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Ecuador’s President Daniel Noboa kicked off his new four-year term on 24 May with ambitious plans to step up the battle on organised crime, push energy investments, and streamline the state without imposing drastic austerity measures.

Most legislators from the left-wing opposition Revolución Ciudadana (RC) didn’t attend the inauguration ceremony as they don’t recognise President Noboa’s victory, even though claims of fraud during the 13 April second round were rejected by the country’s electoral authorities and by international observers.

Nevertheless, a rather fluid situation in the constellation of congressional alliances bodes for a challenging but overall more constructive scenario than Noboa had during his first 18 months in office. On the one hand his newly formed alliance with the indigenous party Pachakutik came under early pressure when the umbrella indigenous movement Confederación de Nacionalidades Indígenas del Ecuador (Conaie) blasted his proposed security bill as a serious threat to human rights and civil liberties [WR-25-20]. On the other hand, a dissident faction within RC has formed in congress, opening up new opportunities for constructive dialogue. The group of 18 legislators called the Bancada de la Gente has signalled it is open to working with Noboa on the same security bill that the indigenous movement has concerns over.

“We don’t oppose it but we have some observations,” Raúl Chávez, a member of the bloc, said in reference to the security bill on 27 May. “We may not agree on everything; we don’t need to be best friends to move forward as a country,” he said on the broader question of Noboa’s legislative support in congress.

The security bill is the centrepiece of Noboa’s renewed effort to win the war against organised crime. Among other things it would allow the police and armed forces to use force more directly, broaden the president’s power to pardon security personnel even while cases are still under investigation, and reform the tax regime to go after the financing of criminal groups and combat money laundering. Separately, Noboa has also announced legislation which would give companies tax incentives in exchange for donations to provide the security forces with cutting-edge technology and equipment.

In a further attempt to undercut gangs, Noboa is increasingly aiming to go after their financial strength. “Our police, our armed forces can face them in the streets, but if they have unlimited sources of income that struggle will continue,” Noboa told local journalism platform Visionarias on 24 May. “We have to take away their money, their source of income,” he said. The government’s plans include efforts to crack down on illegal gold mining by opening a central mining registry in the coming months, as well as tightening border controls.

Energy

Noboa said in his inauguration speech that the worst of Ecuador’s recurrent power outages are over, saying that there is more water in reservoirs and additional capacity has been brought online through new projects and proper maintenance of hydroelectric plants. He said that his government will submit a nuclear energy bill to diversify the electricity matrix, which is heavily reliant on hydropower.

The government wants to add 1,000MW in wind and solar capacity to the national grid in the next two to three years. Concrete progress is being made on this front. Final studies are completed and interested investors have been identified for a project to install floating solar panels on the Mazar reservoir in Cañar province that would have a capacity of 160MW. Equally, feasibility studies for the Cardenillo hydroelectric project on the Paute river, which has a projected capacity of 600MW, are in their final stages.

Noboa told Visionarias that the government intends to reach its target of producing an additional 100,000 barrels of oil per day within the next two years. The focus would be to boost investments from state oil company Petroecuador in the Sacha oilfield but also to attract private capital to fields in the same oil-rich Orellana province. Previous efforts by the Noboa administration to boost private sector involvement in Sacha have run into stiff opposition from the indigenous movement. Noboa also held out the prospect of potential foreign investment in the Amistad gas field in the Gulf of Guayaquil, particularly from the sovereign wealth fund of the United Arab Emirates, which Noboa visited in late April.

Cabinet changes

President Noboa made only two cabinet changes as he swore in his ministerial team following the inauguration ceremony. Juan Bernardo Sánchez was appointed as health minister, replacing Edgar Lama, and María Luisa Cruz was named as environment minister, replacing María Cristina Recalde. Lama and Recalde had both been in their roles since February.

Development: On 10 October Bolivia’s lower chamber approved a short law suspending the construction of a road through an indigenous territory (Tioc) and national park, Isiboro Sécure (Tipnis), and calling two referenda for the regions affected (Cochabamba and Beni).

Significance: The law’s approval formalises a pledge made by President Evo Morales following a controversial police crackdown on indigenous protesters demonstrating against the road’s construction. However, it defies indigenous demands for the complete cancellation of the project. Despite other gestures, including the (forced) resignation of the interior minister and his deputy (Sacha Llorenti and Marcos Farfán), and the removal of the national deputy police commander, General Oscar Muñoz, and the rector of the national police academy, Oscar Chávez, the Morales government does seem to feel sufficiently threatened to bow down.

Key points:

• The law was approved by 71 of the 100 representatives present in the 130-seat lower house, which is dominated by the ruling Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS). It now goes to the senate, also MAS-controlled. Nonetheless, a faction of MAS indigenous legislators walked out in protest. Six indigenous legislators are reportedly drafting an alternative bill which would prohibit the construction of the road through the protected territory.

• The two main indigenous organizations, the lowlands-based Confederación de Pueblos Indígenas de Bolivia (Cidob) and the highlands-based Consejo Nacional de Ayllus y Markas del Qullasuyu (Conamaq), rejected the law. They also confirmed that a protest march from Beni to La Paz, which got underway on 15 August, would continue. The protest caravan is expected to reach the capital in the next few days. This has triggered concerns about potential violence, as Morales has called a supporters rally for 12 October, in support of the 16 October national vote to elect a new judiciary.

• Deep divisions have emerged within Morales’s support base over the Tipnis dispute, namely between indigenous groups and the campesino movement, which includes the likes of the Confederación Sindical Unica de Trabajadores Campesinos de Bolivia (CSUTCB). Despite condemning the police crackdown, coca producers also continue to back Morales.

Development: On 9 November it emerged that the office of Colombia’s prosecutor general has requested copies of all files pertaining to the disciplinary congressional investigation into former President Alvaro Uribe’s (2002-2010) role in the illegal intelligence gathering scandal known as the ‘chuzadas’, in order to conduct its own investigation.

Significance: If found guilty, the disciplinary sentence that such conviction carries would end President Uribe’s future political aspirations.

Key points:

• The prosecutor general’s request comes as a result of last week’s ruling against two former senior members of the Departamento Administrativo de Seguridad (DAS), the country’s (no defunct) intelligence agency, and is included in the decisions’ formal documentation.

• The prosecutor’s thinking is that if Martha Inés Leal Hoyos, the DAS’ former deputy director of operations, and Teresa Guzmán Cortés, the former coordinator of the group for technological development of the general intelligence directorate, did in fact receive their orders from their superiors, as they claim, and the chain of command was not broken, then the initial intructions should have originated with the President.

• According to the report, “the order received by the latter [Martha Leal] from Captain Tabarés Molina, was the product of the request imparted through the chain of command of the DAS by the president at the time, doctor Alvaro Uribe Vélez, an appointment that depending on the results of this process, could result in said public servant having incurred in a disciplinary fault, therefore, this [the possible fault] must be investigated”.

Peru’s economy has made important strides in recent years. In consistently posting real annual average GDP growth of over 6%, it has been one of Latin America’s fastest growing economies in the past decade. The latest first quarter results confirmed a trend of continuing growth. In this context, it would be very easy for any government to become complacent. However Peru’s economy & finance minister, Luis Miguel Castilla, has signalled that in his opinion the time is ripe for Peru to push through important tax reforms in order to ensure the country’s future success.

