MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

New OAS chief champions democracy.

At his installation ceremony here Thursday, the new OAS chief, former Costa Rican President Miguel Angel Rodriguez, championed a hemisphere “united in support of shared growth” to free the Americas from the bonds of poverty.

Rodriguez told the Permanent Council of the Organization of American States that the body should strive to transform "globalization into a political, economic and social equalizer" which would leave no community, region or country behind.

"We will continue to act so that the lights of freedom and democracy shine on the entire hemisphere," Rodriguez said before an audience that included 12 heads of state and numerous foreign ministers.

In a nod to the hemisphere's multilingualism, the Spanish-speaking Rodriguez peppered his address with English, French and Portuguese fragments.

He insisted that the "fundamental challenge" currently facing the region's people is breaking "the shackles of poverty, inequality and (social) exclusion." "Democracy is the form of political organization that corresponds to freedom," Rodriguez said, while noting that this institution "is always fragile." He said this was because the democratic system "is not based in the strength of the powerful ones, but in the legitimacy that arises from respecting the rules of the game and the opportunity for peaceful change." "Our goal is to obtain the necessary balance so that the OAS can guarantee (the right to live in a democracy) without detriment to the free will of the people or to (the policy of) non-intervention." "History has shown us that freedom is the best tool for building and progressing," the OAS chief said.

As an example of the burdensome poverty facing the region, Rodriguez cited the case of Haiti, where - in the wake of Hurricane Jeanne - "the pain of poverty is reflected in its harshest severity." The OAS "should be the conscience which reminds us all of the immense and long-term effort needed in Haiti," Rodriguez said.

Proclaiming "a multidimensional vision of security," Rodriguez said seeing "the Americas as a land free of terrorism, violence, crime, epidemics and the unforeseeable effects of natural disasters is a dream that unites us in the 21st century."