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Mexico’s two main left-wing political parties have announced leadership appointments to gear up for the 12 gubernatorial elections due in June 2016 and the next presidential elections in 2018. It came as no surprise that the Movimiento Regeneración Nacional (Morena) elected its founder, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, as party president for the period 2015-2018 on 21 November. By far the more intriguing appointment was that of Agustín Basave two weeks earlier as the new president of the main left-wing party, Partido de la Revolución Democrática (PRD). Basave, a political analyst with a doctorate in political science from Oxford University, is not a party stalwart. His main challenge will be unifying and revitalising the PRD and resisting the encroachments of Morena.

López Obrador, who was unchallenged, thanked the party delegates who confirmed his election at Morena’s second national congress. He said he would “create a solid organisational structure to win in 2018”. The fact that López Obrador immediately focused on the more distant presidential elections rather than the gubernatorial contests confirmed the view that Morena is his personalist project. Basave, who achieved the notable feat of being elected in internal elections with near-unanimous support from the fissiparous PRD, placed his focus on recovering the party’s ethical and ideological credibility; forging a new identity with which the public can identify; re-establishing the party as an opposition force; and fighting to defend the rights of poor and marginalised Mexicans.

It was López Obrador’s departure from the PRD shortly after the 2012 presidential elections to set up Morena that precipitated the PRD’s political difficulties. Shortly afterwards, the PRD party leadership grasped the opportunity to play a role in reshaping Mexico by accepting President Enrique Peña Nieto’s invitation to participate in the cross-party alliance ‘Pacto por México’ to push through Peña Nieto’s overarching reform agenda.

The PRD then became embroiled in an identity crisis, with a succession of attacks by senior figures and mass desertions to Morena. When Carlos Navarrete was sworn-in as PRD party president on 5 October last year to steady the ship, he immediately lost control of the helm as the party sailed into tempestuous waters. Just two weeks beforehand, 43 trainee teachers in Iguala, Guerrero state, had gone missing, presumed abducted. This went on to become the biggest scandal of the Peña Nieto administration but, while the federal government was widely condemned for its mishandling of the case, Navarrete and the PRD were far from unscathed.

The then mayor of Iguala, José Luis Abarca, and his wife, both of whom stand accused of orchestrating the disappearances, belonged to the PRD and were welcomed into the party despite their suspected links to drug traffickers. The governor of Guerrero, Ángel Aguirre, also belonged to the PRD and Navarrete stuck by him through thick and thin despite his egregious performance. Navarrete was savaged by factions within the party, and the party’s co-founder, Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas, left after a devastating critique in an open letter. The resultant infighting, in conjunction with the rise of Morena, contributed to the reverses suffered by the PRD in last June’s midterm federal legislative, state, and municipal elections. The erosion of its support base in the Distrito Federal (DF) capped the PRD’s worst-ever electoral performance [RM-15-07].

It was against this backdrop that the PRD staged fresh internal elections on 7 November after the resignations of Navarrete and Héctor Bautista as president and secretary general. Basave and Beatriz Mojica won an emphatic 295 of the votes cast to just three for Fernando Belaunzarán and none for Basave’s other rival, Onel Ortiz.

Aware of the serious blow to the party’s credibility from the Iguala scandal (see overleaf), Basave promised during his victory speech to “take more care in selecting our candidates”. He said the PRD would not shelter any criminal: “However powerful or useful they are, it would be better to lose patronage than receive public repudiation”. Basave went on: “There can be no space for corrupt people in the PRD. If we don’t show society that we assume our commitment with honour, we cannot win the support that we need to go ahead; pound for pound there is nothing more revolutionary than honesty”.

In addition to this promise to clean up the PRD and rebuild trust upon ethical foundations and “congruence and honesty”, Basave called time on all pacts with the federal government. “Let nobody be in any doubt: I am going to lead an opposition party, and I will not hesitate to denounce government corruption that hurts the people”, he said. Basave said that the PRD would take the federal government to task for “terrible inequality, rampant poverty and corruption”. He said that Mexicans denied access to education, and the victims of impunity and injustice indignant with the state of the country, were the PRD’s natural constituency, and that if they did not feel represented by the party it had failed in its defining purpose.

Basave said he expected the public to be sceptical about his makeover promises and to require persuasion. “I don’t ask them to follow me but to push me. Only shoulder- to- shoulder can we hope to go far”, he said. Basave was also keen to stress the importance of signing a new internal accord to construct “ideological, pragmatic and statutory consensus within the party” as an early priority.

The fact that he overcame the tribalism within the PRD by getting elected almost unanimously was a good start. Basave only formally became a member of the PRD three months ago, although in 2006 he was a federal deputy for Coalición Por el Bien de Todos, comprising the PRD, Partido del Trabajo (PT) and Convergencia. While he does not belong to any of the PRD’s factions, however, Basave is very close to Navarrete and has a good rapport with Jesús Ortega and Jesús Zambrano (‘Los Chuchos’), leaders of Nueva Izquierda, the faction that has long controlled the party and nominated it. Despite this, Basave insists that he is his own man and that Los Chuchos would give him room for manoeuvre because there is “no alternative, the party has to reform”.

There is considerable media speculation as to whether Los Chuchos have fully relinquished their firm grip on the party and whether Basave can ‘deschuchizar’ the PRD, but the rival factions that backed Basave’s candidacy appear to have taken him at his word when he promises to enforce “a self-critical process of revision”. René Bejarano, the leader of the Izquierda Democrática Nacional (IDN) faction, for instance, said he was very content with the election of Basave who had “a distinct perception of the party”.

One incongruity which jumped out after Basave’s victory was his determination, on the one hand, to try and heal old wounds within the PRD “with the conviction that our adversary is not within the party”, and his announcement, on the other hand, that he would reach out to López Obrador about possible electoral alliances. The ethos Basave wants to inculcate within the PRD of greater unity and harmony is the antithesis of Morena, led by a personalist politician who has demonstrated on numerous occasions that he is not a team player, and is only interested in his own success not a party’s.

Basave has made it clear, however, that he will also forge electoral alliances with the right-wing opposition Partido Acción Nacional (PAN) in several states holding gubernatorial elections next year - Tlaxcala, Zacatecas and Oaxaca, the latter representing the PRD’s greatest chance of securing victory.

Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas forges new movement

Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas has already let Agustín Basave know in a face-to-face meeting that he has no desire to return to the party he helped found. Cárdenas launched a new political movement, Por México Hoy, on 3 October during a meeting in a cultural centre in Mexico City attended by 600 people, including several leftist luminaries. Cárdenas said Por México Hoy would be “a platform for political participation” directly accessible to the public. He said steps had already been taken towards the drafting of a new constitution through public consultations.

“The fight today is not, as so often in the past, with weapons, but with words and images; ideas, proposals and debate; organisation and social and political mobilisation”, Cárdenas said, promising that Por México Hoy would seek to create a progressive, democratic and just Mexico. “What is the plan? To discuss the problems that affect us and to come up with solutions. To organise…and form as soon as possible a great, uncontainable social wave that imposes legally and peacefully the changes the people are demanding”.

Senator Alejandro Encinas, a dissident Partido de la Revolución Democrática (PRD) member, also took to the stage during Por México Hoy’s inaugural event. Encinas called for concrete causes to be debated in schools, universities and local neighbourhoods, and brought to Por México Hoy via social organisations and trade unions or directly in meetings. “We are not trying to construct a political party”, Encinas said, “but we are definitely seeking to enter the political fray through a political and social front that projects the need to live democracy in its collective dimension, truly representing the public”.

Can it work? Por México Hoy is intent on tapping into grassroots politics but whether it really takes hold is a moot point. It might be that Por México Hoy can provide an outlet for a large proportion of the public who have displayed their disillusionment with the political class as a whole. But it will depend on how well the movement manages to apply pressure on elected politicians to approve the solutions to the problems that are articulated during these debates.

• Agustín Basave

Agustín Basave, 57, was born in Monterrey, Nuevo León state. He has served as both a federal deputy and a federal senator for Nuevo León, as well as Mexico’s ambassador to the Republic of Ireland. He has written several books on Mexican nationalism and identity. He has also contributed to the national dailies Excélsior, Reforma and El Universal and the leftist political magazine Nexos as a political analyst.

• PRD and Morena

The Partido de la Revolución Democrática (PRD)’s performance in last June’s midterm elections was its worst ever. It saw its presence in the federal lower chamber of congress slashed from 99 seats to 56 and it won just 11% of the national vote. The debutant Movimiento Regeneración Nacional (Morena), meanwhile, won 8% of the national vote and seized control of the legislative assembly in the Distrito Federal (DF), complicating life for the PRD mayor, Miguel Angel Mancera, as well as many of the delegaciones (boroughs) previously held by the PRD.

The insurgent Ejército de Liberación Nacional (ELN), Colombia’s second-largest leftist guerrilla group, appears to have stepped up its latest military offensive. As well as launching a series of deadly attacks targeting security forces in recent days, ELN guerrillas have been accused of raiding a town in north-western Chocó department, where they killed and forcefully displaced civilians. These actions come despite the fact that the guerrilla group is currently engaged in formal peace negotiations with the government led by President Juan Manuel Santos. The increase in violence has led the national ombudsman’s office to urge both sides to agree to a bilateral ceasefire while they sit at the negotiating table. This is something that the ELN would like but which the government remains reluctant to do.

