paraguay joining the club of Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua, and their softer-in-rhetoric yet solidly left cousins.
Lugo’s Patriotic Alliance for Change is a decidedly center-left coalition of groups ranging from the Broad Front to the Movement for Socialism that united with the single-minded purpose of ousting the Colorado Party from power. (Though, given Paraguay’s history, many will just be happy to have a bloodless transfer of power.) Additionally, no single party will dominate the country’s congress, meaning that Lugo will have to be open to internal
deal-cutting — or, depending on his ensuing leadership style or the strength of his coalition, intimidating or otherwise forcing the hand of the right.
Lugo told McClatchy that his economic vision includes “building an alliance between private enterprise and the state … We need to use our creativity and create a new Paraguayan model that comes from the Paraguayan reality.”
But Lugo — called “the bishop of the poor” by his fans — has promised property to all of the country’s landless peasants, and that has to be taken from somebody to redistribute. Lugo’s supporters, according to The Independent, even hooked up thousands of migrant workers in Argentina with free train rides back to the Paraguayan border so they could vote for the suspended bishop.
Does all of this mean that Lugo will reach the point of nationalizing industry — he claimed during the campaign, while trying to convince voters he wouldn’t be a Hugo doppelganger, that he wouldn’t — or that Paraguay, a renowned transit point for weapons, drugs, and even Hezbollah, will back up Chavez in his quest to unite Latin America in his socialist utopia and strike out at U.S. “imperialism”?
A little bit of Chavez’s discount oil could buy a lot of loyalty.
Bridget Johnson is a columnist at the Los Angeles Daily News.
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18 Comments
1. John Swaine:Wheee another Latin American state goes down the plughole.
I fervently hope this doesn’t end the way of every marxist experiment but that’s mostly because I’m a hopelessly naive optimist.
Apr 23, 2008 - 4:23 am 2. Dark Helmet:You people need to wake th F**k up. chavez is building an army to attack America. Stop buying citgo and support the notion that he gets killed.. fast. ANYONE who supports this sob is guilty of treason and should be put to death.
communisum is alive and groing in the liberal, left wing party. They have infiltrated the enviormentalist movement and even worse THE LOCAL FOOD production.
WAKE UP!!!!!! Do something!!!!! We are going to die.
Apr 23, 2008 - 6:22 am 3. AJB:God forbid Latin America democratically elects leaders that we don’t like. I suppose you people would we return to the days when the region was run by right-wing dictatorships and Salvadoran-style death squads.
Apr 23, 2008 - 11:57 am 4. bill:The Colorado Party conservative? Puhleese. What has happened is a band of extremist fascists have taken over from a local mafia. There isn’t a decent conservative within a thousand miles of Paraguay. The good news: aside from the tragedy in the country, it’s irrelevant to us. There is no country in the western hemisphere less relevant to the US than Paraguay.
Apr 23, 2008 - 3:00 pm 5. narciso:Except for the little detail that The Triple Frontier (which border Paraguay, Brazil & Argentina is a major AQ and Hezbollah sanctuary. That Lugo is peddling the same garbage that REverend Wright is.
Apr 23, 2008 - 8:02 pm 6. Ken Hahn:Paraguay has been a tragedy since its inception. No country in the Americas has had the lack of leadership or of luck that Paraguay has. Its wars have been bloody and costly. Its periods of peace have been corrupt and often brutal. Lugo will not improve things. The tragedy continues.
Apr 23, 2008 - 11:22 pm 7. Thunderball:Ninety thousand oil and natural gas acres Paraguay purchase by Baby Bush. Red Shirt Chavez promotes Lugo Marxist left winger take over of Boys From Brazil Paraguayan paradise. Like Chavez , Lugo may claim Bush energy dynasty investment venture for the state of Paraguay. Someone must be hoppin mad. Coal miner war helmets goose stepping red shirt patriotism closes in on the once untouchable secretive holy sphere of South America. Business cocaine shipments span the world and money is power. Its the ruler influencing heads of state. Monsanto could sterilize the narcotics crops of the world. Monroe Doctrine thrown out from the sixteen story building window by black star silencers. Envision the movie Prime Cut with Lee Marvin rolling up in a black limo outta Crawford Texas. License plate number YALE666. Deep dark omnipresent messaged by D and D priestly executioners. May The Schwarzenegger Bruce Willis be mit uns because you will need them. Ego is one thing and reality is another cold hard hitting fact. Do not mess with Bush. Never mess never mess with these people. The spree could happen. Don’t get it going. Yea tho i walk thru the valley of the shadow of death…and There but for the grace of God go i. The end game who s on top who s on bottom ? Simon Bolivar and his red shirts once freed South America and went to fight in Italy. Money is a supreme power. The far reaching invisible hand of God will control economies. The Darwinian flame burns like an eternal flaming star. Rising stars should know the challenges and the ultimate consequences.