According to the national statistics institute (Inei), real GDP growth in the first quarter of 2012 was 6% year-on-year and 1.8% quarter-on-quarter, meaning that the Peruvian economy has posted growth in the last ten consecutive quarters. Impressively, Inei reported broad based growth across nearly all sectors including construction (up 12.4% year-on-year) and retail (7.9%), while on the demand side domestic investment was up 15.5% and domestic consumption up 5%. With such a high levels of activity across the economy, the government will benefit from higher tax returns and increased fiscal savings. The government led by President Ollanta Humala is determined to continue to operate the fiscal surplus policy set by recent governments. For 2012, it foresees a fiscal surplus of 1% of GDP, up from 0.8% in 2011.

Peru registered a fiscal surplus of 7% of GDP in the first quarter, according to the central bank (BCRP), up one percentage point over the same period of last year. The BCRP said the result was generated on the back of higher government revenues, which were up 0.4% in the period, and lower non-financial government spending, which fell 0.3%. Although the fiscal position tends to be buoyant at the beginning of the year (i.e. before funds are disbursed), the latest BCRP figures will be encouraging for the government as they show that its annual fiscal surplus target is well within reach. Moreover tax revenues should also remain buoyant.

Castilla, a holdover from the previous administration, identifies tax reform as the “main challenge” in the ten point economic programme the government plans to implement before the end of President Humala’s term in 2016.

Castilla explained that although tax revenues have risen to 21% of GDP in the past decade, this can still be improved upon without creating any new taxes or increasing existing rates; but rather by simplifying the tax code in order to eliminate some exceptions and, more importantly, reduce evasion (see sidebar). In his opinion, a tax reform that addresses these issues could increase the government’s tax intake by as much as PEN12bn (US$4.38bn) by 2016. Taking this into consideration, the executive branch recently submitted a formal request to congress to be granted temporary legislative powers for 90 days to modify the tax code to this effect. On 31 May congress granted the executive’s request, but reduced the time period to 45 days (in which it must prepare and present its reform proposals). Castilla and his team have been given an opportunity to achieve an important policy goal, but they will have to work hard to take advantage of it.

• Tax evasion

Economy Minister Luis Miguel Castilla says that sales tax evasion in Peru stands at 35%, while 50% of contributors evade income tax. He claims that tax evasion rates in Peru are double the regional average. He attributed this to factors including weak tax institutions (particularly at the regional government level); a failure to effectively monitor and audit tax authorities; and the lack of clear and strong anti-evasion rules. Castilla notes that this latter factor has allowed big corporations to “disproportionately abuse” the system.

The sharp deterioration in relations between Iraq and Turkey has, according to some sources, reached breaking point.  At the same time, relations between Turkey and Iran clearly remain strained.

The proximate cause of the crisis between Turkey and Iran is the refusal of Turkey to extradite Iraq’s Vice-President Tareq al-Hashimi to Baghdad on murder charges.  But the problem dates back at least to 2010 when Ankara supported Iyad Allawi in the Iraqi elections against the present pro-Iranian Shia prime minister, Nuri al-Maliki.  Relations had deteriorated to such an extent by May this year that al-Maliki was accusing Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of having “hostile intent”.

Turkey has developed a close relationship with the leader of Iraqi Kurdistan, Masoud Barzani, and it supports the Iraqi Sunni Arabs, both of which groups are being marginalized by the al-Maliki government.  Turkey’s relationship with the Iraqi Kurds includes signing oil deals and exporting crude oil from Iraqi Kurdistan through pipelines linking to the Ceyhan oil terminal on the Mediterranean, all without reference to Baghdad.  On Syria, Ankara is openly hostile to the Assad regime, while Iraq, although not overtly supportive of Assad, is tacitly taking the Iranian line.  The differences have now been compounded by the al-Hashimi affair and by Baghdad’s response of suspending the registration of Turkish companies working in Iraq.

Separately, the tense nature of relations between Turkey and Iran was also on display this week.  When Iran's chief nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili met with Erdogan on Tuesday, it was noticed that there was no Turkish official present to greet him at the entrance to the prime minister’s office.  Witnesses say that the Iranian ambassador accompanying Jalili looked particularly disconcerted.  Jalili was met by an official inside the building, who took him to the meeting room.  Local sources say that the snub was prompted, in part, by the way Erdogan had been treated during a visit to Tehran in April.  During that visit, the Iranian side postponed at the last minute a scheduled meeting between Erdogan and Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, saying the Iranian leader was ill.  The Turks were unconvinced.

A Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) terrorist who was captured by Turkish security forces recently has reportedly revealed that 600 of the 1,000 PKK terrorists who are active in the southeastern Turkish province of Hakkari have come from a camp located in Iran.

Susana Villarán permanecerá como alcalde de Lima después de evitar por  poco un referéndum revocatorio contra ella el 17 de marzo. Su triunfo fue atemperado por un serio revés para su izquierdista Fuerza Social (FS): 21 de los 39 concejales de Lima fueron revocados, 19 de ellos del FS. Al parecer los votantes habían decidido mantener a Villarán, a pesar de las dudas, debido a los intereses dudosos detrás del referéndum revocatorio, pero castigarla despojándole de su apoyo en el consejo municipal. El factor decisivo detrás de su triunfo fue el apoyo ofrecido por Lourdes Flores, del conservador Partido Popular Cristiano (PPC), a quien ella derrotó en las elecciones por la alcaldía en octubre del 2010. La decisión del Partido Aprista Peruano (PAP) , mucho menos popular que el PPC en Lima, de buscar el reemplazo de Villarán también solidificó el apoyo hacia ella.

El estrecho margen de la victoria de Villarán (unos 74.000 votos en 2,72m) fue un reflejo de su triunfo electoral sobre Flores en el 2010 (por solamente 36.000 votos) pero la composición de su apoyo fue muy diferente. Esta vez, los partidarios del PPC, predominantemente los limeños más pudientes en vez de los pobres residentes, jugaron un rol clave en su victoria.

Para Flores, los principios prevalecieron por sobre la política partidaria, aunque su apoyo fue también una hábil movida política, que la deja a ella y al PPC bien ubicados para beneficiarse. Villarán abrazó a Flores en la celebración de su victoria (con una bandera del PPC flameando detrás) y ella prometió in gobierno de amplia base. Si ella termina perdiendo 19 de sus concejales, ella no tendrá otra opción más que construir consenso, constriñendo su agenda de reforma: nuevas elecciones se deberán celebrar en seis meses para reemplazar a los concejales revocados.

• Reformando referendos revocatorios

La alcalde Villarán dijo que la ley estableciendo el referéndum revocatorio  debería ser abolida o ser sujeta a una profunda reforma que asegure que no sea mal utilizada de nuevo en el futuro. El gobierno central parece estar de acuerdo. El primer ministro, Juan Jiménez Mayor, dijo que era necesario preguntarse cuánto realmente contribuye el referéndum revocatorio a la democracia y al fortalecimiento de las instituciones del Estado. Él dijo que hubiera preferido invertir los fondos que gastó el Estado en la contienda en Lima, en obras sociales o en agua o en obras sanitarias.