The ELN embarked on a renewed military offensive ever since the establishment in early February of the peace dialogue table with the government in Quito, Ecuador. This offensive has primarily entailed launching attacks on officers from the national police as well as the armed forces. The speculation is that the objective behind the ELN’s actions is to strengthen its hand in the peace negotiations and force the government into making some significant concessions – including agreeing to a bilateral ceasefire – in exchange for a de-escalation of its military offensive. But the government, via the head of its peace negotiating team in Quito, Juan Camilo Restrepo, has been clear it will not be pressured into offering any concessions to the ELN despite its actions.

Instead Restrepo called on the ELN to unilaterally reduce its military operations as a ‘good will’ gesture to help advance the negotiations. However, the ELN appears to have ignored Restrepo’s call and continued its attacks on the security forces this past week. On 25 March, suspected ELN guerrillas launched an armed attack on the police station in the town of Fortúl in the eastern Arauca department, in which the local deputy police commander was shot dead. That same day suspected ELN guerrillas also abducted and murdered a police officer in northern Córdoba department. A few days later, on 28 March, two soldiers were shot dead and three more were wounded during what the army described as a “ambush” by ELN fighters in the Arauca municipality of Tame.

The incident that produced the most concern however was the reported incursion of an ELN column in the Chocó town of Carrá, in Litoral de San Juan municipality on the border with Panama. The national ombudsman’s office reported on 28 March that on eyewitness accounts, the ELN fighters entered the town on 25 March, killed five people and ordered others to abandon the area (see sidebar). According to the ombudsman’s office’s report, the attack was due to the Litoral de San Juan area currently being the site of a territorial dispute between the ELN and local criminal and drug trafficking organisations. The Carrá attack was condemned by President Santos, who ordered the deployment of additional security forces to the area and called for the authorities to identify and punish all those responsible.

The ELN leadership denied responsibility for the Carrá attack. Nevertheless, Restrepo has sent a clear message to the ELN that attacks on civilians, in particular, would not expedite a bilateral ceasefire. In a 28 March radio interview, Restrepo reiterated that the government would not agree to a ceasefire until the conditions are in place, noting that “the attacks on the civil population obstruct this process…the conditions for discussing a ceasefire will be in place when the ELN understands that this is not the time for terrorism”. Yet Restrepo was also clear that the military offensive would not make the government abandon the peace dialogue table, as it knows that talks imply “patience, prudence, and care”.

• Forced displacement

According to a 28 March report by the United Nations Office for Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), 61 members of the local Afro-Colombian community have been forcefully displaced from the town of Carrá since the incursion of suspected ELN guerrillas in the area. The OCHA report notes that marines have been deployed to the area to reinforce public security. It highlights that fighting between the ELN, local criminal organisations, and paramilitary groups has intensified across Chocó after the units from the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Farc) main guerrilla group moved out following the signing of peace deal with the government and urges the authorities to increase the presence of the security forces in Chocó to protect the civilian population.

Three senior figureheads in the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Farc) registered the demobilised guerrilla group’s new political party this week before the national electoral council (CNE). Before the Farc can compete in next year’s elections, however, congress must approve legislation pertaining to the transitional justice system. This has made it through the first of three debates but it was deeply divisive and led to the rupturing of the ruling Unidad Nacional coalition. Cambio Radical (CR), the party of presidential aspirant Germán Vargas Lleras (until March the vice-president) opted to go its own way and withdrew its cabinet ministers from the government.

‘Iván Márquez’ (Luciano Marín Arango), ‘Jesús Santrich’ (Seusis Pausias Hernández), and ‘Victoria Sandino’ (Judith Simanca Herrera) registered the Fuerza Alternativa Revolucionaria del Común (Farc) party before the CNE on 9 October, filing the political organisation’s statutes, ideological platform, and code of ethics. The CNE should decide whether to grant the new party juridical status by the end of the month. “The war is behind us…we have turned that sad page,” Márquez said. “Now we must dedicate ourselves to reconciling the Colombian family, curing the wounds with truth.”

It is this ‘truth’ which has been at the centre of a heated debate in congress about the transitional justice system (JEP), a core component of the peace accord signed with the Farc. Vargas Lleras and the CR, the most lukewarm of the Unidad Nacional coalition allies on the peace accord, have questioned the impartiality of the magistrates selected to sit on the peace tribunal.

Even proponents of peace balked at Márquez et al registering the Farc as a political party before they have made any commitment at all to tell the ‘truth’ about the armed conflict before this tribunal. Senator Claudia López, of the left-wing Alianza Verde (AV), sought to insert an amendment to the JEP legislation barring guerrillas responsible for the worst atrocities in the armed conflict from taking up seats in congress before appearing before the peace tribunal. The CR rowed in behind this proposal but the government rejected it on the grounds that it ran counter to what was agreed in Cuba, and it failed to prosper.

The debate led to a definitive break between the government and the CR, however, shortly after President Juan Manuel Santos issued an ultimatum last week saying that anyone who failed to support the peace process would have to leave his government [WR-17-39]. The CR refused to buckle and opposed the JEP legislation. After a few days of standoff, the housing minister, Jaime Pumarejo, and environment minister, Luis Gilberto Murillo, tendered their resignations, although Santos retained the latter’s services on the grounds that he was not in government because of his ties with the CR (which effectively dissolved in May when CR legislators dropped their support of the minister).

A presidential statement acknowledged the rift with the CR, which it said was due to “a distancing from the government’s most important policy, which has been to consolidate the peace process”. This should spell the end of Santos’s unofficial support of the presidential candidacy of Vargas Lleras. This marks a decisive moment in the election campaign. Santos is likely to endorse the victor in the primary elections in the Partido Liberal (PL) on 19 November. Vargas Lleras, meanwhile, is likely to distance himself decisively from Santos, attacking aspects of the peace process and economic policies about which he has reservations.

• Tumaco

Colombian authorities are investigating a confused incident in a rural area in the municipality of Tumaco in the south-western department of Nariño in which at least six people lost their lives. A crowd numbering between 300 and 1,000 local farmers encircled a field to protest against forced coca eradication being carried out in the area. They claim that police opened fire on them in “a massacre”. The police claim that they were responding to an attack by Farc dissidents.

Recent setbacks to the Colombian peace process have produced deep concern in the international community. The level of concern is such that at the United Nations (UN) Secretary General, António Guterres, decided to conduct a two-day visit to Colombia to offer his full support for the peace process and urge the government led by President Juan Manuel Santos to strive to conclude a process that has helped to reduce violence and improve public security in Colombia and across the region.

The UN Security Council (UNSC) held a special session on 10 January to analyse the progress being made in the peace process. The main aim of the session was to discuss the reports by the head of the UN special mission to Colombia, Jean Arnault, on the implementation of the peace deal that the government signed with the Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Farc) in 2016. However, in the wake of the breakdown of the bilateral ceasefire that the government agreed with the Ejército de Liberación Nacional (ELN), and President Santos’s subsequent decision to suspend talks [WR-18-01], the focus turned to salvaging the peace negotiations with the guerrilla group.

During the special session, the UNSC members lamented the breakdown of the ceasefire with the ELN and called for this to be renewed, and for the two sides to return to the dialogue table (see sidebar). Colombia’s Vice President Oscar Naranjo, who attended the special session, said that the Santos government remained fully committed to negotiating peace with the ELN but that the talks could not continue amid a resumption of hostilities by the guerrilla group. Despite Naranjo’s assurances, the UNSC was sufficiently concerned about the future of the dialogue with the ELN, and the prospect of a sudden upsurge in violence in the country after the ceasefire helped to bring homicide levels to record low levels, to take significant action.

• UNSC disappointment

Speaking at the 10 January UNSC special session on the Colombia peace process, the United Kingdom’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations, Matthew Rycroft, who is the main UNSC rapporteur on the peace process, expressed his disappointment and concern at the breakdown of the ceasefire between the ELN and the Colombian government. “I hoped that today we would be able to talk about a renewed ceasefire between the government and the ELN. Instead I’m disappointed and concerned by the news that the ELN has broken the ceasefire and wasted an opportunity to establish a sustained peace,” Rycroft said. He went on to urge the government and the ELN to “work together to find a way to avoid further civilian suffering”.

This involved Guterres announcing that he would visit Colombia on 13 and 14 January to oversee the progress being made in the implementation of the peace deal with the Farc personally and to urge the ELN and the government to set their negotiations back on track. After meeting Santos, Guterres expressed the UN’s continued support for the peace process (see below) and publicly called on both the government and the ELN to refrain from further violence, agree to a new ceasefire, and resume the peace dialogue. Arguing that there is no “justification for violence”, Guterres called on both sides to “cease all military actions and re-establish a serious and constructive dialogue as quickly as possible”. Guterres added that he had instructed Arnault to take all necessary steps to help re-establish talks.

But Guterres’s calls fell on deaf ELN ears. While he was still in Colombia, ELN guerrillas launched a series of armed attacks targeting oil infrastructure and the security forces. Colombia’s state-owned oil firm Ecopetrol reported that its Transandino oil pipeline, which links Colombia to Ecuador, had been targeted by a bomb attack by suspected ELN fighters, producing an oil spill that contaminated the River Güiza in Colombia’s south-western border department of Nariño. This was the sixth attack on oil infrastructure attributed to the ELN since the expiry of the ceasefire. Meanwhile that same day the attorney general’s office reported that an Ecopetrol contractor had been abducted and taken hostage by suspected ELN guerrillas in the municipality of Saravena, located in the eastern department of Arauca close to the border with Venezuela.

