Countries of the World/COUNTRYS.BIN/dp/0281/02817.txt

Text File | 1991-06-25 | 33KB | 523 lines

$Unique_ID{COW02817}
$Pretitle{356}
$Title{Paraguay
Chapter 4A.   Government and Politics}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Thomas C. Bruneau}
$Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army}
$Subject{president
national
constitution
stroessner
congress
government
political
chamber
executive
state}
$Date{1987}
$Log{Presidential Offices*0281701.scf
}
Country:     Paraguay
Book:        Paraguay, A Country Study
Author:      Thomas C. Bruneau
Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army
Date:        1987

Chapter 4A.   Government and Politics

[See Presidential Offices: At the Governmental Palace, Asunsion.]

     On February 14, 1988, General Alfredo Stroessner Mattiauda was elected
for his eighth consecutive term as president of the Republic of Paraguay.
Stroessner, the candidate of the National Republican Association-Colorado
Party (Asociacion Nacional Republicana-Partido Colorado), officially won 88.7
percent of the vote. At the time of the election, the president was
seventy-five and in his thirty-fourth year of rule. He had held power longer
than any other Paraguayan and was five years ahead of Cuba's Fidel Castro Ruz
for longevity in office in the hemisphere. Among contemporary international
leaders, only Kim Il Sung of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (North
Korea) and Todor Zhivkov of Bulgaria had been in power longer. When Stroessner
first took office in August 1954, Juan Domingo Peron was president of
Argentina, Getulio Dornelles Vargas was president of Brazil, and Dwight D.
Eisenhower was president of the United States.

     Stroessner's enduring power was based on the twin pillars of the armed
forces and the Colorado Party. The former--from which he emerged and in which
he maintained positions as commander in chief of the armed forces and
commander in chief of the army--provided the institutional base for order and
stability. The latter, of which he wrested control in the mid-1950s, furnished
the links with large sectors of society, provided for mobilization and
support, and allowed him to legitimate his rule through periodic elections.
The overall system, based on these two institutional pillars, functioned
through a combination of coercion and cooptation involving a relatively small
sector of the population in the slightly industrialized and partly modernized
country.

     As Stroessner and the enduring small group of supporters around him aged,
the regime was increasingly unable to respond to popular demands to begin a
transition toward democracy, despite much speculation in the mid-1980s that
change was in the air. The demands for change originated from a variety of
sources, both foreign and domestic. As the neighboring republics of Argentina,
Bolivia, Brazil, and Uruguay underwent political transitions from
authoritarian to democratic regimes in the early 1980s, Paraguay was often
considered with Chile, on the far side of the Andes, the only remaining
analogous regime in South America. Pressure from these new democracies for a
similar transition in Paraguay was low; however, in the 1980s the United
States was clearly in favor of a political opening for a peaceful transition
in the post-Stroessner era. Support for democracy with broad participation, as
well as a pointed critique of the Stroessner regime's human rights policies,
also were prominent in the speeches of Pope John Paul II during his visit to
Paraguay in May 1988.

     In addition to the external isolation and foreign pressure, there were
important internal pressures for a transition. After very high rates of
economic growth in the 1970s, Paraguay's economy stagnated in the 1980s. In
addition, the external debt nearly doubled during the same period. Within
Paraguay the major opposition political parties, which had formed a National
Accord (Acuerdo Nacional) in 1979, began to promote public demonstrations in
April 1986. This growing, heterogeneous movement was joined in its opposition
by other organizations and movements, including the Roman Catholic Church and
sectors of business, labor, and university students.

     Despite these pressures, Stroessner was once again nominated by the
Colorado Party for the 1988 election, although the nomination split the party
into a number of competing factions. The state of siege declared by Stroessner
in 1954 was finally lifted in April 1987, but opposition politicians and
leaders of movements were arbitrarily arrested, meetings broken up, and
demonstrations violently repressed. With the closing of the daily ABC Color in
March 1984, the weekly El Pueblo in August 1987, and Radio Nanduti in January
1987, of the independent media, only the Roman Catholic Church's Radio Caritas
and its weekly Sendero remained. Under these conditions, most opposition
parties advocated abstention or blank voting in the elections. The church also
registered its reservations on the validity of the elections by admitting the
acceptability of blank voting.

     Paraguay had had barely two years of democratic rule by law in its entire
history. It lacked any tradition of constitutional government or liberal
democracy to serve as a reference point. Traditionally, out-of- power groups
had proclaimed their democratic commitment but repressed their opponents when
they took over the reins of power. Thus, a transition to democracy for
Paraguay would not mean a return to a previous status, as in the case of its
neighbors, but rather the creation of democracy for the first time.

The Governmental System

Constitutional Development

     The Republic of Paraguay is governed under the Constitution of 1967,
which is the fifth constitution since independence from Spain in 1811. The
Constitutional Governmental Regulations approved by Congress in October 1813
contained seventeen articles providing for government by two consuls, Jos
Gaspar Rodriguez de Francia and Fulgencio Yegros. The framers also provided
for a legislature of 1,000 representatives. Recognizing the importance of the
military in the embattled country, the framers gave each consul the rank of
brigadier general and divided the armed forces and arsenals equally between
them. Within ten years, however, both Yegros and the legislature had been
eliminated, and Francia ruled until his death in 1840 (see El Supremo
Dictador, ch. 1).

     In 1841 Francia's successor, Carlos Antonio Lopez, asked the legislature
to revise the constitution. Three years later, a new constitution granted
powers to Lopez that were as broad as those under which Francia had governed.
Congress could make and interpret the laws, but only the president could order
that they be promulgated and enforced. The constitution placed no restrictions
on the powers of the president beyond limiting his term of office to ten
years. Despite this limitation, Congress subsequently named Lopez dictator for
life. He died in 1862 after twenty- one years of unchallenged rule (see Carlos
Antonio Lopez, ch. 1).

     At the end of the disastrous War of the Triple Alliance (1865-70), a
Constituent Assembly adopted a new constitution in November 1870, which, with
amendments, remained in force for seventy years. The constitution was based on
principles of popular sovereignty, separation of powers, and a bicameral
legislature consisting of a Senate and a Chamber of Representatives. Although
its tenor was more democratic than the two previous constitutions, extensive
controls over the government and the society in general remained in the hands
of the president.

     In 1939 President Jose Felix Estigarribia responded to a political
stalemate by dissolving Congress and declared himself absolute dictator. To
dramatize his government's desire for change, he scrapped the constitution and
promulgated a new one in July 1940. This constitution reflected Estigarribia's
concern for stability and power and thus provided for an extremely powerful
state and president. The president, who was chosen in direct elections for a
term of five years with reelection permitted for one additional term, could
intervene in the economy, control the press, s