MEXICO | Analysts revise forecasts down. The consensus growth forecast for the year has been revised down in the July instalment of the monthly poll of local and foreign economic analysis firms published by Mexico’s central bank (Banxico) to 2.56% from 2.65% the previous month.

The downwards revision comes after the release of the official first quarter GDP figures showed that economic activity had increased by 0.3% during the period, much lower than what analysts had been expecting. It also follows the International Monetary Fund (IMF)’s decision to slash its economic growth forecast for Mexico this year from the 3% it predicted in April to 2.4% quoted in the latest update of its World Economic Outlook (WEO) released on 8 July.

Meanwhile, the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (Eclac) also reduced its economic growth forecast for Mexico in its latest report released on 4 August. Eclac now believes that Mexico’s GDP will grow by 2.5% this year, 0.5 percentage points lower than it had reckoned earlier. Banxico had already lowered its growth projection for the year back in May from 3%-4% to 2.3%-3.3%, but the confirmation of weaker-than-expected GDP figures for the first quarter also prompted Mexico’s finance ministry (SHCP) to lower its growth forecast for the first time this year. The SHCP lowered its forecast from 3.9% to 2.7% despite claiming to be “confident” that economic activity will begin to pick up in the second half of the year.

SHCP’s chief economist, Ernesto Revilla, said that  the SHCP has observed a “very important acceleration” in the second quarter largely thanks to the strong level of exports to the US, Mexico’s main trading partner. “We are seeing exports growing at a very fast pace,” Revilla said, although he did not provide any figures and refused to venture a GDP growth forecast for the second quarter.

Mexico’s national statistics institute (Inegi) is due to release the official second quarter GDP figures on 21 August, after which the SHCP will have to decide whether to keep its current forecast or adjust once again.

La semana pasada, contra los explícitos deseos de la Presidenta Dilma Rousseff, más de 50 diputados del congreso federal de Brasil del gobernante izquierdista Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT), votaron a favor de un proyecto de ley que eleva los salarios de fiscales públicos y de aquellos que trabajan en la oficina del fiscal general. Con incluso miembros de su propio partido desacatando las órdenes del ejecutivo, Rousseff está mirando crecientemente hacia el senado federal para que actúe como un “poder moderador” en la crisis política que ahora enturbia a Brasília.

La votación sobre una de las llamadas ‘bombas fiscales’ –efectivamente, medidas de gastos que golpearán los planes de austeridad del gobierno de Rousseff– fue emblemática de la pérdida de apoyo del gobierno en la cámara baja federal. Un total de 445 diputados votaron a favor de la enmienda constitucional vinculando los salario de los abogados públicos a los de los jueces de la corte suprema; solamente 16 votaron en contra, y seis se abstuvieron. La medida, si es ratificada, le costará al gobierno R$2,4mm (US$690m) al año.

Más de estos proyectos de ley que aumentarían el gasto público ya están en los planes. Frente a una deteriorada situación macroeconómica el ministerio de finanzas ya redujo drásticamente su plan para un superávit fiscal primario 1,1% el PIB, a uno del 0,15%. En caso de que muchas de estas medidas anti-austeridad sean aprobadas, incluso este más modesto obejtivo podría estar  fuera del alcance.

Muchos en el PT están abiertamente opuestos a los planes de ajuste fiscal del gobierno, que van contra las promesas electorales hechas por el partido el año pasado. Otros en la coalición de gobierno de la Presidenta Rousseff también están molestos. La semana pasada, dos pequeños partidos, el Partido Democrático Trabalhista (PDT) y el Partido Trabalhista Brasileiro (PTB) anunciaron que de ahora en adelante votarían independientemente del gobierno. Muchos analistas interpretaron esto como un intento por obtener más empleos en una esperada reorganización del gabinete. Entre ellos, los dos partidos tienen 45 bancas en el congreso federal.

Sumándose a todo esto, Eduardo Cunha, el presidente de la cámara baja federal, del nominalmente aliado del gobierno Partido do Movimento Democrático Brasileiro (PMDB), continúa usando su posición para hacerle la vida difícil al ejecutivo. Se espera ampliamente que Cunha tendrá que afrontar un escrutinio a fondo en las siguientes fases de la ‘Operação Lava Jato’, la investigación sobre el esquema de corrupción descubierto en compañía petrolera estatal, Petrobrás, e incluso que podría ser suspendido de su posición; pero al parecer él buscara caer peleando. Doce pedidos de juicio político contra la Presidenta Rousseff están actualmente ante la cámara baja. Si el tribunal de cuentas federal (TCU) rechaza las cuentas fiscales del gobierno más tarde este mes, se espera que Cunha presente un proyecto de ley para iniciar los procedimientos del juicio político.

Durante el fin de semana (8-9 agosto), Rousseff decidió sobre un plan para negociar esta semana uno a uno con los líderes de todos los aliados en su coalición, en un esfuerzo por evitar más deserciones. Los ayudantes de Rousseff también están trabajando para apuntalar una base leal de al menos 200 diputados federales, quienes bloquearían cualquier intento de juicio político. Los votos de al menos dos tercios de los 513 diputados en la cámara baja federal se necesitarían para aprobar una moción de juicio político.

En otro intento, Rousseff también trata de llegar al senado federal, donde su apoyo es de alguna manera más sólido. El 10 de agosto, ella invitó a más de 40 senadores a cenar en el palacio presidencial de Planalto y les recordó su rol constitucional como un “poder moderador”. Ella describió las ‘bombas fiscales’ presentadas por Cunha, como medidas “no sólo contra el gobierno, sino contra Brasil”.

Después de meses de alejamiento Rousseff también está tratando de atraer a Renan Calheiros, el presidente del senado, quien acusó al gobierno de estar detrás de la decisión de poner su nombre en la lista de políticos en servicio a ser investigados por el procurador general, Rodrigo Janot, por el escándalo en Petrobrás. Calheiros ha estado trabajando sobre un paquete de reformas que podrían ayudar a restaurar el crecimiento de la economía brasilera. Rousseff ha recibido las ideas con entusiasmo. Pero el 11 de agosto, Cunha advirtió que él no sería dejado de lado tan fácilmente. “De acuerdo con la constitución, vivimos en un sistema bicameral […] Ambas cámaras tienen que trabajar y aprobar los proyectos de ley”, él dijo.

• La muerte de un ‘Playboy’

El 8 de agosto Celso Pinheiro Pimenta, un traficante de drogas más conocido como ‘Playboy’, fue muerto a tiros por la policía en el Morro da Pedreira, en la zona norte de la ciudad de Rio de Janeiro. ‘Playboy’ era el criminal más buscado en el estado del mismo nombre, con una recompensa de R$50.000 (US$14.500) ofrecida por información que conduzca a su captura. Sentenciado a 15 años en prisión por tráfico de drogas y homicidio calificado, él fue liberado de la prisión en Rondônia en el 2009, con una licencia de siete días por razones humanitarias y retornó a Rio para reanudar sus actividades criminales.

