Paraguayans went to the polls on 9 October to approve a referendum that will have serious repercussions for future elections. They might not have turned out in droves - indeed only 12.5% of the 3m Paraguayans eligible to vote cast their ballots - but voters created the second largest electoral constituency after Asunción: it will lie on foreign soil. Paraguayans living abroad will now be eligible to vote – and they will be courted assiduously by future presidential candidates – assuming congress raises no objections to the referendum. At a stroke the size of the electorate will increase by very nearly 25% to 3.76m.
The referendum amending the 1992 constitution to grant the vote, and the right to stand for elected office, to Paraguayan expatriates was approved by 78% of those who decided to vote. The referendum was the first such to be staged since Paraguay’s return to democracy in 1993 and only the second in the last 70 years. It must now be approved by congress, but, having allowed it to be staged, it is unlikely deputies or senators would seek to block it now.
Paraguayans living abroad will be able to vote in general elections from 2013, and the electoral authorities will begin registering them in embassies and consulates abroad. They will also now be eligible to run for the presidency and the vice-presidency, and compete to become national senators or deputies to the Mercosur parliament (Parlasur). A further reform would be required, however, before they could seek to become national deputies, or run for governor or municipal positions.
Ironically, just over half turned out to vote (some 375,000), than the additional number that will now be added to the electoral roll (over 700,000). The electoral tribunal estimates that there are as many as 722,000 Paraguayan expatriates eligible to vote living abroad, the vast majority (551,000) in Argentina, followed by Spain (87,000), the US (50,000) and Brazil (29,000). Presidential aspirants will now need to appeal to this significant new constituency. This could change the dynamic of the relationship with Argentina, which after Asunción will now be the second largest Paraguayan constituency.
Setback for Lugo?
It was the lowest turnout for an election since records were compiled (admittedly this only dates back until 1996). Turnout in the municipal elections last year was 55% and in the 2008 general elections it was 66%.The next lowest turnout was 50%, in the 2006 municipal elections. The poor turnout is a bit of a setback for the government of President Fernando Lugo. While the constitutional amendment will still take effect (there was no minimum threshold required), the low turnout pokes fun at Lugo’s oft-stated objective to increase citizen participation in Paraguayan democracy. As it suggests there is little public appetite for greater involvement
At least that is one possible reading, favoured by the political opposition. Another reading is that this particular referendum failed to set the public pulse racing because it did not feel very meaningful for those living in Paraguay (although it is a significant number of extra voters who could sway the outcome of an election without ever having to live in the country and feel the effects of government policy). Congress has thwarted the Lugo administration’s efforts to hold referendums which would excite far more interest, such as publicly gauging the performance of congress and the judiciary and, more recently, an attempt by Lugo’s leftist coalition, Frente Guasú, to win approval for a referendum to allow presidential re-election.
Frente Guasú will be hoping to gain most from the referendum entitling Paraguayans living abroad to vote, on the grounds that some of them are exiles (or their relatives) from the years of the Stroessner dictatorship, although in recent years those leaving the country have been economic migrants whose political affiliations less clear.
Lugo seeks to crack down on guerrillas
President Fernando Lugo promulgated a state of exception for 60 days in the northern departments of Concepción and San Pedro on 10 October to track down members of the Ejército del Pueblo Paraguayo (EPP). Congress approved the measure last week.
Lugo appointed Brigadier General Félix Pedrozo, to head the armed forces deployed to the area and General Aldo Pastore, to head the anti-terrorist police force in the joint military-police task force. Both will sit on the operational command. They will need to improve coordination between the two forces considerably: in May 2010, during the last state of exception declared in five northern departments, soldiers engaged in an intense gunfight with police in Concepción in a botched operation to raid a supposed birthday party of an EPP leader, and little progress was made against the guerrillas.
“This is a government that closes neither its eyes nor its ears to the real problems the country faces,” Lugo said. The interior minister, Carlos Filizzola, said the armed forces would back up the police, which was in charge of internal security.
Congress exerted pressure on the Lugo administration for a new state of exception to be declared after two police officers were shot dead in an overnight raid by the EPP on a police substation in Horqueta in Concepción on 21 September. Two days earlier an explosive device was hurled at the state prosecutor’s office in Horqueta.
Despite these actions, the biggest threat to the Lugo administration in these departments comes not from guerrillas but from a potentially devastating outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease. Paraguayan authorities announced this week that they had vaccinated 27,602 cattle against foot-and-mouth to contain the outbreak, which was first reported on 18 September, in San Pedro [WR-11-38]. They also ordered the culling a week later of 819 infected or susceptible cattle, and applied quarantine measures on farms as well as restricting movement of livestock in the region.
Beef exports, which reached US$881m last year (not far behind Argentina) played a big part in stellar economic growth figures of 14.5%, have been suspended as Brazil and Argentina banned imports from Paraguay. The last outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease in Paraguay was in July 2003.
- The expatriate vote
Paraguay joins six other countries in South America where expatriates are also eligible to vote: Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Peru and Venezuela. A referendum to allow expatriates the vote in Uruguay won just 37% support in October 2009. Chile’s left-wing opposition Concertación is keen for the vote to be extended to Chilean expatriates because they are predominantly made up of individuals or families who went into exile during the Pinochet dictatorship.
- Exports
Fresh, chilled and frozen meat exports in the first half of 2001 totalled US$445.5m, accounting for 16% of Paraguay’s primary-industry exports. Soybean exports led the way over this period on US$1.24bn, according to the industry and commerce ministry.
