The election

The streets in Montevideo were wild with enthusiasm last Sunday night, as Tabaré Vázquez, leader of the left-leaning Frente Amplio coalition, announced his presidency from the balcony of the El Presidente hotel. Standing in a press room among middle-aged career journalists pulling on cigarettes and watching the event on television, I could hear the roar of the crowd outside. Outside was where the people were, where the life was, and where the journalists should have been. Outside, the streets told me a story that a press conference never could.

All kinds of people were jammed together on 18 de Julio, Montevideo’s main street: men with flags wrapped around them, face painters donning red, white and blue paint, little girls with big eyes watching their parents embrace in joy, wandering vendors selling candied apples and cotton candy amidst the crowd. At the height of festivities, people were still polite and cautious, save for the folks who were making up for lost time on the two day pre-election liquor ban.

Despite the enthusiasm, singing and dancing, Uruguayans kept a cool head about the future of their country. On the corner of 18 de Julio, near the Social Science building of the State University, I met Agustin Fernandez. He is a young Uruguayan who voted for a radical faction within the Frente Amplio coalition. In his opinion, the new government will be “a government like Lula in Brazil or Chavez in Venezuela. Left to North Americans, maybe, but in substance, centre… still, it’s a step in the right direction.” Just what does a step in the right direction mean for Uruguayans?

The context

Between 1973 and 1985, Uruguay was home to one of Latin America’s most repressive military dictatorships. According to U.S. foreign policy researcher William Blum, Uruguay “had, at one point, the largest number of political prisoners per capita in the world.” Two hundred Uruguayans were “disappeared” by the military during the dictatorship, and according to current Uruguayan law, the case is closed on the dictatorship and its perpetrators.

For Alba Gonzalez Souza, whose son disappeared in 1976, there is real hope that a process will be started by the Frente Amplio to address the cases of “disappeared” people, who have been made invisible in Uruguayan political life. In reference to the new Frente Amplio government, Souza says, “We have fought for thirty years for this, all the dead, all the disappeared, this is their fight. It’s not really a leftist government, but it’s close.”

In 2002, Uruguay experienced an economic crisis that saw a sharp increase in poverty, and the unemployment rate spiked to 20 per cent before settling at its current level of 15 per cent. Eduardo Galeano wrote in 1999 that, “Twenty-some years ago, the military dictatorship forced many people into exile. Now, in a democracy, the economy is driving them out of the country in even greater numbers.” Graffiti on the streets proclaims “no more tears: emigrate to the U.S.” and it is estimated that 40,000 (out of a population of 3.4 million) Uruguayans emigrated between June 2001 and May 2002. With an economic crisis and population exodus of such proportions, change was the only option for Uruguay.

The election of the Frente Amplio is a historic break from the domination of the conservative Blanco and Colorado parties, who have controlled democratic life in the country for the better part of the last hundred years. Uruguay, in North American political parlance, is readily prefaced by something along the lines of “tiny U.S. ally” most recently following former President Jorge Batlle’s strong allegiance to U.S. policies.

While Argentina may have been known as the “IMF’s star pupil” before its economic crisis in 2001, Uruguay in recent years could certainly be known as the “U.S.’s star pupil.” According to the U.S. state department website, “under President Batlle, Uruguay has been particularly open to increasing ties with the United States” and of late has acted as local champion of the unpopular Free Trade Area of the Americas agreement.

The Frente Amplio coalition formed 30 years ago, and held a minority of seats in parliament when the military dictatorship assumed control of the country in 1973. In their early incarnation, the FA was a radical party, demanding land reforms and questioning the role of big banks in the country. In the years leading up to this election win, the FA broadened its coalition members, and today includes organizations of Christian democrats, social democrats, communists, socialists and former Tupamaros, Montevideo’s 1970’s era urban guerillas.

New Possibilities for Uruguay

While fear mongering U.S. headlines conjure images of a new “Socialist Elect” in Uruguay, the reality is that the FA is a centrist coalition with leftist tendencies. Many analysts feel that Vázquez ensured his election victory by selecting orthodox economist Danilo Astori to be his Minister of Finance. Astori has promised to work with the IMF (to pay Uruguay’s estimated USD $14 billion debt), as well as with the private sector; garnering him praise from The Economist magazine as the “most responsible leader of the coalition.”

Vázquez is promising a new economic strategy for Uruguay, focused on regional trade and renewing relationships with South American partners. He has affirmed Uruguay’s participation in Mercosur, a common market between Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay, as well as promised that diplomatic relations with Cuba, suspended by former president Jorge Batlle, will be restored. Relations between Uruguay and surrounding nations suffered under Batlle, but Lula de Silva of Brazil and Argentinian leader Nestor Kirchner both showed support for Vázquez during his election campaign.

All told, the Frente Amplio has taken power by placating Wall Street, vowing to strengthen Uruguay’s ties in Latin America, and promising to improve the lives of the country’s one million poor. It remains to be seen what the future holds for Uruguay, but without question, a break in the conservative political duopoly is the first step towards more fundamental social change. The most important task for Uruguayans today is to keep their critical sense, and look at this election victory not as the end of a struggle, but as the beginning of a new era of activism.