“Ahora tenemos presidente,” repeated my friend Haydeé, grinning after Mauricio Funes’s victory. Now we have a president. Her words captured both the satisfaction of the leftists in winning their first presidency and the calmness with which the nation has received the result.
My reporting is belated, but on March 15th, in Latin America’s first election since Obama’s victory, El Salvador followed the North American lead. Funes is a charismatic center leftist, often accused of being more radical than he seems, who comes from outside the world of the established political elite. He based his platform on “secure change” and inspired a devoted following, especially among young people. Funes’s party, FMLN (Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front), was the guerilla faction during the war in the ‘80s that laid down its arms in 1992 and became a political party. They’ve been running socialist former comandantes since then, but this time around they finally got it and put forward this well-liked former television personality with no ties to the bloodshed of 20 years ago.
This may partly explain why the campaign of fear that worked so well five years ago against Shafik Handal failed to swing the vote to the right in 2009. This time the people just weren’t willing to believe, as ARENA (Nationalist Republican Alliance, the right wing party that’s been in power for 20 years) tried to tell them, that the moment the FMLN’s mild mannered journalist won the election he would call up Hugo Chávez and order a shipment of Kalashnikovs, or seize all private enterprise, or cut all ties with the United States. The people wouldn’t be duped this time. This election was a triumph over fear and misinformation.
Funes joins the emerging pan-American left of Obama, Chile’s Bachelet, Argentina’s Kirchner, Ecuador’s Correa, and Brazil’s Lula, among others. His first visit after winning was to Brazil to get tips from Lula, whom he wants to emulate. El Salvador could certainly further develop its social programs, and a laid-back samba vibe wouldn’t hurt either—perhaps Funes’s Brazilian wife will dedicate herself to that end.
Funes takes office June 1st, and I can’t wait. I hope it’ll go well for him. A peaceful change in power and governmental shakeup may be the best thing that can happen to El Salvador right now.
