Brazil & Southern Cone - August 2011 (ISSN 1741-4431)

Juvenile crime is rapidly becoming a major political issue in Uruguay. The opposition Partido Colorado (Colorados) is collecting signatures for a plebiscite on whether to lower the age of sentencing to 16 from 18. Both the leader of the less right-wing opposition Partido Nacional (Blancos), Jorge Larrañaga, and the ruling Frente Amplio (FA) have criticised the proposal. They are accusing the Colorados of politicising juvenile crime - the Colorados want the plebiscite to be held together with the next general elections in 2014 and appear to have chosen this issue as their flagship campaign policy.

The Colorados dismissed Larrañaga, unfairly, as a government stooge because of his opposition to the proposed plebiscite. The Blancos were split over the issue in the 2009 elections when Larrañaga’s rival for the presidential candidacy, former president Luis Alberto Lacalle (1990-1995), proposed much tougher sentences for young people aged between 16 and 18. Lacalle also advocated the creation of a national rehabilitation institute, to supplement the existing juvenile detention centres, which he said were overcrowded, with staff unable to manage the inmates.

The Blancos are determined to be seen to be tough on crime, however, with party senator, Francisco Gallinal, presenting a bill in congress in early August to exempt shop owners from punishment if they defended their shops, with arms, from criminals. A number of shop keepers have been killed recently by armed criminals.

Mujica wades into debate

President José Mujica conceded that Uruguay had lost the enviable public security reputation it enjoyed in the past, largely because of an upsurge in juvenile crime, but noted that it remains the most secure country in Latin America. He took aim at the Uruguayan media for sensationalising the issue and exacerbating the problem by making it self-perpetuating. He called on the media to demonstrate greater “social responsibility” and less desire for profit.

Mujica described freedom of expression as “the dorsal spine of human freedoms”. He said it should “never be separated from social responsibility… which is not a product of the market, not something you can buy over the counter in a pharmacy”. He said that “when the bounds of this freedom of expression are stretched by nothing more than profit, the freedom has in reality become enslaved to the market and fallen into sensationalism.”

Mujica’s words came in the same week that Ecuador’s President Rafael Correa lambasted his country’s media throughout his state-of-the-nation address on 10 August for perverting the freedom of expression with profit-motivated comment: Correa insisted the media had ceased to be a source of information and become a political actor.

Mujica, who said the press should be contributing to the debate with “useful commentary” on how to help address juvenile crime, also insinuated that the government could deny ‘offending’ press outlets revenue from official advertising in future. The president of the association of Uruguayan broadcasters, Rafael Inchausti, told the weekly magazine Búsqueda that this threat was “unfortunate”.

The press struck back at Mujica by pointing out that misinformation was by no means the preserve of the press. It said that Senator and First Lady Lucía Topolansky, for instance, last June erroneously claimed that Radio El Espectador, one of the most important broadcasters in the country, had been sold to Argentina’s media giant Clarín .

Uruguay enjoys a moment in the sun
There was some relief from the acrimonious congressional political debate over public security in the form of the national football team’s victory in the Copa América, an achievement made all the sweeter by the defeat of Argentina on the way to the trophy.

Members of all the main political parties sought to portray the Uruguayan footballers as models for misguided youth. “In a world where many people pursue violence, drugs and war, our players run after the ball on all the pitches in the country and build a passion that feeds triumphs, which are the fruit of dedication and sacrifice,” a deputy for the Colorados, Gustavo Espinosa, commented. The manager, Sebastián Coates, was awarded a plaque to honour the triumph.

Coates responded with all the normal platitudes, before concluding that the team faced the difficult task of coming down to earth to prepare to compete in the qualifying group for the World Cup in Brazil in 2014.

Uruguay has won the World Cup on two occasions. Indeed the last time the World Cup was held in Brazil, in 1950, it was won by Uruguay, who defeated the host nation. Uruguay also won the first edition in 1930, beginning a national obsession with the game which prompted the doyen of Uruguayan journalists, Eduardo Galeano, to comment that “All Uruguayan babies are born crying, ‘goooooooal’”.

• Verbose senators
  The leader of the opposition Colorados, Senator Pedro Bordaberry, has called for a style manual to be produced for use in the drafting of congressional legislation. Bordaberry took the floor in the senate to complain about a phrase containing 127 words in a law on the electoral court. He said that its prolixity was in danger of making it unintelligible, and was costing the state money as time was lost trying to understand it. He argued that studies showed sentences should not contain more than 15 words: “Descartes, in the 17th century, used an average of 74 words in a sentence; Proust in the 19th century used 39; and Flaubert only 18. We approved a law last week containing a sentence with more than 100 words.”