*** KAMLA’S DOMINANCE OF T&T OPPOSITION REINFORCED. Despite having led the People’s Partnership (PP) alliance to defeat in the 7 September Trinidad & Tobago general election, former prime minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar (2010-2015) maintains her ascendancy over the United National Congress (UNC), the main component of the PP. The People’s National Movement (PNM) defeated the PP by 23 seats to 18 after Kamla had waited until the last possible moment to call an election.

Following its electoral defeat, the UNC held internal elections in early December in which Persad-Bissessar was challenged for the leadership of the party by Roodal Moonilal, the former minister of housing and urban development and the Leader of Government Business in the lower house, and by Vasant Bharath, the former minister of trade, industry, investment, and communications. Neither made any significant dent in the former prime minister’s support. In the 5 December leadership election, Persad-Bissessar secured 15,477 votes against Moonilal’s 1,466 and just 1,102 for Bharath.

Having secured her domestic flank, the former prime minister now has to re-establish herself as an effective leader of the opposition, and in this she is likely to be helped by the economic cycle, in particular by the collapse in oil and gas prices. In the week following Persad-Bissessar’s triumph over her UNC challengers, natural gas prices fell to US$1.894 per MMBtu (British thermal units in millions), their lowest level since September 2001 and well below the budget figure of US$2.75 per MMBtu. In the same week, the price of West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude oil fell to below US$35 a barrel against an original 2015 budget figure of US$80 per barrel. In June 2014, the price of WTI was US$106 per barrel. The T&T energy sector has contributed on average 40% of gross domestic product (GDP) growth since 2008.

In an address to the nation at the turn of the year, Prime Minister Keith Rowley emphasized the difficulties caused by the collapse in oil and gas prices, as well as pointing out that oil production had fallen from 90,000 barrels per day in 2010 to 80,000 barrels per day in 2015. He said that there was no alternative but for the government to borrow more and that, added to the last five years, “this would mean ten years of heavy deficit spending and explosive growth in the national debt burden.”

Persad-Bissessar’s response was to say that Rowley had done nothing more than “exacerbate anxiety and instability” with his speech and that he had “no understanding or idea of how to manage the present economic challenges”. This is clearly the ground over which the political battle will be fought for the foreseeable future. Persad-Bissessar said: “The private sector needs to know what the government’s development agenda and plans are if they are to align their strategic plan to the direction intended by the state.”

*** GUYANA REBUILDS ARMY RESERVE. Guyana’s new APNU (A Partnership for National Unity) government under Prime Minister David Granger, a retired army brigadier, has responded to Venezuela’s renewed territorial claims by reactivating the Guyana People’s Militia (GPM) and recruiting 1,500 reservists.

*** SKN FISCAL PROSPECTS BOOSTED BY CITIZENSHIP PROGRAMME. St Kitts & Nevis’s Prime Minister Timothy Harris told parliament on 15 December that revenue from SKN’s citizenship by investment (CBI) programme would surpass the 2015 budget by 42.3%, helping to boost the recurrent account surplus to EC$222.1m (US$82m), 16% above budget. When in opposition, Dr Harris’ Team Unity had dismissed the CBI as a “slush fund” at the disposal of former prime minister Denzil Douglas (1995-2015).

Residents in at least 40 cities across Mexico took to the streets to stage events, marches, and workshops as part of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women held on 25 November.

Though violence against women manifests itself in many forms, including psychological and emotional abuse, extreme violence against women remains an endemic problem in many Mexican states. The incidence of ‘femicide’ – the killing of females for no other apparent reason than their sex – has almost doubled within the last ten years according to a 2015 report from Mexico’s national statistics institute (Inegi). Moreover, in the last two years, an average of six women were murdered per day on account of their sex, Inegi found. Femicides are also the biggest cause of death in Mexico for women between 15-29.

However, these statistics barely scratch the surface of the extent of the violent crimes committed against women in Mexico. Femicide is notoriously underreported and the aforementioned figures do not include some 7,435 women who went ‘missing’ last year, according to a 2015 report by international human-rights NGO Amnesty International. Indeed, lack of precise and up-to-date statistical data collected by the state about the issue makes it difficult to pin down an exact figure.

President Enrique Peña Nieto called for an end to the violence against women in a national address making the International Day Elimination of Violence against Women. He asked women to “not be victims of violence” and to come forward and report abuse. Equally, he ordered men who “cross the line” to hand themselves over to the authorities. “Whoever refuses to report these crimes and are witnesses become complicit in the violence we are trying to eradicate”, he stressed. Peña Nieto’s comments relate to the social stigma against victims of gender violence which may prevent them from reporting abuse in the earlier stages.

While the need for victims to speak out is important, many human-rights campaigners have called for the state to redouble its efforts to prevent gender violence. In theory, Mexican women can seek legal protection from discrimination based on their sex under the 2007 general law on women’s access to a life free from violence – a piece of legislation drawn up following the recommendations of the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), which purports to sanction all forms of violence against women including domestic, economic, psychological, social, and institutional abuse. In practice, however, a lack of enforcement has rendered this legislation ineffective. Though it is difficult to source up-to-date statistics on the topic, a report by the Observatorio Nacional Ciudadano del Femicidio, a local NGO, found that of 613 men accused of femicide, only 1.6% received a sentence in 2012-2013, pointing to widespread impunity for gender-based crimes.

In Mexico City, public measures to protect women from violent crimes have also fallen flat. In April, Mexico City launched a 100-day initiative to crack down on violent crimes committed against women. Promoted by the federal interior minister, Miguel Angel Osorio Chong, the initiative was designed to reduce incidences of violence in public places including on public transport. However, a joint report published on 24 November by women’s rights groups found the initiative to be woefully inadequate. For example, the government gave out whistles so women could alert the authorities about potential abuse but only supplied 115,000 whistles in a city which houses over 9m inhabitants. More worryingly, the report found that both the police and the authorities had not been trained about how to react if a woman reported abuse. Feminists and human-rights groups have called upon the government to come up with more strategic way to address the problem of gender violence and spurned the previous initiative for being “poorly planned, poorly executed” and ineffective.

• Puebla proposes female-only transport

A state deputy for the Partido Verde Ecologista de México (PVEM) in Mexico’s south-eastern state of Puebla, Geraldine González Cervantes, has drawn up a new initiative designed to cut down on sexual violence in public spaces. The bill, called ‘Transporte Rosa’ (‘pink transport’), will offer exclusive public transport services for women and children under 13 years old. A similar initiative called ‘Pink Taxis’ was implemented in 2009 but was scrapped after a year amid rumours that some of the men driving the taxis had allegedly been exploiting the women they were chauffeuring.

Brazil’s central bank held its benchmark interest rate unchanged on 6 February and signalled that congress needs to pass austerity measures before borrowing costs can fall. The bank board, led by its president, Ilan Goldfajn, kept the Selic rate at 6.50 percent for a seventh straight meeting. This was likely the last rate decision under Goldfajn, as the senate is expected to approve President Jair Bolsonaro’s nominated successor later this month.