The attacks on oil infrastructure and the security forces have been interpreted as an attempt by the ELN to strengthen its position in the negotiations with the government by showing that it is still a force with which to be reckoned. But the abduction of the Ecopetrol contractors looks like a major act of defiance. One of the pre-conditions set by the Santos government for establishing peace negotiations with the ELN was for the guerrilla group to release all hostages and abandon the practice of kidnapping for ransom. As such, it is unsurprising that the government has insisted that while it remains committed to negotiating a peace with the ELN this will not happen until the guerrilla group makes “unequivocal acts in support of peace” and commits to renewing the ceasefire.

Improving security in Tumaco

During his visit to Colombia, Guterres said that while he was satisfied that the Colombian government was making progress in implementing all the aspects of the peace deal reached with the Farc, more needed to be done to increase state presence in areas previously controlled by the guerrilla group to improve public security and promote the social reintegration of demobilised fighters in these areas.

Guterres’s remarks come amid efforts to crack down on drug trafficking and shore up public security in areas that were in Farc hands. On 8 January the government announced the deployment of 2,000 armed forces personnel to the Pacific port city of Tumaco, Nariño department. Tumaco has long been a hot spot of guerrilla and drug trafficking activity, in large part because it is one of the country’s major coca-producing areas.

Since the withdrawal of the Farc from the area the security forces have moved in to try to prevent Tumaco from being overrun by other guerrilla or drug trafficking groups, and to conduct forceful eradication of coca crops. But this has produced some violent clashes with local coca farmers.

The government explained that the new military deployment formed part of its ‘Exódo 2018’ operation consisting of the mobilisation of 9,800 army, navy, air force, and police personnel, the largest of its kind in Colombia’s history, that is to “provide security to Nariño and the south-west of the country, decisively attacking all threats affecting the local community”.

• Venezuela border humanitarian crisis

During his meeting with United Nations Secretary General António Guterres, Colombia’s President Juan Manuel Santos asked for United Nations assistance to deal with the humanitarian crisis resulting from the mass arrival of Venezuelan nationals to Colombian border towns in search of food and medicine as Venezuela continues to suffer from a deep economic crisis. Santos said that the arrival of “hundreds of thousands” of Venezuelans to Colombia (470,000 according to figures from the Colombian authorities) was putting a strain on the emergency services and communities in the border areas. Guterres responded by recognising that the mass arrival of Venezuelans seeking humanitarian assistance was “impacting” Colombia and promising UN support.

Guyana’s A Partnership for National Unity-Alliance for Change (Apnu-AFC) coalition government will be feeling less confident about re-election in the crucial 2020 general election after a mediocre showing in November’s local elections and the news that President David Granger has cancer (non-Hodgkin lymphoma).

The local elections on 12 November were memorable for the fact that it was the first time in 50 years of independence that Guyana has held successive local elections on the constitutionally ordained date. The last local elections, in March 2016, were the first to be held for 22 years.

The key difference between the latest local elections and those of 2016 is that the AFC did not run as a coalition partner. It went its own way, and it paid the price, proving unable to win seats in either the People’s Progressive Party Civic (PPP/C) Indo-Guyanese rural heartlands or in the mostly Afro-Guyanese townships where Granger’s People’s National Congress (PNC), the main component of Apnu, dominates.

The main positive for Apnu is that it easily retained control of Georgetown, the capital, but it did lose ground, winning 21 of the seats on the 30-member council as against the 25 it won in alliance with the AFC in 2016. The AFC, campaigning on its own, won two seats in Georgetown. The PPP/C improved its 2016 performance by winning seven seats in Georgetown under the mixed first-past-the-post and proportional representation system.

Nine of the Apnu’s Georgetown seats were allocated under the PR system, 12 were straight wins in first-past-the-post contests. PPP/C received four seats from the PR system and three under the first-past-the-post system. AFC won two seats, both via PR allocations.

Analysts are taking two key lessons from the results. The first is that race-based voting remains an unshakeable component of Guyanese elections. It is a more important factor than policy. The second is that Apnu and the AFC do better together than apart.

However, the AFC’s poor showing makes for difficult coalition politics. Internally the balance of power was already shifting away from the AFC. Having gained a generous deal prior to the last national election to secure key seats in parliament and ministries in government, it has failed to make inroads into PPP/C strongholds and ended up losing ground in several constituencies where it had performed well in 2011. Now, with the local elections going badly, it will be nearly impossible for the AFC to secure promises for a similar level of power in any post-2020 government. Nevertheless, Apnu did not excel at the local polls either, and the AFC still brings to the coalition the promise of multiracial appeal and so Apnu is likely to be cautious in casting the AFC aside.

The other factor that must be making Apnu cautious about jettisoning the AFC is Granger’s illness. He is the coalition’s strongest asset, with his reputation for being clean, but it now seems highly unlikely that the 73-year-old president will lead the coalition into the 2020 election. The one asset that the government does still have, however, is the power to spend money, and although first oil from Guyana’s huge recent offshore discoveries is not expected to begin flowing until election year, the temptation to turn on the spending tap ahead of first-oil, through borrowing, has just increased significantly.

The nomination of the Brazilian production ‘The edge of democracy’ for best documentary feature at the Academy Awards, announced on 13 January, prompted reactions from politicians of all colours in Brazil. Following on from the attempted censorship last week of a comedy depicting Jesus as gay, this has revived deep politico-cultural divides in the country. It is also indicative of the important role that cultural issues have come to play under President Jair Bolsonaro, whose government has given centre-stage to a conservative moral agenda and exploited the country’s culture wars to its advantage.  

Directed by Petra Costa, ‘The edge of democracy’ narrates a version of recent Brazilian politics, notably the impeachment of former president Dilma Rousseff (2011-2016) and the rise to power of President Bolsonaro and the far-right, that is favourable to the leftist Partido dos Trabalhadores (PT), while weaving in Costa’s personal story. In a review for Americas Quarterly after the documentary’s release on the streaming platform Netflix in June 2019, AQ editor Brian Winter noted the production’s “bias and omissions”, while also describing it as “one of the best-produced, most thoughtful accounts” of Brazil’s recent, tumultuous, political history.  

The Oscar nomination was celebrated by the PT, which has continued to cling to its narrative that Rousseff was ousted in a coup and that her predecessor Lula da Silva (2003-2011), who has been convicted for corruption (although he is not currently in prison) is the victim of political persecution. Rousseff herself applauded the fact that the truth about her “fraudulent impeachment” was being presented to the world through Costa’s eyes. Lula, who since his release from prison has been attempting to rally the political opposition [WR-19-45], also congratulated Costa. “The truth will prevail!” he tweeted.

Other left-wing parties and politicians have joined in the congratulations, including representatives from the Partido Comunista do Brasil (PCdoB) and the Partido Socialismo e Liberdade (Psol), as well as the opposition leader in the senate, Randolfe Rodrigues from the centre-left Rede Sustentabilidade (Rede).  

On the Brazilian Right, the cultural accolade has elicited sardonic comments about the documentary being nominated in the fiction category. “Congratulations to director Petra Costa for the nomination for best fiction and fantasy for The edge of democracy,” the PT’s historical rival, the Partido da Social Democracia Brasileira (PSDB), tweeted. Conservative pressure groups Vem pra Rua and Movimento Brasil Livre (MBL), which were instrumental in the pro-impeachment popular protests of 2016, also rejected the veracity of Costa’s documentary.  

The Bolsonaro government has echoed such positions. Questioned about the nomination, Roberto Alvim, the government’s special culture secretary, told national daily O Estado de São Paulo that the Left creates fictional narratives to try and undermine a reality that doesn’t serve its project. Bolsonaro told journalists on 14 January that the documentary was “fiction”, but he admitted that he had not watched it as he didn’t waste his time with that kind of “crap”.

Debates over the accuracy of Costa’s take on Brazilian politics aside, the government’s response is emblematic of the reshaping of Brazil’s public cultural institutions undertaken by the Bolsonaro administration as it seeks to root out what it sees as pernicious left-wing ideas and influence. Alvim, for example, is just one of several ideological appointees in the cultural sphere. A Bolsonaro supporter and devout convert to Catholicism, he took over as culture secretary last November, not long after outraging the Brazilian theatrical world for insulting the country’s most renowned actress, Fernanda Montenegro.

Another censorship row

Another aspect of these culture wars has been a backlash, led by both the government and conservative circles, against cultural and artistic productions deemed to be offensive to traditional moral values [WR-19-36]. The latest manifestation of this was an attempt last week to take down a Christmas special by a Rio de Janeiro-based comedy channel and producing company, Porta dos Fundos, in which Jesus is depicted as gay.

‘The First Temptation of Christ’ was the object of criticisms from the moment it began airing on Brazilian Netflix on 3 December last year, including from Eduardo Bolsonaro, a federal deputy and the president’s son. On Christmas Eve, Porta dos Fundos’ Rio offices were the target of a Molotov cocktail attack, believed to be motivated by the controversial film (the principal suspect has fled to Russia).

