Lacalle Pou officially declared Uruguay's next president

[sandensea]

Conservative presidential candidate for the National Party Luis Lacalle Pou will be Uruguay's next president, the country's Electoral Court confirmed today.

The National Party nominee won the presidential run-off on November 24, his narrow victory marking an end to a 15-year era of center-left Broad Front administrations in the South American nation of 3.5 million.

While the final vote count is still ongoing, as of 2:30 p.m. local time Lacalle added 7,188 votes to his preliminary total, compared for 3,361 for Martínez - bringing Lacalle's margin to 32,193, or 1.4%.

"The evolution of the vote scrutiny does not change the trend, so we greet President-elect Luis Lacalle Pou with whom I will hold a meeting tomorrow. I thank those who trusted us with their vote from the heart," Broad Front nominee Daniel Martínez tweeted this morning.

"We will continue to defend democracy with more force than ever."

Martínez, 62, won the first round on October 27 by 11%.

But Lacalle secured endorsements from the center-right Red Party - as well as the far-right Open Cabildo Party, whose nominee, retired Gen. Guido Manini Ríos, exhorted fellow officers to vote against the Broad Front to "close the door on communism and gender ideology."

Lacalle, 46, inherits one of Latin America's strongest economies, with GDP growing 4% annually during the Broad Front era - compared to 1.5% in the previous 50 years - while poverty fell from 40% to 8.1%.

The "Macrisis" in neighboring Argentina has pushed Uruguay's small economy into a downturn however, with GDP inching up just 0.1% year-on-year in the second quarter.

At: https://www.batimes.com.ar/news/latin-america/lacalle-pou-officially-declared-uruguays-next-president.phtml

An exultant Luis Lacalle Pou greets reporters after his narrow victory this Sunday, confirmed today by the provisional count vote.

Lacalle's win ends the 15-year center-left Broad Front era, during which the economy grew strongly and previously widespread poverty declined sharply.

Martínez, who conceded defeat this morning, has compared Lacalle to neighboring Argentina's Mauricio Macri, whose "Macrisis" has pushed Uruguay into a downturn.

[Judi Lynn]

1. Lacalle has created his own support group of gullible, simple minded, greedy, racist idiots.

At least his victory is minimal.

Hope the more well-balanced people of the opposition will be paying close attention, breathing down his neck until he's gone.

The same people who elected Vázquez and José Mujica must not back away as Uruguay still needs them and their beliefs close at hand. They are the ones who care about the well-being of the country, not themselves.

[sandensea]

2. As that Uruguayan voter living in Argentina told him: "don't make Macri's mistakes"

Lacalle's team are already squawking about "the need to reduce fiscal deficits" - which as you know, Judi, is right-wing code for cutting social programs and infrastructure while cutting taxes on the rich.

My guess is that Lacalle with move to further deregulate their already-shady banking system (Uruguay has long been called the "Switzerland of South America" for its banking secrecy laws, as well as its mostly white population and relative prosperity).

He'll do so not only because his top backers expect him to - but also because now that Fernández will probably raise export and wealth taxes in Argentina, Lacalle will try to lure the expected increase in tax evasion from Argentina's landowning and financial elites.

Macri's (utterly unproductive) tax cuts spoiled them, and they're not looking forward to paying their fair share again. Uruguay has long been a favorite tax heaven for them.

Reminds me of when Clinton was elected in '92.

You may recall that there was a wave of capital gains cashed in during December of that year, in order to dodge what they expected to be higher taxes under Clinton. Some, like Ken Dart and John Dorrance (the Campbell Soup heir), even moved to the Caribbean "in protest."

And then they got homesick! Oh, well.

[Judi Lynn]

3. Excellent comments. I hope many pairs of eyes will see your post.

People can be so close to the results of these maneuvers for so many years they can't see what the pattern is at all and it's so important they gain an overview, and realize what has always been the plan with NO exceptions.

Your post is perfectly ordered, should bring a lot of light to the subject.

What a shame it has been going on so long, and causing so much suffering, and worse.

I have heard references to the mysterious Uruguayan national identity and the fact so many of the people are conspicuously white. It wasn't always that way was it? It didn't happen before massacres, and even turning indigenous people into actual slaves, to serve the interests of the ruling class, during the 35 year old (with blessings from the US) reign of fascist President Alfredo Stroessner who even gave haven to "The Auschwitz Angel of Death" Josef Mengele the torture happy surgeon who did inhuman experiments on people in the concentration camps.



Stroessner, left, Pinochet, right.







Mengele, hangin' with his pals.

Uruguay's President welcomed Mengele with open arms of course. Kindred spirit.

It shows the spirit of the people of Uruguay when it's learned future President Pepe Mujica and his wife, the future Senator Lucia Topolansky, were folk heroes as they fought so hard and were imprisoned by the Stroessner regime!







Former militant group member José Mujica (left), later Uruguay's president, sits with fellow
political prisoners Adolfo Wassen Jr. and Mauricio Rossenco on March 14, 1985, the day they
were freed.

Credit:
AFP/Getty Images



Lucia Topolansky as a prisoner.

Great article on former President Pepe Mujica's wife:

Think Uruguay’s president is fascinating? Meet his wife
GlobalPost

March 30, 2014 · 8:15 AM UTC

Updated: March 31, 2014 · 8:30 AM EDT
By Will Carless

https://www.pri.org/stories/2014-03-30/think-uruguay-s-president-fascinating-meet-his-wife


Sorry for adding all the baggage to this post, felt it is encouraging to be reminded of the real spirit of the people of Uruguay, regardless of the horrible leaders they've had to accept from time to time.

[sandensea]

4. Why, thank you Judi. Likewise.

Uruguay, like Argentina, has a white majority mainly because from around 1870 to 1930, they received large waves of European immigration (mostly Italian and Spanish).

How much is up for debate, since neither country counts ethnicity in their census - but it's probably around 70% in Argentina, and around 80% in Uruguay. The rest are mainly mestizo or mulatto.

There were massacres of Indigenous peoples - but their numbers in that region were relatively small to begin with. They didn't have anything even resembling the highly-populated cultures in pre-Columbian Peru, Bolivia, Guatemala, and Mexico.

Still, many in Uruguay and Argentina have some Indigenous blood (and African blood, especially in Uruguay). The degree to which people have any, often determines their social status.

Just a little too much makes someone a "morocho" - which is tantamount to being discriminated. This is true in even in cases where the morocho/a reaches the pinnacle of their career, as was the case with Cristina Kirchner.

Consequently, progressive parties in the Southern Cone region (Chile/Argentina/Uruguay) are simply not viable if they nominate someone who isn't white. It's just too easy for the elite to use middle-class racism against them if they do.

I remember this worrying me when Néstor Kirchner (whose health was failing) nominated Cristina in '07. "Any tax hikes on the rich," I recall thinking, "and they won't go after the policy - they'll go after her for her ethnicity (una negra!), and everything that follows from that ('uppity/thieving morocha, how dare she!' etc.)."

A lot like what Obama had to put up with - and for many of the same reasons.

[Judi Lynn]

5. Your post is more helpful than you can imagine to educate on the social dynamics there.

I never would have grasped that Cristina Kirchner was anything other than a very attractive Spanish lady whose husband seemed to truly care for her and enjoy her company.





Looking for images of her and or/her husband I was horrified to discover there are more than a few grotesque political caricatures of them BOTH, truly cruel which were published over the years. Those cartoons say it all. She had some bitter enemies. People don't do "artwork" like that who aren't coming from a vicious dark place. Wow.

Thank you for the insights. They aren't something a person would discover casually at all.