In the statement accompanying the decision, the members of Copom – the bank’s monetary policy board – considered that “inflationary risks have moderated” since their last meeting, but they stressed that the “frustration of expectations regarding the continuation of reforms” could trigger price pressures. In the minutes to the decision, published a week later, Copom members pointed out that “an acceleration in the pace of the economic recovery will depend on the decrease in uncertainties regarding the approval and implementation of reforms – notably those of fiscal nature – and adjustment in Brazil’s economy”.

The newly elected speakers of both houses in congress have expressed support for a proposal to cut pension spending that are the heart of Brazil’s budget woes.

Brazil’s pension expenditures are already high compared with other countries, and a rapidly aging population makes the current system a ticking time bomb. Brazil spends the equivalent of 13 percent of gross domestic product on social security, well above the average of eight percent for G-20 nations, according to a government report published in December. Yet it is far from clear if and when the government can muster the necessary majority in congress to approve the constitutional amendment.

Chief of Staff Onyx Lorenzoni said in early-February that the economy could see sustainable growth of three percent if the government’s reform agenda is passed. Still, a lower-house lawmaker later said getting the necessary votes will not be easy, as the administration needs to build a coalition of support in a fractious congress.

Economists recently switched their forecasts from an increase to a hold of the Selic rate as inflation came in below expectations and the labour market weakened. In addition, emerging market jitters had eased, and investors had become more optimistic with the Bolsonaro administration’s market-friendly discourse. Swap futures also show traders are already pricing in a mild bias toward a cut.

Since at least 1996, when the country’s current monetary policy board was created, no incoming bank governor has ever cut the benchmark Selic in his first meeting. Roberto Campos Neto, nominated to replace Goldfajn, may be no exception. He is expected to receive senate confirmation and assume his post before the bank’s next monetary policy meeting in March.

Who is Campos Neto?

Campos Neto is the grandson of Roberto Campos, a controversial economist, diplomat, writer, and politician who enjoyed sprinkling his conversation with dry witticisms, helped mould Brazil’s economic liberalism in the 1950s and 1960s, and as Brazil’s planning minister signed the decree that created the central bank in 1964.

The central bank presidency will be Campos Neto’s first public-service role. In his private sector experience, he has accumulated a deep understanding of international investors. Much of that experience comes from his work at Santander Americas’ treasury business, which had offices in the US, Mexico, Chile, Peru, Brazil, and Argentina. Campos Neto also oversaw the market-making business at the bank, a job that introduced him to dozens of fund managers and company executives looking to invest in Brazil.

• Fiscal crisis

Six states have declared a fiscal crisis, citing a lack of control by previous governments. Minas Gerais, Rio Grande do Sul, Goias, Alagoas, Mato Grosso do Sul, and Para have asked the STF for authorisation to reduce salaries and/or the work week of state employees to reduce the latter to 60% of state expenditures. 

Brazilian politics has remained volatile and confrontational over the last month, and there are signs that, along with other factors, this is dampening down the pace of the country’s economic recovery.

Relations between Brazil’s three powers – judiciary, legislature, and presidency – remain hostile. Large demonstrations in support of right-wing President Jair Bolsonaro were held on 7 September amid threats of an attack on the supreme court (which did not materialise). The president has become increasingly unpopular, and counterdemonstrations are also being organised. The business community often downplays the impact of politics and focuses instead on encouraging signs of recovery, but it has become increasingly difficult to keep the two things separate. Economy Minister Paulo Guedes admitted as much on 20 August, when he said the political crisis was overshadowing positive news on growth and a hoped-for reduction in the fiscal deficit next year. “There is much political noise – it is understandable, but it has to be reduced”, he said. Guedes predicted that despite political uncertainty the primary deficit would drop from 1.7% of GDP this year to 0.3% in 2022, and he forecast a surplus in 2023.

There is however evidence that the recovery is faltering not just due to the political chaos, but also other factors such as a drought. The latest figures show that second quarter GDP unexpectedly fell 0.1% on a quarter-on-quarter basis (due to low baseline effects the year-on-year change was +12.4%). Alberto Ramos of Goldman Sachs told Bloomberg the numbers were “disappointing” and “show that the underlying growth in Brazil is still very weak”. As a result, he said, he was cutting his full year growth forecast down to 4.9% from 5.4% previously. Economists are now predicting a further slowdown in 2022, perhaps to only 1%-2%. 

The slower pace of growth is attributed to the impact of the drought, which has lowered water levels in hydroelectric plants, increasing energy prices, and to higher interest rates as the central bank tightens monetary policy to counteract a surge in inflation. Investors are also concerned that consumption levels are still too dependent on unsustainable coronavirus (Covid-19) stimulus measures.  Marcelo Fonseca, an economist at asset manager Opportunity Total, told the Financial Times that Brazil was experiencing a “triple whammy” of inflation, high interest rates, and uncertainty.        

MEXICO | Second quarterly GDP contraction. Mexico’s economy contracted by 0.1% in the final quarter of 2021, compared with the previous quarter, the national statistics institute (Inegi) announced this week. The economy also contracted by 0.4% in the third quarter on the second quarter.

Mexico’s second consecutive quarterly GDP contraction prompted some analysts to suggest the country had entered a technical recession. In response, Jonathan Heath, the deputy governor of Mexico’s central bank Banco de México (Banxico), tweeted that this was a “simplification” of the definition of a recession.

“If there are two quarters in a row with negative GDP, it increases the possibility that there is a recession, but that is not enough by itself,” Heath said. “A recession has to comply with three requirements: depth [significance of contraction], duration [length of contraction], and spread [of contraction across sectors]. For now, we comply only with duration,” he added.

President Andrés Manuel López Obrador also waded into the issue himself on 2 February. “The economy is growing. There cannot be a recession if in the month of January more jobs were created than nearly any month in the last 20 years,” he said in his morning press conference. “What recession?” He confidently predicted that the economy would grow by 5% this year (and indeed the following two), not for the first time putting him out of step with Banxico which forecast growth of just 2.27% for 2022, less than half his bold prediction.

López Obrador went on to contend that “it is not enough just to look at the growth figure, we also have to take well-being into account”, something he said had been neglected during “36 years of neoliberal governments”.

According to Inegi estimates, the final quarter results mean that GDP growth for 2021 will total 4.8%, below the 6.3% growth that the finance ministry (SHCP) had projected. López Obrador claimed that this target had only been missed because of the appearance of the omicron variant of the coronavirus (Covid-19).

MEXICO | Pemex ups production. Mexico’s state-owned oil company, Petróleos Mexicanos (Pemex), has published 2021 production figures, which put crude oil production at 1.757m barrels per day (bpd), an increase of 2.9% on the 1.705m bpd produced in 2020 and a record high during the administration of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.

The 2021 figures are just above the 1.756m bpd target set by Pemex CEO Octavio Romero Oropeza in December last year, but far below the original 1.944m bpd target set in January 2021.

Romero has estimated that Pemex production will reach 2m bpd by 2024, at the end of López Obrador’s term.

Brazil has entered the pre-electoral window for political realignments ahead of the October general election, while other deadlines in the electoral calendar loom in the next two months. A slightly different political landscape will therefore emerge as electoral alliances are hashed out and parties’ representation in congress shifts.