On 8 January, an appellate judge in Rio state’s justice tribunal issued an injunction for the film to be removed from Netflix’s catalogue, in response to a request from the Centro Dom Bosco de Fé e Cultura, an ultra-conservative Catholic association. The judge who handed down the injunction, Benedicto Abicair, justified his decision by declaring it “appropriate and beneficial, not only for the Christian community but for Brazilian society, which is predominantly Christian”.

Netflix refused to comply and appealed to the supreme court (STF) on 9 January. That same day, STF president Justice José Antonio Dias Toffoli overturned Abicair’s injunction. “It is not to be assumed that a humorous satire is capable of undermining the values of Christian faith, the existence of which goes back more than 2,000 years,” Dias Toffoli said. Abicair’s move was widely condemned as censorship, with the special rapporteur for freedom of expression at the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), Edison Lanza, as well as organisations such as the Brazilian bar association (OAB) and Human Rights Watch (HRW) speaking out against it.

Democracy on the edge?

Petra Costa’s documentary argues that Brazilian democracy is at risk following Dilma Rousseff’s impeachment and Jair Bolsonaro’s election. Bolsonaro’s victory in 2018 did prompt concerns that his authoritarian tendencies would erode democracy in the country. He has tested the limits of Brazil’s democratic institutions on more than one occasion during his first year in office, but the consensus is that he has generally been contained by congress and the courts. However, a Datafolha poll, published on 2 January, shows that fewer Brazilians believe democracy is the best form of government now than a year ago (62% versus 69%). Preference for a dictatorship remains unchanged at 12%, while those who have no regime preference total 22% (up from 13% in late 2018).   

Brazilian evangelicals

Although criticism of the satirical comedy depicting Jesus as gay was particularly strong from Brazil’s conservative Catholics, evangelical Christians are becoming an increasingly important demographic in the country, as well as a growing force in politics. According to the results of a Datafolha poll presented by the national daily Folha de São Paulo on 13 January, Evangelicals now make up 31% of the population. Catholicism remains the dominant religion, but its influence is diminishing, with Catholics representing just 50% of the population.

The Dominican Republic’s national legislature has approved an extension to the state of emergency to contain the spread of coronavirus (Covid-19), the fifth such extension since the measure was first implemented on 19 March. The extension was approved on 12 June, the day after the DR registered its highest daily number of new Covid-19 cases (629), casting further doubt on the process of opening up the economy, which began last month [WR-20-21], over which the government led by President Danilo Medina has already had to backtrack.

Having announced the process of re-opening the Dominican economy (which the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean [Eclac] forecasts will register zero growth in 2020 - the highest in the whole region bar Guyana), the Partido de la Liberación Dominicana (PLD) government revealed on 16 June that the conditions were not in place for starting the third phase of the process. The minister for the presidency, Gustavo Montalvo, told reporters that since 3 June, the start of the second phase, there had been a significant rise in the average daily number of new cases – from 350 in the first phase to 500 currently.

The legislature’s willingness to approve the extension also reflected concerns about the rise in infections - with 23,686 confirmed cases as of 15 June (including 615 fatalities). There had been uncertainty as to whether it would be approved due to complaints by the political opposition that the PLD was exploiting the government’s response to the pandemic in order to favour its candidates ahead of the 5 July general election (pushed back from 17 May).

The opposition Partido Revolucionario Moderno (PRM), whose presidential candidate and current frontrunner Luis Abinader revealed on 10 June that he had tested positive for Covid-19, had complained that the PLD was using the emergency to benefit Gonzalo Castillo, its presidential candidate. Castillo has been an active face of the official response, distributing medical supplies such as face masks. The opposition has also complained that the curfew, which remains in place despite the phased reopening of the economy, has made electoral campaigning difficult.

Voting intentions

The latest electoral surveys show Luis Abinader ahead of Gonzalo Castillo, with the vote going to a second round if no candidate wins over 50% of the vote. A survey by Instituto Dominicano de Estudios Aplicados, Mercadeo y Encuestas (Idéame), published in the local media on 15 June, showed Abinader on 52.5% to 34.4% for Castillo. This is similar to a poll published on 1 June by Mercado y Cuantificaciones which gave Abinader 51.2% to 33% for Castillo. Another survey, published by Noticias SIN on 28 May, showed Abinader defeating Castillo by 39%-37%, within the 3% margin of error, although it suggested Abinader would win at least 46% of the vote in a run-off, while Castillo would not obtain more than 42%.

Concerns in Haiti persist

Jean William Pape, a specialist in infectious diseases and co-chair of the Covid-19 Multisectoral Management Commission in Haiti, recently reiterated warnings that the continued spread of the virus in the Dominican Republic poses a threat for Haiti which, as of 16 June, had registered 4,441 cases with 76 fatalities. These concerns were echoed by Carissa Etienne, the director of the Pan American Health Organisation (PAHO) in her weekly briefing on 16 June. Etienne said “in the Caribbean, where most islands have not reported significant increases in Covid-19, we remain concerned about Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Both countries, which share an active border, continue to report a rise in new cases, particularly Haiti.”

This follows warnings by Etienne last month of a ‘perfect storm’ approaching in Haiti due to Haitians returning from the Dominican Republic [WR-20-21]. According to latest figures from the UN International Organisation for Migration (IOM), 164,441 Haitians crossed the shared border between 17 March and 15 June, despite Haiti’s closure of its border on 19 March, returning to their home country due to a lack of work opportunities amid the Dominican lockdown.

While on 15 June Patrick Dely, the director of epidemiology at Haiti’s National Laboratory, said that the number of cases had peaked in Haiti, NGOs such as Médecins Sans Frontières have warned that, with just two laboratories in Haiti able to process Covid-19 tests, the number of cases is likely to be much higher than recorded.

The US government led by President Donald Trump has already drawn criticism from local and international human rights groups over its increasingly hard-line on migration - evident in moves such as the inking last year of three bilateral migration accords known as Asylum Cooperative Agreements (ACAs) with El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras [SSR-20-01]. These concerns have intensified over its determination to press ahead with the deportation of illegal migrants to Central America during the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic amid fears that this risks further spreading the virus.

International institutions such as the United Nations (UN) Network on Migration, which includes the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and the UN Refugee Agency, have more generally called on governments around the world to “suspend forced returns during the pandemic, to protect the health of migrants and communities”. However, human rights organisations like Human Rights Watch (HRW), Medecins Sans Frontières (MSF), and Refugees International (RI) have all highlighted the particular vulnerability facing Central American countries such as Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras, urging the US to halt deportations which have already been on the rise (see sidebar).

In a statement dated 4 May, MSF warns that this process is moving people from the epicentre of the pandemic in the US to lower transmission countries and will exacerbate the public health emergency in the region, particularly given people awaiting deportation from the US “are often held in detention centres for weeks or even months…[which] have become ideal breeding grounds for the massive spread” of the virus. In a press release dated 4 June, HRW said that as of 1 June, over 1,406 US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detainees in the US had tested positive for Covid-19, adding that the number of detainees who have fallen ill is likely to be much higher given ICE has tested fewer than 12% of detainees. Meanwhile an RI report released on 23 June noted that a 34-year-old Guatemalan man was the second detainee to die from Covid-19 in ICE custody.

According to figures cited by MSF in total, the US and Mexico returned at least 6,500 Guatemalans, 5,000 Hondurans, and 1,600 Salvadorans between March and mid-April while the RI report highlights that at the end of April, deportees from the US made up nearly 20% of the 500 Covid-19 cases in Guatemala. This led Guatemala’s President Alejandro Giammattei to suspend deportations on 15 May while in a video conference organised by US think-tank, the Atlantic Council, on 21 May, he complained that “Guatemala is an ally of the US, but I don’t believe that the US is an ally of Guatemala, they don’t treat us like an ally”. Giammattei said the US has left Guatemala with imported Covid-19 cases, serving as a strain on the country’s health system. However, flights resumed on 9 June and according to RI, deportees continued to test positive for Covid-19 upon arrival in Guatemala despite having clean bill of health documents from the US.

• Ruling against ACAs

The Trump administration received a setback over the ACAs after a panel at the US appeals court for the Ninth Circuit ruled on 6 July that the controversial Interim Final Rule (IFR), established by the US government last year which set out the framework for the implementation and background for the ACAs, was unlawful. The appeal was lodged by a group of non-profit organisations representing asylum seekers. While the US government argued that IFR was consistent with an existent rule that bars a migrant who can be removed to a ‘safe third country’ from applying for asylum, the panel concluded that the IFR “does virtually nothing to ensure that a third country is a safe option”. 

• Deportations

In FY 2019 the US deported 54,919 Guatemalans compared with 50,390 in FY2018 according to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) figures. The figures show a significant increase in the number of Hondurans deported (from 28,894 in FY2018 to 41,800 in FY2019) while 18,981 Salvadorans were deported in FY2019 compared with 15,445 in FY 2018.

As the clock ticks down towards Ecuador’s 7 February general election, the confusion that has come to characterise the preparations for this vote has by no means dissipated. Electoral disputes tribunal (TCE) judge Ángel Torres turned the turmoil up a notch on 6 January by dismissing four out of the five members of the country’s electoral council (CNE), after ruling that they had breached electoral law by rejecting the presidential candidacy of Álvaro Noboa, of right-wing party Justicia Social.

