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Brazil & Southern Cone - July 2018 (ISSN 1741-4431)
PARAGUAY: Inauspicious start for new gov’t
Paraguay’s newly elected national congress was formally sworn-in on 30 June. The event should have been cause for celebration for the ruling Asociación Nacional Republicana-Partido Colorado (ANR-PC) party as it succeeded in retaining the presidency and a simple congressional majority in the 22 April general election. However, the ceremony was marked by the controversy over the decision by the outgoing senate leadership not to allow former president Nicanor Duarte Frutos (2003-2008) to swear-in as an active senator and to take the oath from an alternate ANR-PC senatorial candidate instead. The episode has reopened the divisions between the ANR-PC and the political opposition, and among rival ANR-PC party factions, that have afflicted and undermined the outgoing administration led by President Horacio Cartes. These divisions now also look likely to affect the incoming government led by President-elect Mario Abdo Benítez after he assumes office next month.