The window for pre-electoral political realignments opened on 3 March and will last until 1 April. This means that elected lawmakers are currently free to change political parties, a process which is complicated to do without losing their electoral mandate the rest of the time. Anyone planning to run for office – whether legislative or executive – must be affiliated with the party they plan to represent by the beginning of April.

The past fortnight has seen a shift in favour of the Partido Liberal (PL), the party President Jair Bolsonaro joined last year, to the detriment of União Brasil (UB), a new right-of-centre party that was formed last October from the merger of the Democratas (DEM) and the Partido Social Liberal (PSL). UB became the most represented party in the chamber of deputies after its recognition by the supreme electoral court (TSE) in February, with 81 affiliated deputies. However, it has already lost at least 16 of these, almost all to the PL.

This is because Bolsonaro was elected on the PSL ticket in 2018 but broke with the party a year later; the party has since remained split between PSL loyalists on the one hand, and the ‘bolsonarista’ members who were prevented from disaffiliating themselves for risk of losing their mandate on the other. The latter are now making the most of the electoral realignment window to follow Bolsonaro to the PL, which has already become the most represented party in the chamber. Meanwhile, UB hopes to keep around 50 deputies, which would make it the third largest party in the 513-member chamber behind the PL and the leftist Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT).

Party federations

A small electoral reform passed last year created the concept of ‘party federations’ – which allows two or more parties to join forces and function as one, for example sharing electoral lists in legislative elections (which are proportional), but without formally merging. Critics say that this essentially reinstates the coalition lists which were banned in a 2017 electoral reform in a bid to reduce party fragmentation (this year will be the first general election that this rule is effective).

But unlike coalition lists, which were opportunistic electoral alliances sealed at a local level and did not last beyond the elections, parties which join forces as a federation must remain allied for the duration of the four-year term; and the alliance must be in place at a national level. Joining forces as a federation will allow smaller parties to meet the requirements of the so-called ‘barrier clause’, a law which limits the distribution of public electoral funding and advertising airtime to parties which received a minimum of 1.5% of the valid vote in the last legislative elections. Parties have until 31 May to register as a federation.

Brazil’s first federation is likely to be between the centre-left environmental party Rede Sustentabilidade (Rede) and the left-wing Partido Socialismo e Liberdade (PSOL). Rede voted in favour of entering into a federation with the PSOL on 12 March; the left-wing party must still approve the alliance. It is not yet clear whether the Rede-PSOL federation would field its own presidential candidate or support former president Lula da Silva (2003-2011) of the PT.

Cabinet reshuffle looms

Another upcoming electoral deadline is 2 April, the date by which government ministers must step down if they plan to run for electoral office this year. On 10 March, President Bolsonaro said that nine of his 23 cabinet ministers will be leaving government to run for federal deputy, senator, or state governor positions. These will include some important ministerial portfolios such as agriculture and regional development. A big cabinet reshuffle therefore looms, although Bolsonaro has yet to give any indication of who will be appointed to fill the vacant ministerial posts.

A six-week power struggle in Ecuador’s legislature intensified this week, with the president of the national assembly, Guadalupe Llori of the indigenous Pachakutik (PK) party, securing a judicial order preventing deputies from forming an ‘ad hoc’ commission to investigate her alleged failures of leadership. The judicial order came as parties aligned with President Guillermo Lasso, which for weeks had sought to remain above the fray, appeared to be leaning towards supporting an investigation of Llori and the administrative council (CAL) over which she presides.

Since 24 February, Llori has sought to obstruct the formation of a commission, sought by the left-wing opposition coalition Unión por la Esperanza (Unes) and the centre-right opposition Partido Social Cristiano (PSC), that would investigate her actions as congressional president. Specifically, these opposition parties have voiced concern at Llori’s decisions as head of the CAL, which vets legislation before it can proceed to a plenary vote.

Unes and the PSC argue that Llori has abused her authority by repeatedly altering the legislative schedule to prevent motions criticising her leadership from being debated in the legislature. On 24 February, Llori suspended a legislative session in which Unes, PSC, and six PK rebels (since expelled from the party) planned to submit a resolution to form a commission tasked with evaluating her leadership. Six weeks later, that session has yet to be resumed.

With the resolution still gathering dust in the CAL, Unes and the PSC have changed tack, seeking instead to form an ‘ad hoc’ commission without legislative approval. They have also sought to ‘self-convene’ a legislative session to debate the resolution without Llori’s authorisation, which deputies are able to do with the backing of two-thirds of the national assembly’s 130 deputies. They are currently around 10 signatures short of that threshold, though appear close to gaining the support of government-aligned parties which until recently have remained neutral. On 4 April, the parliamentary coordinator of Lasso’s conservative Movimiento Creo (MC), Juan Fernando Flores, said that he would support the formation of an ad hoc commission comprising the leaders of the five main legislative blocs (Unes, PK, PSC, MC, and the centre-left Izquierda Democrática [ID]).

Llori’s opponents received a setback on 5 April when a Quito judge ruled that the formation of an ad hoc commission is illegal, in response to a claim filed by Llori the previous day. The judge ordered deputies to “abstain from announcing, debating and voting upon the proposed resolution in the national assembly for the creation of multiparty ad hoc commission for the investigation of the CAL.” That ruling is likely to be appealed, with the PSC and Unes accusing the judge of overstepping his mandate and violating the separation of powers.

Lasso himself has endeavoured not to be drawn into the dispute, likely wary of further damaging a relationship with the legislature that has plumbed new depths since the rejection of his investment bill on 24 March [WR-22-13]. The government’s relationship with Llori has been poor, and Lasso has previously sparred with the CAL over its rejection of his omnibus tax and labour reform bill last September [WR-21-39]. However, Lasso could find himself in an even more disadvantageous position should Unes succeed in taking the congressional presidency after ousting Llori, with Unes having acted in lockstep opposition to the government’s agenda, compared with PK’s divided stance on a number of key issues.

Pachakutik-Conaie tensions

PK’s expulsion of the six rebels, announced in a 1 April statement that accused them of “having their own agendas and destabilising objectives”, has triggered a rift with the party’s powerful civil society branch, the Confederación de las Nacionalidades Indígenas del Ecuador (Conaie). Conaie, which has previously accused Llori of leading PK into collaboration with Lasso, insisted in a statement that the party cannot be home to “authoritarianism, arrogance, or caudillos.” Conaie accused Llori and other figures in PK of “co-opting our organisational processes and our historic struggle in order to benefit themselves, revealing a clear pact with Guillermo Lasso’s right-wing government.”

On 20 February the Council of the European Union (EU) removed The Bahamas, Belize, and the Turks & Caicos Islands (TCI) from its list of non-cooperative jurisdictions for tax purposes. The decision is seen as good news for all three jurisdictions; however, four others in the Caribbean (Anguilla, Antigua & Barbuda, Trinidad & Tobago, and the US Virgin Islands) are still considered by the EU to be “non-cooperative”.

The EU list of non-cooperative jurisdictions for tax purposes was first established in December 2017 as part of an effort to “promote good tax governance worldwide”. Twice a year, usually in February and October, jurisdictions are assessed against criteria such as transparency, fair taxation, and adherence to international standards designed to prevent tax base erosion and profit-shifting. They are also assessed in the light of recommendations from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)’s Forum on Harmful Tax Practices (FHTP).