Apr 24, 2008 - 3:57 am 8. Zepoulpe:Instead of blaming the people of these countries who freely voted for these candidates, we should ask ourselves what is wrong in what we maret be doing that they can’t see the risks that exists behind real communism ?
Apr 24, 2008 - 9:05 am 9. Roark:why is it that some people today are still willing to go back to such an abusive system ?
South America is the ‘Africa’ of the Western hemisphere.
Apr 24, 2008 - 9:20 am 10. Mortimer:Dark Helmet,
Apr 24, 2008 - 1:37 pm 11. Dark Helmet:I appreciate your toungue in cheek wake up call. Funny how we all love the little people except when those little people do things we dont like. Then we start to fume about the elites who control the little people and left us little people out of the loop.
Mortimer,
It’s one thing to be left out of the loop, quite another to build an army and attack America. Those who don’t hate communism, don’t know communsim.
Apr 24, 2008 - 6:46 pm 12. Joshua:Liberals fall on their knees to welcome them, not unlike the french did with the nazis.
Zepoulpe: why is it that some people today are still willing to go back to such an abusive system ?
This Lee Harris piece from a couple of years ago goes a long way toward answering your question.
Apr 24, 2008 - 8:59 pm 13. Michael Lonie:All those who think it is a fine thing that the Paraguayans elected a Marxist to oppress them, and who tut-tut against the nasty conservatives for pointing out just what a dumb move this is, when the Paraguayans are impoverished and starving as a result of socialist policies and the Paraguayan DGI and Red Guards are murdering thousands of them, what will you do then? Rescue the Paraguayans? You’d throw a hissy fit if anyone suggested the idea. You guys are perennial apologists for the worst tyrants and murderers around, and you dare to criticize conservatives for pointing out that electing a Marxist is suicidal? Go learn before you speak again, you have nothing to contribute now. The immoral character of the Left is terminal.
Apr 25, 2008 - 5:48 pm 14. » Paraguay Votes Left - By ¡Para Justicia y Libertad!:[...] reports about Lugo win is now making its rounds throughout the news media and blogosphere. Pajama’s Media Bridget Johnson, Latin America’s Latest Marxist Leader Takes Power in Paraguay, feels Lugo campaign was funded by [...]
Apr 25, 2008 - 5:48 pm 15. Javelin:Dark Helmet
Apr 26, 2008 - 11:13 pm 16. A victory of Hugo Chavez, this time in Paraguay >> liberal.family:How exactly is Paraguay going to invade the US? By marching along the Andean Cordillera, down through the coastal plains of Columbia, through Central America and Mexico(across the Canal Zone). All this from a landlocked country that has about the GDP of Pittsfield Massachussets. By the way, the French hardly welcomed the Nazis, unlike say the Danish. Read a book for once not written by a right wing talk show host. People that deal in gross generalities are by nature both ignorant and dishonest.
[...] A victory of Hugo Chavez, this one in Paraguay. [...]
Apr 28, 2008 - 5:38 am 17. Dark Helmet:When chavez shows up, I hope it’s your front door first. You’re unimformed, the french fell rather than fight. Read a book not written by a frenchman. Poor lefty, anything close to the truth probably does seem off the scale to you.
May 3, 2008 - 2:47 pm 18. Carlos J S A:Paraguay is not a country so poorest like Africa continent. An if it is, because the diferent us governors has been condenando to south america in this destination.
Dec 19, 2008 - 9:35 pmParaguay is the worlds second production in soya, iliens paraguayensis and cannabis too.Who buy his products?