President Porfirio Lobo led a delegation of seven including Foreign Minister Arturo Corrales to Venezuela to attend the state funeral of President Hugo Chávez on 8 March, where he described Chavez as “an extraordinary leader who fought for Latin American unity, social inclusion and social justice”. Although Chávez was the first to rail loudly against the coup d’état against his Honduran ally President Manuel Zelaya (2006-2009) in June 2009, and later vowed not to recognise as legitimate the subsequent November 2009 election in which Lobo came to power, Chávez and his Colombian counterpart Juan Manuel Santos later succeeded where the…
Former president Elías Antonio (Tony) Saca (2004-2009) has officially launched his presidential campaign for March 2014. Saca was elected on the ticket of the right-wing Alianza Republicana Nacionalista (Arena) in 2004 but now is seeking to break the political duopoly which has maintained a stranglehold on El Salvador’s political system since the end of the 1980-1992 civil war at the head of a right-of-centre coalition. Coming to power as the chosen candidate for Arena, with its powerful electoral machinery and broad support base, is one thing; defeating Arena and the ruling left-wing Frente Farabundo Martí de Liberación Nacional (FMLN), who…
Jostling has begun ahead of Panama’s May 2014 general elections. Last month two ministers, José Domingo Arias (health) and Rómulo Roux (foreign affairs), quit in order to compete in the ruling Cambio Democrático (CD)’s primaries which are due to take place on 12 May. The latest polls for the overall presidential race augur badly for the CD with former Panama City mayor, Juan Carlos Navarro (1999-2009), from the Partido Revolucionario Democrático (PRD) and Vice-President Juan Carlos Varela of the Partido Panameñista (PPA) well ahead. There have been other signs of apprehension on the part of President Ricardo Martinelli (who is…
Costa Rica has an extraordinary number of legislative officials, in comparison with more developed nations with roughly the same size population. A report published on 11 March by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) found that Costa Rica’s legislative assembly employed 683 members of staff as of April 2012, whereas parliaments such as Norway employ just 445 staff, Croatia, 250; United Arab Emirates, 97 and Singapore, 43. On average, every member of the legislative assembly has 8.05 advisors and two administrative staff. The disproportionate size of the government has an impact on the legislative process, where bills can become stuck…
Earlier this month a Nicaraguan delegation took part in the 2013 Prospectors & Developers Association of Canada (PDAC) Convention, the world’s leading mining event. This is in line with President Daniel Ortega’s declared intention of boosting the mining sector, which has become one of the country’s most important exporters. These efforts are not without controversy, however, and have recently attracted concern from the Catholic Church and a leading environmental organisation, Humboldt. According to ProNicaragua, Nicaragua’s official investment and export promotion agency, a delegation which included Nicaragua’s presidential delegate for investments, Alvaro Baltodano; the Nicaraguan ambassador to the US and Canada,…
In less than a month, President Otto Pérez Molina has travelled to Spain, hosted a trade and investment mission from the United Kingdom (UK) and sent a high level delegation to Mexico, all evidence of his efforts to make good a declared priority upon taking office in January 2012 – attracting foreign direct investment (FDI). These efforts have already produced results in his first year in power; at the end of February he boasted that FDI reached US$1.2bn in 2012, up 26% on the previous year. On 13-14 February Pérez Molina paid his first official visit to Spain as president,…