In the case of The Bahamas and TCI, poor enforcement of “economic substance requirements” had been an issue. This is the criteria that jurisdictions should not allow the setting up of shell companies – offshore structures aimed at attracting profits and holding assets – that do not reflect some level of real activity in their territory. The two countries appear to have benefited from an FHTP decision to change this from a ‘hard’ to a ‘soft’ recommendation for jurisdictions that have no, or purely nominal, corporate income tax. This was enough to take them off the “non-cooperative” list.

Belize on the other hand had been placed on the list in October 2023 after a negative OECD assessment regarding its commitment to exchanging information upon request. As a result of changes in applicable rules, however, the jurisdiction has been taken back off the non-cooperative list awaiting a supplementary review, to be undertaken in the near future.

In fact, the EU maintains two lists. Annex I is the full list of non-cooperative jurisdictions, which now number 12 worldwide, of which four are in the Caribbean. But it also publishes what is called a “state of play” list (Annex II) of “countries which cooperate with the EU and have pending commitments”. The latest Annex II praises Aruba for fulfilling all its pending commitments on the automatic exchange of financial account information. It also praises Dominica for improving its exchange of information on request.

As for the four non-cooperative Caribbean jurisdictions, an EU statement invited them “to improve their legal framework in order to resolve the identified issues.” Without giving further details, it said that the group included countries that had not engaged in a constructive dialogue and those that had failed to deliver on their reform commitments.

IMF praise for The Bahamas

The executive board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) announced on 2 February that it had concluded its Article IV consultation with The Bahamas, noting that “the economy is in the midst of a solid expansion, with signs of continuing strength across sectors”. The IMF estimated GDP growth of 4.3% in 2023, and also highlighted falling unemployment and inflation. However, it advised the Bahamian government to increase its fiscal buffer to mitigate against “an economic slowdown in tourism source markets and the potential for costly natural disasters”.

Jorge ‘Tuto’ Quiroga accused his rival in the upcoming second round of presidential elections in Bolivia, Rodrigo Paz, of “manipulating hatred and selling fear, nothing else” this week. Quiroga, a former interim president (2001-2002), was responding to the latest development in an aggressive run-off campaign, which has seen his running mate, Juan Pablo Velasco, come under fire for racist comments in social media posts dating back more than a decade. Velasco denies having posted the comments and claims he has been framed.

Paz won 32.1% of the vote in the first round of presidential elections on 17 August to 26.7% for Quiroga. Campaigning ahead of the second round on 19 October has been increasingly acrimonious with both candidates conscious that this might be their only chance to take advantage of the absence of the ruling left-wing Movimiento al Socialismo (MAS), the dominant political force of the last two decades which blew out in the first round after succumbing to bitter infighting.

Quiroga accused the MAS government and Paz’s centre-right Partido Demócrata Cristiano (PDC) of mudslinging after the publication of social media posts dating back to 2010 on an account linked to Velasco (since deleted) making pejorative and racist comments about indigenous Bolivians living in the west of the country. Velasco claims the account was hacked. While campaigning in the municipality of Viacha in the department of La Paz, Paz said he would condemn “racist aggression whatever its source” in a clear allusion to the posts. “Anyone who is racist is not Bolivian because it shows disdain for [the country’s] cultural diversity,” Paz added. The PDC has urged the supreme electoral tribunal (TSE) to investigate the social media posts.

Paz is keen to capitalise on the controversy to persuade voters in western departments of the country to vote for him in the run-off, , especially disgruntled supporters of the MAS, for instance, a large constituency that could carry him over the line. Traditional MAS supporters were already more likely to be predisposed to back Paz than Quiroga, an inveterate critic running for the more right-wing Libre party, although Paz will be keen to win over many that might be preparing to cast blank or void ballots to express their disillusionment with the electoral process.

Arce heaps blame on Morales

President Luis Arce laid the blame for the electoral defeat suffered by the MAS squarely at the door of Evo Morales in an interview with the Brazilian daily Folha de S Paulo published on 30 September. “We were divided by the ambition of Evo Morales, who always wanted to be a [presidential] candidate despite knowing that, constitutionally, he could not be,” Arce said in the interview which was conducted days earlier on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly.

Arce said Morales had “discredited, attacked, and slandered” his government. He accused Morales of having negotiated with the right-wing opposition in the legislative assembly to block the approval of key initiatives, especially economic, to sabotage his government, notably contracts that had been signed with Chinese and Russian companies to industrialise Bolivia’s lithium with an investment of US$2bn. Arce said this resulted in the Bolivian people suffering the consequences of “financial strangulation that the right promoted in a blood pact with Evismo in the legislative assembly”.

Arce maintained that Morales had miscalculated, saying that he thought that “with this logic of subverting the government he would be the candidate that everyone wanted, but he was wrong as the electoral results showed that, divided, we lost everything”. Arce said that whoever wins out of Paz and Quiroga would pursue a neoliberal economic programme to the detriment of the majority of Bolivia’s population. Both Paz and Quiroga insist that they will rescue the country after two decades of MAS misrule.

Aggressive campaigning

Earlier this month Jorge Quiroga and Rodrigo Paz signed an ‘accord for democracy’ to put an end to ‘dirty’ campaigning but the trading of insults and accusations has not abated. Falsehoods and slander have been amplified by social media in an unedifying negative campaign focused on destroying the image of the opponent rather than setting out a positive vision to transform the country.  

President Fernando Lugo will not be able to seek re-election in 2013 – even if he wants to. The senate last week rejected a petition presented to congress on 26 June by Lugo’s Frente Guasú party calling for a referendum on a constitutional reform to introduce presidential re-election. The petition contained 100,000 signatures (more than three times the amount required under the constitution). Lugo has reiterated on several occasions that he had no desire to run for a second term in office, but the opposition was deeply suspicious of his intentions.

Somewhat surprisingly, the motion to vote on the petition came from an opposition senator. A fairly heated debate ensued, with senators from the opposition Partido Colorado hyperbolically comparing Lugo with former dictator Alfredo Stroessner (1954-1989), who amended the constitution in order to stay in the post indefinitely. The petition was then emphatically rejected by 31 of the 34 senators present in the 45-seat senate. Senator Carlos Filizzola, a member of Frente Guasú, accused opposition senators of turning their backs on the people. He and his colleague Sixto Pereira left the building in protest.

Vice-president Federico Franco, who belongs to a faction within the nominally allied Partido Liberal Radical Auténtico (PLRA), which is openly critical of Lugo, accused the Frente Guasú of looking to follow the lead set by Venezuela’s President Hugo Chávez. This is a familiar cry from Lugo’s opponents, who have sought to constrain the President and blocked his more populist reforms out of suspicion of his “real agenda”, some of them accusing him of pursuing a personalist agenda that is “absolutely anti-democratic”. Paraguay’s congress is virulently anti-Chavista, and is adamantly refusing to approve Venezuela’s application to become a fully fledged member of Mercosur.

The country’s traditional parties, especially the Colorados, have also been hostile to any attempt to increase instruments allowing for greater participative democracy in Paraguay, which Lugo has been advocating since coming to power. Their hostility owes to the fact that a move away from the current system of representative democracy would naturally erode their own power. The Frente Guasú has everything to gain because it enjoys little congressional representation.

