MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Former vice-president to head Mercosur committee

Former Argentine vice president Carlos “Chacho” Alvarez will become the new president of the Mercosur Commission of permanent representatives. He will be taking office during the December 8/9 presidential summit in Uruguay.

Argentine President Nestor Kirchner made the appointment announcement Wednesday during a press conference in Puerto Iguazu, northern Argentina, following a meeting with his Brazilian counterpart, Luiz Inancio Lula da Silva.

Alvarez will replace former Argentine President Eduardo Duhalde, whose term as the Mercosur commission head ends in December. Duhalde was a key sponsor of Kirchner's election in May 2003 but has since had a falling out with him due to the bitterly contested congressional elections last October in which both men's political allies ran against each other.

"It was a consensus decision" with all Mercosur members (Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay) said President Kirchner during the celebration marking the 20th anniversary of Brazil-Argentina Friendship Day, created in 1985 by former presidents José Sarney (Brazil) and Raúl Alfonsin (Argentina).

Originally a member of President Kirchner's Peronist Party, Alvarez resigned in 1990 to protest the shift to the right under then President Carlos Menem and formed the Grand Front party. It later integrated into a center-left coalition of parties known as Frepaso, of which Alvarez took the leadership.

In 1999, when he was then leader of Frepaso, Alvarez formed an alliance with Fernando De la Rua of the Radical Party. When their broad coalition, known as the Alianza, won the elections that year, he took office as De la Rua's vice president.

However the coalition didn't last: Alvarez quit De la Rua's government in October 2000, accusing De la Rua of involvement in a bribes scandal in the Argentine Senate. His departure from government, which weakened De la Rua's power base, has since been widely interpreted as the first blow towards the ousting of De la Rúa which effectively occurred with the financial collapse in December 2001.

In his first statements Mr. Alvarez said he had definitively abandoned professional politics and has been working for several years now on "integration and cooperation affairs" in non government organizations.

"Integration is very important for the region, it will also help improve the way politics is addressed and cooperation among country members will help face the challenges of Mercosur", said Mr. Alvarez.