Paraguay: A Political Milestone

 

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.The reported death in a helicopter crash of retired general and Paraguayan presidential candidate, Lino Oviedo, marks a turning point in that nation’s transition to democracy that carries important lessons. Oviedo, the one-time commander of the army’s First Division, was instrumental in the overthrow of dictator Alfredo Stroessner, the military ruler and staunch anti-Communist, who held sway over the small agrarian nation for over 35 years.  Some say it was actually Oviedo who held the gun to the Stroessner’s head and told him that it was all over in 1989. 

 

Ironically, Oviedo, who led a reformist military group that helped move Paraguay from dictatorship to democracy, also had leanings like those of his former leader.  In 1996, after being asked to step down from his military post, he was charged with plotting a coup against democratically elected President Juan Wasmosy.  Oviedo actually served four years in prison for his role in the crime, demonstrating that the democratic system he helped set up was actually capable of defending itself.  

 

Pardoned and released from prison by President Raúl Cubas—a former Oviedo running mate from an earlier presidential bid—he headed to Brazil.  There, he and his cronies strategized on his political rehabilitation.  In 2007, the Paraguayan Supreme Court overturned his treason conviction.  This past year, he resurfaced as a presidential candidate for a party he helped create, the National Union of Ethical Citizens.  

 

Some of Oviedo’s supporters are not so sure that his demise was an accident, coming as it did just before the twenty-first anniversary of Stroessner’s ouster.  But until there is an investigation, the stormy late summer weather of the Southern Cone seems a more likely explanation of what happened Saturday night. In Paraguay, however, rumors are the stuff of political legend.  

 

No matter what the cause, his departure marks a transition—from a time when military rule and coup-mongering was among the undocumented missions of the military to a gradual democratic civilian political system in a region that had often deferred to praetorian traditions.  When Oviedo and his fellow senior officers overthrew the Stroessner government in1989, they saw themselves as leaders of new type of government that would ultimately end in free elections and civilian leadership.  Governance was strengthened, judicial institutions improved (thanks to lots of U.S. aid) and efforts to shift the economy from one dominated by corruption to legitimate businesses was making progress.

 

Still, Paraguay’s democratic transition has hit many bumps along the way, including the most recent removal of its first left-of-center president, Fernando Lugo—technically impeached, although many believed this act of Congress lacked due process.  That Oviedo was able to make a comeback in this new round of presidential elections is also testimony to the return of old line political beliefs that a “mano dura” approach to law and order is preferable to the hurly-burly of democratic political discourse.  Yet even this demonstrates that elections are now more acceptable than military coups.

 

For me, the lessons of Paraguay are also personal.  In 1992, as a director of a program that supported democracy with a focus on civil-military relations, I was sent to Asunción to meet with the generals who were the face of Paraguay’s new democracy.  It was an education.   These men (there were no women) saw themselves as the future of democratic leadership.  One interview with General Oviedo made me nervous.  In his huge conference room in First Division headquarters outside Asunción, he seemed less interested in talking about installing a democratic state than he was about warning the United States not to meddle in his nation’s internal affairs.  Democracy building was neither welcome nor appreciated.  My doubts were confirmed a few years later when he tried to overthrow elected officials.  Not only did he plot a coup against an elected president, but he allegedly arranged the assassination of Vice President Luis Maria Argaña, a prominent Colorado Party figure.  

 

When it comes to building democratic institutions we must look not only to those who oust dictators, but to citizens who want a better future.  Paraguay is making progress, although it is plagued by narcotics trafficking and other illicit trades.  Its tri-border location, adjacent to Brazil and Argentina, with porous boundaries and a weak police, opens the door to other types of threats.  But as a new generation takes up its leadership role, and with time and patience, it will emerge as a more stable and democratic state among the nations of the Americas.  And Oviedo’s odyssey will become part of the region’s dramatic history of democratic transitions after the Cold War, one that coincided with the fall of the Berlin Wall, and for the most part endures. 

 

 

Photo Credit: Fernando Lugo Méndez, FLICKR, Creative Commons