The vote scuppers the hopes of the left-wing parties grouped within Frente Guasú of winning more congressional seats in 2013 on the coattails of a Lugo re-election campaign. It could also sound the death knell for the ruling Alianza Patriótica para el Cambio (APC) coalition, as Frente Guasú is very unlikely to throw its weight behind any candidate put forward by the PLRA.

Officially the PLRA is no longer part of the APC after voting in a recent convention to pull out because Lugo had rewarded the party with insufficient cabinet ministries. The PLRA party president, Blas Llano, a Lugo supporter who nonetheless failed to throw his weight behind the re-election proposal because of fierce opposition to it within his party, said he believed the APC to be alive still if not kicking, adding that the PLRA would continue to seek more space within the government.

Intriguingly, Llano said the PLRA was committed to forging a broader coalition, Alianza de la Nueva Mayoría del Paraguay, which the Frente Guasú was welcome to join. Feelers have been sent out to the Unión Nacional de Ciudadanos Éticos (Unace), the party of retired General Lino Oviedo, for whom political scruples are thoroughly subordinated to the quest for power.

• Copa América
  

President Lugo celebrated Paraguay’s triumph on penalties over the mighty Brazil on 17 July in the quarter finals of the Copa América regional football tournament. On 20 July Paraguay played Venezuela, whose performances President Hugo Chávez has been following closely on Twitter during his convalescence, in the semis. The full time draw was resolved in Paraguay’s favour in a tense 5-3 penalty shoot-out.

Development: On 30 January Chile’s President Sebastián Piñera signed a bill proposing the creation of a new under-secretariat for human rights at the justice ministry.

Significance: The Piñera administration is struggling to regain the political initiative. Following opposition from within the ruling coalition itself, the executive has been unable to move on a highly anticipated reform to the binomial political system. It seems to be trying to make up for that disappointment by acting more decisively on other fronts. The decision to submit the new bill comes after the ministry of education was forced to recant a controversial proposal to describe on the national curriculum the Pinochet era (1973-1990) as a military regime, rather than a dictatorship.

Key points:

• According to Piñera, the new body will handle all human rights complaints made against Chile in international tribunals and will be expected to collaborate with public and private human rights institutions. Since the return to democracy in 1990, Chile has not had an official human rights authority. Upon signing the bill, Piñera declared, “It is something we owe to all those that suffered grave and unjustifiable violations to their human rights in the past”.

• Under the bill, the justice ministry would become ‘the ministry of justice and human rights’. The bill also envisages a new inter-ministerial committee on human rights. 

• An investigation in Chile’s state-run medical service (SML) by ArchivosChile, an investigative group from the Universidad de Chile, has documented a further 150 potential cases of victims of human rights violations during the military dictatorship (1973-1990), 84 of which refer to individuals with no identification. According to the findings, Chile’s military prosecution service took jurisdiction of 90% of all cases of what it termed victims of political repression. Researcher Pascale Bonnefoy explained that in the majority of these cases, the cause of death was described as “bullet wounds”.  He added that the official military report claimed 118 of these victims were found “on the street”.

• The Rettig commission, which looked into disappearances and execution cases following the end of the dictatorship between 1991 and 1992, found 3,195 cases. The commission was reopened in February 2010 after further cases were brought to its attention. Since then, 30 more disappearances and executions have been identified, in addition to 9,765 torture cases.

He was once known as Colombia’s high commissioner for peace; overnight, however, Luis Carlos Restrepo has become one of Colombia’s most famous fugitives. His notoriety is not so much the result of the gravity of his crimes - many guerrilla and paramilitary leaders have committed much more atrocious ones - but for the political implications that his prosecution and his subsequent decision to flee have had, and will continue to have, in the short-term.

It has been clear for some time now that former President Alvaro Uribe (2002-2010) and many of those who were members of his administrations now constitute the strongest source of opposition to President Juan Manuel Santos. The problem is that by declaring themselves as being politically persecuted through the courts, alleging there are no judicial guarantees in Colombia, they are providing a defence for the same criminals they were once so intent on apprehending.

If there were in fact no guarantees for the so-called Uribistas, then the leaders of the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Farc) and other guerrilla or paramilitary groups could also claim that they are not being tried for their actions but for their ideological convictions. Uribe always sought to get around this when he was in office by accusing Colombia’s judiciary, and the supreme court in particular, of practising ‘selective justice’ by going after Uribista politicians, for instance, with ties to paramilitaries rather than politicians with ties to guerrillas. There are growing doubts since he left power, however, about his security legacy, and the true extent of his accomplishments.

In recent months Restrepo has failed to attend at least eight formal legal proceedings, including two relating to accusations he had levied against the attorney general (AG)’s husband. Restrepo has yet to respond to his alleged role in the organisation of fake demobilisations in 2006 (see the March 2011 edition of our sister publication the Andean Report [RA-11-03]) and he is now at large in relation to this case. The AG has also filed for contumacy, the wilful contempt of the order or summons of a court, meaning that Restrepo could be prosecuted in absentia.

On 9 February the local immigration authorities confirmed that Restrepo had left the country and, although he is believed to have flown to New York, that is unlikely to have been his final destination if he is seeking to evade prosecution. Colombia has deported dozens of criminals to face justice in the US, including top paramilitary leaders who refused to testify about the crimes they had committed as part of the demobilisation process led by Restrepo (2005-2006). The US government would likely comply with any extradition order filed by Colombia for Restrepo so as to avoid jeopardising the future extradition of other criminals wanted by the US and also to signal faith in the institutional integrity of the Colombian judiciary.

Seeking asylum elsewhere would not be an original alternative to facing the courts at home; two other members of the Uribe administration have already resorted to this: 1) the former director of the intelligence service (DAS), María del Pilar Hurtado (2007-2008), who fled to Panama; and 2) former interior minister Sabas Pretel de la Vega (2003-2006), who tried his luck with Costa Rica but was denied safe haven.

However, Restrepo broke all previous moulds by sending a USB, which contained an open letter sent “from hiding” to the think tank Primero Colombia, closely associated with Uribe; the strategy appears to be more in line with the communication techniques employed by the Farc than with the man formerly in charge of securing the demobilisation of this and other illegal armed groups.

Restrepo’s letter states that the Partido de la U (PU) must “recognise that Uribismo made a mistake when choosing Santos. In 2010 the elections were won, but the government was lost”. Restrepo then goes on to call for the launch of a campaign against Santos’s re-election, which the president himself has repeatedly declared he will not seek, and to start “an open process in order to find three candidates for 2014: a) a presidential candidate; b) a head of the senatorial list; c) a head of the list for a national constituent assembly” (see sidebar).

• A bespoke constitutional reform

Luis Carlos Restrepo’s letter also says that the constituent assembly should deal with “a reform of the justice [system] to give legal guarantees to the members of the public forces and end the merry-go-round of pensions and corruption in the tribunals and courts” – suggesting implicitly that the current legal proceedings against him are nothing more than political persecution led by corrupt judges on the payroll of the criminals, a theory advanced many times by former president Uribe.