Noboa, a five-time former presidential candidate and three-time runner-up (although not since 2006), had not initially been thought of as a major contender in this race, but the publicity generated by his struggle to be included – as well as by the institutional tensions sparked by this issue [WR-20-50] – saw him gain ground in the polls, to the extent that his exclusion from the 16-name ballot published by the CNE on 4 January caused a considerable stir. It still remains unclear whether the matter will be resolved in time to save Noboa’s candidacy, but this whole affair risks tarnishing the authority of the CNE at a crucial moment.

• Álvaro Noboa

The CNE immediately pledged to appeal against TCE judge Ángel Torres’ decision, claiming that the ruling “violates democratic stability in Ecuador”. This statement also maintained that “the electoral process will continue, despite attempts to interfere in the general election”, and that the four officials will remain in office while the appeal process is ongoing. This appeal will be heard by the full TCE and is meant to be completed within two weeks – but this may well be too late for Álvaro Noboa, with the CNE’s deadline for printing the ballots set for 7 January.

The other candidates, however, will be sure to keep their eyes on the prize. Campaigning began on 31 December, but restrictions imposed in light of the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic will ensure that this is no ordinary campaign. Two of the three remaining frontrunners, Guillermo Lasso of the right-wing party Movimiento Creo and Yaku Pérez of the left-wing indigenous party Pachakutik, have already started holding open-top bus tours and online rallies, while the third, Andrés Arauz of the left-wing Unión por la Esperanza (Unes) coalition, has had to put his campaign launch on hold, after testing positive for Covid-19 in late December.

Covid-19 concerns

These presidential hopefuls are not the only ones facing increased sanitary restrictions; on 21 December, President Lenín Moreno declared a 30-day national state of exception, for the third time since the pandemic began back in March. Moreno sought to impose a curfew and to tighten controls on a range of activities ahead of the holiday period, citing “the serious increase in the spread of Covid-19 due to crowds”. Restrictions were also imposed on international arrivals from the United Kingdom, the European Union, and South Africa, in light of the risk of exposure to “more virulent mutations” detected in these countries.

On 2 January, however, Ecuador’s constitutional court (CC) informed Moreno that this declaration of a state of exception had been deemed unconstitutional. The ruling was not entirely unexpected, as the CC had told Moreno back in August that it would not approve a third state of exception on the same basis as the previous two. The court’s January statement acknowledged “the seriousness of the pandemic and its enormous impact on the rights to life, health, and others”, but it maintained that “after more than nine months of pandemic…such a situation ceased to be unforeseen or supervening”.

And yet, nine months after the devastation of the first wave [WR-20-14], Ecuador’s infection curve is starting to rise once again; in announcing the state of exception, Moreno reported that intensive care units (ICUs) in many cities were “on the edge”. Health Minister Juan Carlos Zevallos insisted on 30 December that the situation is being “contained”, but the CC’s intervention may yet throw a spanner in the works; Zevallos noted on 2 January that ICU occupancy nationwide had risen from 54% to 68% since 27 December, with many units already at capacity, and the number of cases still on the rise.

The latest Global Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI), by Berlin-based anti-corruption NGO Transparency International (TI), released on 31 January, revealed that Costa Rica had dropped four points since 2021, receiving its second-lowest rating ever - the most significant drop of any country in the region. While Costa Rica remains among the least corrupt countries in Latin America, the fall in rankings, which TI’s regional advisor for the Americas, Luciana Torchiaro described as a “warning”, highlights a key priority for the administration led by President Rodrigo Chaves which took office in May 2022.

The latest CPI showed that Costa Rica scored 54 out of 100 (where 0 means ‘highly corrupt’ and 100 ‘very clean’), down from 58 in 2021. While Costa Rica surpassed the average CPI score for the Americas (42) – the only country in Central America to do so - this is the country’s second worse score after registering 53 in 2013. The same index showed Costa Rica ranking 48 out of 180 countries, a drop of nine places on the previous 2021 rankings.

According to TI’s report on the CPI, recent corruption scandals in Costa Rica point to transparency deficits, overpricing and a lack of competition in the infrastructure sector, which it describes as a trend that can be seen across the region. Torchiaro told specialist website InSight Crime in a report published on 2 February that this was an allusion to the so-called ‘Cochinilla’ scandal, which broke in June 2021 (under the previous government led by Carlos Alvarado, 2018-2022). This was a corruption scheme involving construction companies and public works officials which cost the government some ₡78bn (US$126m) in public funds. CPI and Torchiaro also attributed the recent results to the allegations of illegal campaign financing during Chaves’ electoral campaign [SSR-22-06]. Speaking to Insight Crime, Torchiaro was clear that Costa Rica “needs to redouble its anti-corruption efforts, especially to prevent the possible penetration of drug trafficking in politics” – comments which come as Costa Rica registered record homicides last year which has been linked to the same issue [SSR-23-02].

Blacklisted by EU

Costa Rica also received a setback with the European Council’s 14 February announcement that it had added Costa Rica to its list of non-cooperative jurisdictions for tax purposes – a list of jurisdictions which are “non-cooperative on tax matters”. According to an EC statement, for the first time since the list was established, in 2017, Costa Rica is included because it has not fulfilled its commitment to “abolish or amend the harmful aspects of its foreign source income exemption regime (criterion 2.1)”. Latin America & Caribbean territories which remain on the list include Anguilla, Bahamas, British Virgin Islands, Panama, Trinidad & Tobago, Turks & Caicos Islands and US Virgin Islands.

Elsewhere

Predictably, given the democratic backsliding in other countries in the sub-region, Costa Rica’s Central American neighbours fared badly in TI’s latest CPI. The worst performer was Nicaragua where President Daniel Ortega has continued to dismantle democratic institutions and crackdown on dissent, scoring 19 out of 100, (-1 on 2021) and ranking 167 out of 180 countries (down from 164). This was followed by Honduras (23 and 157, unchanging in both cases) and Guatemala (24, down 1 on 2021 and ranking 150, unchanging) where TI cites “evidence suggesting organised criminals wield a strong influence over candidates and politicians, financing electoral campaigns or even running for public office themselves”. In the case of Honduras, TI says extortion of small businesses and ordinary citizens by criminal gangs is a significant problem that goes unpunished, citing estimates that Hondurans pay US$737m per year on extortion, representing 16% of Honduras’s annual GDP. TI also criticises the response by the leftist Partido Libertad y Refundación (Libre) government led by President Xiomara Castro aimed at tackling the issue – the suspension of constitutional guarantees through a state of emergency [SSR-23-01] - which it warns concentrates power in the executive, reducing transparency and accountability.

In the case of Guatemala, TI highlights the co-opting of justice institutions and the criminalisation of actors who report corruption – reiterating familiar complaints about attacks on independent judicial officials and journalists [SSR-23-01]. El Salvador, which under President Nayib Bukele has seen a crackdown on gangs which has suspended constitutional guarantees and, as TI describes “triggered unjustified arrests and abuses of power”, scored 33 out of 100 (down one place on 2021, ranking 116 (down one place on the previous year) while Panama remained “stagnant”, scoring 36 (unchanging) and ranked 101 (up four places on 2021).

Panama

TI notes that Panama’s 2022 score is a drop of two points on the CPI since 2012 and highlights that its inability to improve its score from 2021 reflects “poor institutional conditions to fight corruption and end impunity, particularly in cases of grand corruption”. It highlights the wave of protests which rocked the country between July and August 2022 [EB-22-08] sparked by the rise in living costs which TI describes as “an organic response to public institutional corruption and unjustified growth of the government payroll”.

January has seen a surge in political violence in Mexico, with politicians - many of them opposition candidates running for local seats in this year’s elections – falling victim to fatal attacks. The murders, which have drawn widespread alarm and criticism from the political opposition, have set a worrying precedent as Mexico embarks on 2024’s bumper electoral year.

On 4 January, Alfredo Giovanni Lezama, a local councillor for the right-wing opposition Partido Acción Nacional (PAN) in Cuautla municipality, Morelos state, was shot dead while at the gym. Lezama was seeking a seat in the Morelos state congress in June for the main opposition coalition Fuerza y Corazón por México, comprising the PAN, the centrist Partido Revolucionario Institucional (PRI), and the leftist Partido de la Revolución Democrática (PRD).

Another candidate for the opposition coalition, David Rey González Moreno, was killed the following day. González was running for mayor in Suchiate municipality, Chiapas, and was killed near the Guatemalan border – an area of the state that has seen a surge in violence in the past year. On the same day, Sergio Hueso, a mayoral candidate in Armería municipality, Colima, for the opposition-aligned Movimiento Ciudadano (MC), was also murdered.

Three PRD politicians came under attack later in the month. On 24 January Marcelino Ruiz Esteban, who was mayor of Atlixtac municipality, Guerrero state between 2015-2021 and was seeking another term this year, was killed in Chilapa municipality. His wife, Guadalupe Guzmán Cano, a state councillor for the PRD, was also killed. Three days later, José Alejandro Naredo García, PRD’s president in Cuitláhuac municipality, Veracruz state, was also killed.

Xóchitl Gálvez, the 2024 presidential candidate for Fuerza y Corazón por México, has denounced the murders. The PRD’s national leader Jesús Zambrano issued a statement following Naredo’s killing, asking President Andrés Manuel López Obrador: “How many lives must be taken for you to change your stupid strategy of complicity with criminals?”.

These incidents paint a worrying picture of the dangers facing local politicians, who have historically been most vulnerable to political violence, in 2024. Indeed, many experts predict that criminal violence will play a bigger role than ever in this year’s elections, given the number of positions up for grabs.

