El Salvador: Victory of the Old Guerrillas, by Sergio Ramirez
	Sun, 23 Apr 2000 02:39:12 -0400

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Prensa Latina
DIRECT FROM CUBA Weekend Feature Service
April 22, 2000
 

EL SALVADOR: THE VICTORY OF THE OLD GUERRILLAS

by Sergio Ramirez
Nicaraguan writer and politician

Managua.- During the last weeks of the election campaign in El Salvador I
was NOT surprised at the virulent speech given by the former president,
Alfredo Cristiani, in Santa Tecla, beating alarm drums against the danger of
a communist victory.

There were protests in the streets, a strike of the workers of the Social
Security continued and the business elite of the National Association of
Private Entrepreneurs (ANEP) closed ranks with the National Republican
Alliance (ARENA), the government party who Cristiani represented.  The signs
were dangerous.

In spite of the fact that it was a campaign speech, it was strange to hear
Cristiani unearth an out of date language, when he himself, was sailing
against the extremist winds that were blowing over his own party, that
during the 90s had made a peace agreement possible that changed the
guerrilla forces of the Farabundo Marti Front (FMLN) into a political party,
setting the foundations of peace that those parliamentary and municipal
elections should continue to consolidate.

The winner was the FMLN, not surprising according to the surveys, and
everything has happily returned to its course.  Hector Silva, FMLN candidate
who won the re-election by an overwhelming majority as Mayor of San
Salvador, at the head of a coalition of three parties, has expressed very
wise words when he said that what was important now was not the
confrontations, but that these be held on the electoral plane and that the
left and the right agree to respect the rules of an institutional democracy.

Violence is a matter of the past.

The results were equally distributed.  They have given the FMLN a majority
of two seats in the National Assembly over ARENA, with an important third
place to the Partido de Conciliaci<=n Nacional (Party of National of
Reconcilement) that, during the 70s, was the springboard for the military
hierarchy to take power over repeated frauds and now emerges from the old
rubbish room.

A 70 percent abstentionism has not favored the governing party, as usually
occurs.

The most noteworthy, however, was the victory of Mayor Hector Silva, who has
given his charisma and prestige to the front in the capital.  I am sure that
he influenced the parliamentary elections in favor of the FMLN and
contributed to the victory of its candidates for mayors of the main cities
of the country.

Silva, a gynecologist, graduated in the United States, who rose from the
ranks of Christian Democracy, has become a key figure in the immediate
future of El Salvador, in spite of the fact that he is not favored by the
heads of the FMLN, who in 1999 preferred defeat in the presidential
elections rather than accept him as a candidate; because of his
independence, which is his greatest electoral strength and, for the old
guerrillas, is the greatest obstacle.

The coming years will be proof for the FMLN, that, in spite of the positive
electoral results, maintains its rigid ideological codes, a subject that is
losing the interest of the people and is where Cristiani is also mistaken,
by using extremist language to win votes.

Because the voters tend to ignore, even more, the old ghosts of the
conflicting propaganda.  As the analyst, David Escobar Galindo, who
participated as Cristiani's government representative in the peace talks,
explained, now politics in El Salvador "is based on what the people feel,
not necessarily what they think.  For this reason the ideological views are
losing their effect".

And people tend to feel that ARENA, according to the analyst, is a party
that is more intent on protecting the interests of the privileged, than
those of the poor.

The triumph of the FMLN can be a good sign for the coming presidential
elections, supporting a winning candidate such as Hector Silva rather than
prefer defeat for ideological reasons or fear of a loss of political
control; with an independent figure in the presidency, to fear losing
control of power, by the strong attraction that this figure would wield; and
then to deny an opening up becomes an affair of survival.

But the FMLN counts on its own strength, that it should not lose, because
its electoral prestige depends on it: its leadership, although rigid in
ideological terms, has acted as a true opposition, loyally supporting the
democratic system that they themselves contributed to create and has not let
itself be drawn by the seduction of political pacts to divide parts of power
with ARENA.

And in this integrity of conduct and in knowing how to select a candidate
beyond ideological prejudices is the key to a future in power.


(c) 2000 Prensa Latina, S.A. (PL). All rights reserved

 
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