MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Presidential hopefuls' inflation in Uruguay's ruling coalition

Dissident communits and socialist support Marcos Carambula

The Uruguayan ruling coalition Broad Front made the official launching Monday of the third presidential hopeful for June primaries: Marcos Carambula who is mayor of the second most important electoral circumscription after Montevideo.

In his first speech, clearly conciliatory, Carambula called for Broad Front unity and adherence to its founding principles and promised his first visits would be to the government run University and the trade unions headquarters. "Workers and students' united advance and fight" said Carambula rememorizing the Montevideo street battles of the sixties and seventies triggering a strong applause from the heterogeneous rally which included four cabinet ministers, leaders of different groups from the ruling coalition and dissenting Communists and Socialists. Carambula a doctor by profession and with Communist roots joins former Economy minister Danilo Astori and Senator Jose Mujica in the dispute to become the Broad Front's presidential candidate for next October's Uruguayan presidential election. "We must all turn out to vote in June so we ensure October's victory in the first round", emphasized Carambula who promised he is planning to visit the friendly governments of Paraguay, Ecuador, Chile, Bolivia, Venezuela, Brazil and Argentina. However a third option means not everybody is satisfied inside the ruling coalition that when in opposition always preached unity and an only presidential option, scoffing the so called Uruguayan traditional parties multi candidate options, The fact is that former guerrilla leader Mujica, on his own words, "has the charm and the votes", while economist Astori is a "genius with numbers" and the "best Finance minister in half a century", but has trouble getting through to people and even worse seems allergic to smiling. Mujica represents the populist source of the ruling coalition, Astori the conservative white collar centre and Carambula the Communists who loathe the former Tupamaro guerrillas and Socialists who feel the economic policy under President Tabare Vazquez has been too orthodox. Actually the leaderships of the Socialist party in a divided vote decided to support Astori, and the Communists with a greater majority Mujica. The dissatisfied seem to have cuddled under Carambula. The three options formula has travelled a long way from the original proposal of President Vazquez who suggested the winning October ticket should be Astori-Mujica, thus avoiding the divisive and slow to heal June primary. However the former guerrilla leader, the most popular leader behind Vazquez and his sector the most voted (in the last election and according to current opinion polls) feel it was time they headed the ticket which was rejected plain blank by the Astori team. Since then the dispute in spite of the "unity" pictures at cosmetic rallies, has turned increasingly sour. "It's hard for the Communists to vote for a member of the former guerrilla group with whom they have a long historical difference. And among Socialists, hard rock Socialists, Astori has proven too conservative to swallow, much less support", said Juan Carlos Doyenart chief pollster of Interconsult. Adolfo Garcé a political scientist was quoted saying that the first reaction is that there's "uncertainty" among the Broad Front rank and file. Mujica is still the favourite and it's hard to see Astori even with the support of four groups, leading with votes next June. Carambula has been a surprise and we have to see how deep he bores into the militants' hearts". Uruguay's Broad Front based on the electoral tradition of the country can be defined as a catch-all political movement, extending from former guerrillas and communists to Christian democrats.