Morena targeted

It is not just opposition politicians that have fallen prey to political violence this electoral period. In December, Ricardo Taja Martínez, who was running for mayor of Acapulco municipality, Guerrero state, for the ruling left-wing Movimiento Regeneración Nacional (Morena) was killed while at a restaurant.

In late January the International Monetary Fund (IMF) published a report following the conclusion of an Article IV consultation with Grenada, revealing that despite the damage caused by Hurricane Beryl last July – equivalent to around 16% of GDP – growth has been holding up well with GDP expected to expand by 3.9% in 2025.

The report says Grenada has been benefiting from buoyant tourism, moderating inflation, and a narrowing current account deficit. This has been helped by higher-than-expected Citizenship-by-Investment (CBI) revenues.  The CBI programme was launched in 2013 and offers wealthy individuals residence rights and a passport in exchange for a US$235,000 donation to the country’s National Transformation Fund (NTF) or a minimum real estate investment of US$270,000.

The IMF team says that another pro-growth factor has been the rapid response to Hurricane Beryl, which hit Carriacou and Petite Martinique as well as some parts of the main island but caused only limited damage to tourism infrastructure. The government responded with large recovery and reconstruction spending, funded out of substantial government savings and the triggering of disaster-contingent financial instruments. Fiscal spending rules have been relaxed because of the emergency; the report says a key decision for the government is how quickly normal spending constraints should be re-introduced. “Assuming a subsequent timely return to the fiscal rules” the report says, “public sector debt is projected to continue falling and reach the debt target of 60% of GDP by 2030”.

The Fund suggests the major medium-term risks facing the small Caribbean island’s economy include a tourism slowdown because the sector is operating at near capacity, further natural disasters, and what it describes as the “uncertain scale” of future CBI inflows. The IMF Board of Directors made various recommendations, including further strengthening of public investment and budget planning to improve climate resilience, work on the energy transition, and a tightening of regulations against corruption and money-laundering.

Es improbable que el Presidente Sebastián Piñera tenga un tranquilo ‘mes nacional’ (setiembre), pues los problemas, en el país y en el exterior, parecen acecharlo en cada esquina. La Presidenta Cristina Fernández, de Argentina, propinó el último golpe; miembros del gabinete chileno han confirmado que ella no asistirá a las celebraciones de la independencia el 18 de setiembre en Santiago. Aunque no fueron citadas las razones específicas de la cancelación, hay un extendido acuerdo en los medios locales de Argentina, como también en la administración chilena, que la decisión fue tomada para enviar un mensaje a Santiago: las relaciones con Buenos Aires sufrirán sustancialmente si el gobierno de Piñera otorgase asilo político a Otilio Romano, un juez (ahora suspendido) por la provincia de Mendoza, buscado en relación a violaciones contra los derechos humanos cometidas durante la última dictadura militar (1976-1983). Una fuente no-nombrada del gobierno de Piñera ha sido citada por el diario de Argentina La Nación como diciendo que la decisión de Fernández era un “acto poco amistoso”.

Indudablemente, el caso tiene implicaciones para las relaciones bilaterales, como también para la política interna chilena. La derechista Unión Demócrata Independiente (UDI) de Chile, el socio mayor en la coalición gobernante de Piñera, desde hace tiempo ha presionado por la extradición de Sergio Galvarino Apablaza, un ex guerrillero, buscado en conexión con el asesinato en 1991 de un fundador de la UDI y ex senador, Jaime Guzmán. Apablaza ha recibido asilo político en Argentina [IL-10-40]. El caso de Romano da a Piñera la oportunidad de dar la otra mejilla, para enfatizar que Chile confía en el sistema judicial de Argentina, que ordenó la extradición de Apablaza, y le da a él una oportunidad para mostrar que su gobierno de Derecha no protegerá a sospechosos buscados por violaciones contra los derechos humanos. Otorgar el requerimiento de Romano destruiría las chances de Chile con relación a Apablaza.

Chile ha apelado contra la decisión política del comité nacional para refugiados (Conare) de Argentina, que hizo caso omiso de la decisión de la corte suprema ordenando la extradición de Apablaza. Ahora es el turno del Conare chileno para revisar el requerimiento de asilo de Romano. El Conare chileno está encabezado por el jefe nacional de inmigraciones y la policía internacional, el prefecto Raúl Sepúlveda, y conformado con dos representantes del ministerio del interior, dos representantes de la cancillería y un representante del Alto Comisionado de la ONU para Refugiados (Acnur) –este último tiene voz pero no voto. La decisión del Conare termina como una recomendación al viceministro del interior, Rodrigo Ubilla.

Argentina puede presentar un requerimiento formal de extradición sólo después que el consejo de magistrados de Mendoza remueva formalmente a Romano de la judicatura. Si eso llegase a pasar, se incrementaría la presión sobre el gobierno chileno pues, de acuerdo con el presidente de la corte suprema de justicia de Chile, Milton Juica, la corte chilena probablemente dictaminaría en favor de la extradición de Romano –Juica, sin embargo, insistió en declarar que esa opinión estaba basada en lo que los medios habían informado y no en un conocimiento en profundidad de las circunstancias específicas del caso.

• La UDI señala las contradicciones de Fernández

El presidente de la Unión Demócrata Independiente (UDI), el senador Juan Antonio Coloma, señaló la semana pasada que si Argentina presenta un requerimiento para la extradición de Romano, ese sería una movida hipócrita. “Es una paradoja. La presidenta de Argentina está requiriendo exactamente lo que ella negó [a Chile] y eso lucirá como un acto desvergonzado”, dijo.

Compensación para víctimas
Esta semana, Alberto Breccia, secretario de la presidencia de Uruguay, dijo al diario local El País que el estado uruguayo pagará compensación (estimada en US$500.000) a Macarena y Juan Gelman por la desaparición forzada de María Claudia García Iruretagoyena de Gelman. A comienzos de este año, la Corte Interamericana de Derechos Humanos (CIADH) en un  dictamen que marcó un hito había ordenado a Uruguay pagar a Macarena Gelman US$180.000 en compensación [IL-11-21].
Separadamente, en Argentina, un juez federal pidió al ministro de justicia, Julio Alak, que clarifique si 68 personas que aparecen como ‘desapariciones forzadas’ en la llamada ‘lista de la Conadep’, agregadas en una actualización de 2006, fueron de hecho muertas durante ataques a bases militares durante los gobiernos constitucionales de Juan Domingo Perón (1973-1974) y su viuda y sucesora, María Estela Martínez (1974-1976). Alak también tendrá que explicar si sus descendientes recibieron compensaciones y, si es así, por qué.

EL SALVADOR | Reduciendo pronóstico. El Presidente Mauricio Funes anunció esta semana que el pronóstico de crecimiento para 2011 había sido recortado a 1,4% de 2,1%, debido a las fuertes lluvias recientes que costaron 34 vidas, y provocaron que cerca de 60.000 personas sean evacuadas, diezmando alrededor del 10% del territorio nacional y causando daños y pérdidas por un valor estimado en US$840m. Eso representa 4% del PIB, que en 2010 llegó a US$21,79bn, de acuerdo con cifras del Banco Mundial. Esta es la segunda vez que el pronóstico de crecimiento de El Salvador ha sido ajustado este año, habiendo sido previamente reducido de 2,5% en agosto, como resultado del impacto de la crisis económica en EU.

Funes, quien inicialmente anunció que él estaba requiriendo US$650m en ayuda, dijo que las pérdidas abarcaban infraestructura, viviendas, salud, educación y turismo. En un momento anterior él había estimado el costo de la reconstrucción en unos US$1,5bn.

Las lluvias, que fueron causadas por una depresión tropical, mató a 123 personas en la región y dejó 1,6m de afectados, haciendo que los gobiernos de Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador y Nicaragua declaren el estado de emergencia. Los líderes de Centroamérica han convocado a una cumbre para el 16 de diciembre para bosquejar los requerimientos de ayuda.

Development: On 12 December José Miguel Vivanco, the director of Human Rights Watch (HRW)’s Americas department, sent a letter to President Juan Manuel Santos regarding the justice system reform bill promoted by his administration.

Significance: Vivanco warns that if the bill were passed by congress, Colombia could be “exposed to investigations by the International Criminal Court (ICC)”. HRW has thus become the latest voice to express opposition to the proposed judicial reform, which it argues goes against the jurisprudence of Colombia’s top courts and judicial councils. Yesterday, the president of the Colombian chamber of jurists, Gustavo Gallón, said that if the proposal were approved with Article 11 as it stands, it would constitute a “monumental backward step” for the defence of human rights in Colombia. The proposed reform could soon prove to be the biggest stumbling block of the Santos administration thus far.

Key points:

• Article 11 stipulates that all acts committed by members of the armed forces during military operations are to be considered “related to service” and should thus fall under military jurisdiction. HRW argues in the letter that this contravenes prior rulings by the constitutional court, the supreme court and the council of the judicature, which have found that “human rights violations, and other conducts ‘contrary to the constitutional functions of the security forces’ are never related to service, and thereby must always be investigated, prosecuted and judged by the civilian justice system”.

• According to official figures, the attorney general’s office has received reports for 2,700 people believed to have been victims of the false positive practices –i.e. civilians killed by members of the armed forces subsequently passed off as members of illegal groups killed in combat. To May this year, 368 military personnel had been convicted in relation to the false positives scandal while a further 700 are still being investigated by the judiciary.

