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Elections in Paraguay: Progressive forces are forming

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Elections in Paraguay: Progressive forces are forming

Assumption. In the agricultural country of Paraguay, the election campaigns are currently in full swing. On April 30, in general elections, the people will cast their votes on the parliament, the presidency and the regional governments.

While progressive governments have been elected at the head of state in most South American countries such as Colombia, Chile and Brazil, the right-wing conservative Partido Colorado continues to dominate in Paraguay. In the last seventy years, it has won all elections except for one in 2008. At that time, the candidate of the left-wing alliance “Patriotic Alliance for Change”, Fernando Lugo, was elected president – and was overthrown in June 2012 by a parliamentary coup.

According to election forecasts, Colorado candidate Santiago Peña is 19 percentage points ahead of his rival and outsider candidate Payo Cubas, fielded by the populist Cruzada Nacional party. Peña represents traditional family values ​​and claims to be fighting insecurity in the country.

Third place in the polls goes to Efraín Alegre, who is running for the liberal electoral alliance “Concertación Nacional” and wants to fight corruption and mafia structures in the country. Alegre attended a gathering of left-wing forces with “Youth Paraguay” last Saturday, along with former Uruguayan President Jose Mujica and former Paraguayan leader Lugo. Shortly before the elections, Mujica called on the left-wing movements to “learn to tolerate one another and to reconcile differences.”

Other progressive forces such as Ermo Rodríguez, who is running as a Senate candidate for the Guasu Nemongeta Front, also want to break the model of permanent rule of the Colorado Party. He campaigns for the rights of young people and women, wants to revolutionize the health and education system and promises to promote “rural and local family businesses that produce healthy food for the population”. The electoral list of the left movement is headed by Lugo. Esperanza Martínez, who was nominated for the presidency by the Frente last year and campaigns for the interests of minorities and has already served as health minister, was eliminated in the primaries.

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The country suffers from the agrarian oligarchs, who use the country’s soil for export products such as soybeans and cattle breeding and are constantly expanding. 85 percent of the lands are in the hands of only 2 percent of the population.

Less than one percent of electoral candidates are of Indigenous origin, such as activists Paulina Villanueva and Ángela Sale, who were nominated for the congressional elections. The more well-known candidate Marciano Chevugui is running with the call for an “indigenous development agenda” to be included in the national agenda.

The National Farmers’ Union (Federación Nacional Campesina, FNC), together with indigenous organizations, has organized several protests against the current government in recent weeks, including the “XXIX Marcha Campesina, Indígena y Popular”. The rural population is thus speaking out against their historical neglect.

At the closing event in Asunción, FNC Secretary General Teodolina Villalba addressed the two biggest problems facing indigenous and rural people: the “complete absence of the state” to meet the needs of these parts of the population and the lack of educational opportunities in rural areas. Despite this plight, most parties’ election manifestos ignore the 19 indigenous communities and farmers and their struggle for access to land. 85 percent of the lands are in the hands of only 2 percent of the population.

On behalf of the Farmers Union shouted Villalba zur Wahl des Kandidat: innenduos der “Concertación Nacional” Efraín Alegre – Soledad Núñez auf.

At the end of March, the FNC had reached an agreement with Alegre and Núñez based on a proposal for a state policy to strengthen peasant and indigenous family agriculture presented by the association and publicly presented.

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In the last elections in 2018, right-wing conservative candidate and current President Mario Benítez won with 46.46 percent of the vote. During his reign, the head of state campaigned in particular for the wealthy population and large landowners as well as multinational companies and their interests. The rural poor and indigenous communities were subjected to criminalization and forced evictions (america21 reported).

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