Paraguay elects a new president today

Presidential candidates Efrain Alegre, of the Partido Liberal (left-wing), and Horacio Cartes, of the Partido Colorado have the best opportunity, among the 12 candidates that today compete por the Presidency of Paraguay,  a country with a wound still open for the rapid destitution of Fernando Lugo in 2012, in a controversial impeachment in the Senate.

Efrain Alegre (left) and Horacio Cartes

Today’s elections are a milestone in the country’s return to international respectability one year after the dismissal of Lugo, criticized by neighboring countries as an “institutional coup” that threatened the democracies of the region and led to the nation to be distanced from the Unasur and Mercosur.

“Hopefully, this isolation that Paraguay suffered with this elections is over,” said this week OAS representative, Oscar Arias, who reiterated that “sanctions are not imposed to a government, are imposed to the people; and poor people, like Paraguay, does not deserve that. ”

During the campaign, which ended last Thursday night, the candidates did not stop hurling accusations. Alegre did not stop repeating that Cartes is a drug dealer, and Cartes accused his liberal opponent of embezzling state funds when he was minister and for usung public resources in his campaign.

Whoever wins will face the same difficult problems that have been endemic for decades in this nation of about 6.2 million inhabitants, of which more than half leave in poverty.