• HRW writes that “In practice, Colombia’s military justice system has long failed to hold perpetrators of human rights violations accountable. This is evidenced by the military courts’ glaring lack of results in obtaining convictions against those responsible for cases of ‘false positives’”.

President Sebastián Piñera has only just passed the halfway point in his four year term but attention in Chile is already turning towards the next presidential election (due in late 2013), amid widespread disappointment with the country’s first centre-right administration since the return to democracy in 1990. Taking note of this, Chile’s Centro de Estudios Públicos (CEP), a respected think-tank, decided to bring forward publication of its latest public opinion omnibus to 10 May. The CEP found that in contrast to the government’s own expectations, public perceptions of its performance remain very negative. The survey paints a bleak picture for the ruling Coalición para el Cambio.

The CEP poll, taken twice a year, is the country’s most respected. The last edition came out in December 2011 and the next was only scheduled for release in June or July. However, in recognition of the fact that Chile is undergoing important political and socio economic changes, the CEP decided to put out its poll early. In the December 2011 poll, the Piñera administration had a 23% approval rating, the worst rating of any government in at least two decades and far lower than any of its left-wing Concertación coalition predecessors. In the latest poll, the government’s approval rating up a notch at 24%; while its disapproval rating was down three percentage points to 59%, from 62% previously. However given the error margin of three percentage points, the results are basically stable. The fact that the ratings finally appear to be moving in the right direction was of little solace to the government. The Piñera team had expected far better results, particularly after it managed to deal with several serious challenges including student protests and civic unrest in Southern Chile (with varying degrees of success) since the last poll.

Back in December, the government’s low approval ratings were attributed mainly to the highly damaging student protests. Students spent at least six months on the streets last year demanding that the government make sweeping changes to the country’s education system. Since then, the government has been able to establish talks with the students and reach partial agreements with other protestors around the country. Thus in government circles there was an expectation that its approval rating would go up by around three percentage points. Indeed, government representatives held a meeting with leading members of the two coalition parties, Unión Demócrata Independiente (UDI) and Renovación Nacional (RN), ahead of the CEP poll to present this view and transmit ‘calm’ to the coalition. However it appears that the government badly underestimated the level of disenchantment amongst general population, which is voiced in a popular sentiment that Chile, for all its economic stability, is going in the wrong direction.

Looking in detail at the CEP, the electorate is unhappy with the government’s handling of a number of issues. At the top, predictably, is education, which was cited by 46% of respondents as the biggest problem facing the country and the government. This was followed by crime (45%) and healthcare (42%). Significantly, the students have lately renewed mass demonstrations, in protest at the government’s inability to address their demands, leaving the government open to fresh criticism.

Harder to explain is the negative sentiment surrounding the government’s stewardship of the economy. Despite the fact that Chile has posted consistent and higher than expected growth figures since the crippling 2010 earthquake and tsunami, only 24% of respondents approved of the government’s economic management, while a full 58% disapproved of it. Indeed, 34% of respondents felt that Chile’s current economic situation was ‘very bad’; while only 21% thought it was ‘very good’.

Surprisingly, 31% identified low wages as the fourth most important issue in the country (after education, crime and healthcare). In the previous poll, 25% identified low wages as a key problem and so the jump is significant. Yet President Piñera has repeated time and again that his government has not only successfully guided Chile through the global economic crisis but has also helped the country achieve record levels of employment. The official unemployment rate is just 6.6%, which has led to increases in real wages.

These negative perceptions about the economy were largely unexpected. The presidential spokesman, Andrés Chadwick, admitted that the executive would like to have more public “support” for its policies, but he added that “there is no frustration or wavering, on the contrary: there is strength, motivation and drive…if Chile is asking for more, we are going to do everything possible to move forward”. Similarly President Piñera highlighted the resilience of Chile’s economy in the face of the adverse global economic climate and called on Chileans to give themselves a pat on the back for a job well done. “Just as they [the public] have the capacity to pinpoint our problems, I want to ask them to also have the capacity to value what we are building together”.

Political evaluations

Coalition politicians are concerned with CEP poll results, which also public perceptions of individual political figures and parties. The UDI and the RN fear the government’s negative ratings will damage them ahead of this year’s municipal elections and, more importantly, next year’s presidential elections. In December 2011, 55% disapproved of the coalition’s performance; in the latest results this dropped to 52%. However, the coalition’s approval rating also dipped two percentage points to just 18%. This may not make for positive reading for the Coalición para el Cambio but it will take some comfort in the fact that the opposition Concertación fares even worse, with a 50% disapproval rating and an approval rating of only 14%. All in all, the two should face into the municipals on an equally weak footing.

However, when it comes to voter preferences ahead of next year’s presidential elections, the picture alters dramatically. For the first time the CEP asked respondents an open ended questions as to whom they would like as their next president. Just over half (51%) opted for the former president Michelle Bachelet (2006-2010). Although she left office two years ago and is now working at the United Nations (UN), Bachelet remains by far Chile’s most popular politician. According to the CEP, 83% of Chileans have a positive evaluation of her, while just 6% view her negatively. To put this into context, the second most popular politician in the country according to the CEP is the independent public works minister, Laurence Golborne, who has a 68% approval rating and an 11% disapproval rating. However only 7% said they would like to see Golborne become the next president. Another 7% said ‘no one’. Other politicians, including Piñera himself, were mentioned by 2% or less of respondents.

If the Concertación can convince Bachelet to return to Chile to bid for another term (and that is by no means a certainty) then the prospects for the Coalición para el Cambio, which has no obvious presidential candidate for 2013, are rum indeed.

The 2010 tsunami case may yet drown Bachelet’s reputation

On 7 May Solange Huerta, a prosecutor from Santiago’s VII court of guarantees, formally began an investigation into whether government officials including the former deputy interior minister, Patricio Rosende, and the former director of Chile’s national emergency office (Onemi), Carmen Fernández, had any responsibility in the deaths of 156 people as a result of the tsunami that followed the devastating 27 February 2010 earthquake in Chile.

The investigation centres around the fact that the authorities failed to alarm the population about the impeding tsunami. Huerta’s initial investigations have discovered a “complete lack of coordination between Onemi and the navy’s hydro-graphic and oceanographic service [Shoa]”, as Shoa issued a tsunami alert which Onemi then failed to communicate to the general public. As a result, Huerta has charged both Rosende and Fernández, concluding that this lack of coordination caused deaths that could have been avoided.

The current Piñera government, which took office shortly after the disaster, is highly critical of the previous Bachelet administration’s handling of the incident. It maintains that other former officials, including Bachelet herself, may also have to answer to the case. The opposition Concertación has accused the ruling Coalición por el Cambio of seeking to politicise the investigation by going after Bachelet in a deliberate attempt to tarnish her reputation. However others including the legal team for the victims’ also maintain that Bachelet should testify before the court, noting that as president Bachelet was responsible for making sure that the nation’s institutions were operating efficiently. At the time of the emergency, Bachelet herself was not made aware of the possibility that the earthquake could be followed up by tsunami until two hours after the original quake, by which time, arguably, it was too late. On that basis Huerta has to date rejected calls to call upon Bachelet, on the grounds that the president was not given any information about what was going on”. Huerta has also pointed out that under Chile’s emergency alert system; all decisions are made by the interior ministry. That day, Huerta has said, Bachelet “was reduced to acting as the government’s spokesperson”. End box

• Weak

In perhaps the most damming CEP poll finding, a full 70% said that the government led by President Sebastián Piñera had shown little ability or dexterity in dealing with social pressures. The same proportion (69%) agreed that the government has appeared ‘weak’ in the face of these pressures. These findings will not escape the Unión Demócrata Independiente (UDI), the senior partner in the ruling coalition, which has consistently called on the government to adopt a tougher stance towards social conflicts.

• Insulza defends Bachelet

The Chilean secretary general of the Organization of American States (OAS), José Miguel Insulza, said on 13 May that in his opinion a president “exercises his post through his ministers and officials” and that adjudicating the full responsibility on President Bachelet [for the 2010 earthquake] “does not follow”. Insulza also said that the people working at the national emergency office (Onemi) that day acted under immense pressure and in his view did their best to deal with the catastrophe. “I know the people that worked at Onemi. Many of them worked with me when I was interior minister and I think that they did the best they could” Insulza declared.

SECURITY| Another heavy blow to the Farc. On 20 May Colombia’s defence ministry announced the death of ‘Negro Eliécer’ (Ernesto Hurtado Peñaloza), the leader of the insurgent Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia (Farc)’s mobile ‘Antonio Santos’ column, during a military operation in the rural Hacarí municipality of Norte de Santander department. According to a ministry statement, Hurtado, a long-time Farc military commander, was the right-hand man of the Farc’s current top leader, ‘Timochenko’ (Rodrigo Londoño Echeverri), who is heading up the current peace talks between the Farc and the Colombian government in Havana, Cuba. He was also believed to have links to a local drug trafficker known as ‘Megateo’, a former member of the also insurgent Ejército Popular de Liberación, who is believed to have formed a new drug trafficking criminal organisation that is currently operating in the area. Thirteen other Farc guerrillas were also killed in the attack that was carried out by the army on intelligence gathered by the national police.  Defence Minister Juan Carlos Pinzón later added in a radio interview that Hurtado’s death was “A significant blow to the Farc as he was one of the main contacts between the insurgent group and drug traffickers operating in the area”.     

Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood has a big day on 30 August as it tries to re-establish its mass appeal and influence.  It has called for mass rallies after Friday prayers in Tahrir and Ramsis squares in Cairo, and in Giza, Duqqi, Mustafa Mahmud, and Sphinx squares in Giza.  The moves are being co-ordinated with Salafist and jihadist groups, and the MB has also been in contact with liberal and leftist groups.

The mass rallies on Friday will call for the restoration of the revolution and an end to military rule.  Opinion is divided on how well attended they will be, but there is no doubt that the MB sees Friday as a key day in its campaign for the restoration of ousted President Muhammad Mursi, the return to the suspended constitution and Shura Council, and the trial of people responsible for killing protesters.

Those who believe the turnout will be low say that the crackdown on leading MB figures is bound to have an adverse affect, but MB activists deny this.  MB spokesman Jihad al-Haddad said on 25 August: “People lead their revolution without leading figures or symbols.”  He added: “The Friday protests will be peaceful and we will not carry any arms or use any violence”.

Meanwhile, jihadist groups are continuing to gain momentum in the Sinai, where they have been attacking security bases, checkpoints, and gas pipelines to Israel on an almost daily basis since the deposing of President Mursi on 3 July.  More than 50 soldiers and 70 jihadists have been killed.

Three groups are said to be particularly active.  The largest is thought to be Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis (Supporters of Jerusalem), which is linked closely to the Gaza Strip and also (it is said) to al-Qaeda.  Egyptian sources say the group has more than 2,500 members and is prominent in the towns of Rafah and Shaykh Zuwayid.  A recent funeral for one of its ‘martyrs’ in Shaykh Zuwayid is reported to have been attended by 3,000 mourners.

Also active across Sinai is Al-Salafiyah al-Jihadiyah fi Sinai (The Salafi Jihadists in Sinai).  The group has mostly targeted Israel, but on 11 August it issued a warning to the Egyptian army, saying it had “stepped out of its role of protecting the nation…to achieve the interests of the US and Israel.”

The third main group is the Majlis Shura al-Mujahidin fi Aknaf al-Quds (the Mujahidin Shura Council in the Environs of Palestine).  It is said to be the best organised of the three main groups, with over 1,000 members based in north and central Sinai, including in Shaykh Zuwayid and Rafah.  A defector from the group has been quoted in Egypt as saying that the group has carried out more than 15 attacks on gas pipelines.  It has also hit targets in Israel with missiles.  The group’s leader is the Jordanian Hisham al-Saidani.  He is opposed to Hamas rule in Gaza.

The animosity between Salafi groups and Hamas was well illustrated by the announcement on 20 August by the Palestinian jihadist group Ansar Al-Mahdi wa-Hawariyah that it had created a special squad to kidnap senior Hamas fighters for the purpose of swapping them with Salafists in Hamas prisons.

ECONOMY | US Supreme Court omits holdout case. On 7 October the US Supreme Court omitted from its latest to-do list an appeal presented by Argentina against a New York Appeals Court ruling favouring the holders of defaulted 2001 Argentine government bonds, which rejected debt swaps offered by the Argentina and continue to demand full payment of their bonds. The supreme court’s decision means that the issue will continue to be processed on the US Appeals Courts Circuit, where Argentina is challenging the ruling on the grounds that it sets a negative precedent for debt swaps carried out by other countries. The longer the case drags on, the more damaging it becomes for the government led by President Cristina Fernández, as uncertainty grows over whether Argentina might be forced to pay the so-called ‘holdouts’, in which case it could be forced into a technical default given its declared inability to foot the US$1.3bn bill.

POLITICS | Boudou takes charge. On 7 October Argentina’s Vice-President Amado Boudou formally assumed the presidency on a temporary basis while President Cristina Fernández undergoes surgery today (8 October) and recovers from a cerebrovascular injury. There was intense speculation as to whether the unpopular Boudou, whose political leadership is questioned even by the ruling Frente para la Victoria (FPV) faction of the Partido Justicialista (PJ, Peronists), would formally assume power. Some political commentators suggested that the FPV would not accept Boudou taking charge on concerns that he might undermine some of the policies championed by Fernández, particularly if her temporary absence extended beyond the announced one-month period. However, in a ceremony formalising him as the acting president at the Casa Rosada Boudou stressed that “She [Fernández] wants to maintain the current line of administration and together the team is going to do so. “Come on Cristina, come on Argentina, come on all of us together!”, he rallied. Problematically for the FPV, Fernández’s convalescence comes in the final stretch of the campaign for the 27 October mid-term congressional elections, a campaign personally led by Fernández.

POLITICS| Jaua accepts invitation to visit. On 7 October Paraguay’s foreign ministry said that Venezuela’s foreign minister Elías Jaua had accepted a formal invitation from Foreign Minister Eladio Loizaga to visit Paraguay on 9 October. Jaua’s visit would mark the restoration of bilateral diplomatic relations, severed in June 2012 following the impeachment of Paraguay’s former president Fernando Lugo (2008-2012). The Venezuelan government, then-led by former president Hugo Chávez (1999-2013), viewed the impeachment as "a break in the democratic order". Chávez’s successor, Nicolás Maduro, who was Venezuela’s foreign minister at the time of the impeachment and has been declared persona non grata by Paraguay’s congress, refused to recognise the post-Lugo administration led by Federico Franco (2012-2013). Only after Horacio Cartes assumed office as Paraguay’s new elected president in August did Maduro seek to restore bilateral relations. However, a full restoration has been complicated by the fact that Cartes refuses to accept Venezuela’s entry into the Southern Common Market (Mercosur), approved during Paraguay’s temporary Mercosur suspension, (which had been imposed by way of sanction for Lugo’s impeachment). Cartes says that Paraguay will not take up its seat at the Mercosur table again until this issue is resolved. The foreign ministry said that the Loizaga’s invitation was a “follow-up to the talks held between the respective heads of state in Paramaribo, Suriname, during the VIV Union of South American Nations heads of state meeting over the normalisation of bilateral relations”.

Rafael Ramírez, the long serving energy minister and president of the state oil company Petróleos de Venezuela (Pdvsa), and since last year also vice-president for economic affairs, announced this week another new ‘reform’ of the officially controlled exchange rate regime. Though Ramírez did not say as much, the government looks to be moving towards more of a formalised dual exchange rate regime, with one rate for imports of designated essential goods and another for all other imports.

Ramírez announced that airlines, Venezuelans travelling abroad and foreigners sending remittances home must henceforth use the secondary exchange rate (FX) agency, Sistema Complementario de Divisas (Sicad). Although the central bank does not publish the average FX rate offered in its weekly Sicad dollar auctions, it is generally reckoned to be about BF11/US$1. Ramírez more or less confirmed this in revealing that the average rate in the latest auction was BF11.36/US$.

The minister seemed to indicate that airlines, outbound Venezuelan tourists and remittance senders would now be offered this rate specifically, but he was not entirely clear as to whether this would now be a set rate for all the other importers taking part in the weekly Sicad auctions, or whether the rate would continue to be dictated by demand. However, Ramírez did say that the central bank would double the size of the weekly Sicad auctions to US$200m.

Meanwhile, the preferential (official) rate of BF6.3/US$ is now effectively reserved for purchases of priority goods like medicines and essential foods, which in many cases are brought in by the government itself and/or State agencies. Even foreign investment (including in the oil sector) is now booked at the Sicad rate. (Allowing foreign companies to charge expenses at the lower Sicad rate will reduce the cost of investing in Venezuela). The main FX agency, Comisión de Administración de Divisas (Cadivi), is being abolished, with the new national centre for foreign trade, led by Commerce Minister Alejandro Fleming, now managing these essential imports.

In other words, the government (and government officials and/or associates) will have preferential access to the preferential rate. Of course there is nothing to stop unscrupulous officials from selling on the essential goods they acquire at the preferential rate for a lucrative profit on the black market, where scarce goods are now being traded at up to BF78.85/US$ on the Colombian border, according to websites that publish the (illegal) black market rate.

More notably, Ramírez said the government would “review” the rates for its debts with private sector companies. That will sound alarm bells. According to the International Air Transport Association (IATA), foreign airlines have the equivalent of some US$3.3bn trapped in Venezuela (measured at the official rate) because of exchange controls. Ramírez suggested that the government might offer them fuel (oil/gas) or bonds by way of payment.

Ecuador’s Tame Línea Aerea this week suspended indefinitely its seven weekly flights from Caracas because of payment delays from the Venezuelan central bank, a company spokeswoman told the news agency Bloomberg, which also noted that payment delays had forced the Spanish carrier Air Europa to suspend sales in January. Elsewhere, Empresas Polar, Venezuela’s dominant food company, has complained that it cannot import sufficient raw materials because of delays by the authorities in releasing dollar assignments for its suppliers. Foreign reserves were US$21.5bn as of 21 January, on central bank data, down from US$28.5bn a year ago.

• Calling a duck a duck

The general consensus is that what is taking place is devaluation by stealth. “It looks like a devaluation, it quacks like a devaluation, it hurts like a devaluation: it’s a devaluation,” was one Tweet in response to the Ramírez announcement, quoted by the news agency Reuters.