MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Paraguay: progressive president and conservative congress

Paraguay's President-elect Fernando Lugo will face a largely conservative Congress that may make carrying out his reforms difficult, according to the vice president-elect Federico Franco.

Although the former Catholic prelate or "the bishop of the poor" as he's known ran as an independent he was backed by the Patriotic Alliance for Change, a coalition of center and center left political and grass roots groupings plus the Paraguayan Radical Authentic, a party with a long history in the country. Vice president-elect, Federico Franco, from the Radical Authentic party said the political composition of the country's Congress indicates that there will likely not be any abrupt changes in Paraguay. "We have a Congress that is fundamentally conservative," Franco said. In the Chamber of Senators, one of the two bodies of Congress, he said, "of the 45 senators, for example, only one is of the left. Forty-four are of center-conservative tendency". Actually the Legislative will be divided almost in equal thirds between Lugo's supporters, the long established Colorado Party and the dissident Partido Colorado general Lino Oviedo. But Lugo can count on support from splinter groups of the Colorado Party, which ruled Paraguay undisputed for 61 years, but was unable to unite behind a common candidate in last Sunday's election thus sealing its electoral fate. Actually Lugo's main problem will be trying to convince Brazil and Argentina to pay a "fair price" for the electricity from the two huge dams, Itaipú and Yaciretá respectively. Jointly built along border rivers but with most energy going to the major neighbors. Brazilian Foreign Affairs minister Celso Amorim was quoted in the Sao Paulo press saying that Brazil does not want to be seen as "imperialist" or interested in taking advantage of its dominant position. "The time when we could think we're the biggest and the rest of South America had to follow us is over and gone. President Lula da Silva is well aware of this and we must have a generous vision of the whole picture. This does not mean we have to be nice but rather generosity implies our own interests in the long term, and a peaceful region" However Brazil is looking for a mechanism to introduce amendments to the Itaipu treaty of 1973, --without modifying it-- which states that Paraguay must sell all the surplus energy exclusively to Brazil. Paraguay only needs 5% of the huge dam's electricity generated. "The treaty can't be modified, we must talk with the other side to know exactly what the problem is", said Amorim. Sao Paulo press revealed that president Lula da Silva congratulated Mr. Lugo and requested a meeting to address "a bilateral agenda" before he takes office August 15.