Yahoo – AFP,
Tupac POINTU, 29 December 2017
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| The election in Chile of conservative Sebastian Pinera December 17 is part of a tilt to the right in Latin American politics |
Next year
will be a big election year for Latin America, a region where democracy in many
countries is only decades young, and where the shadow of corruption stretches
wide and long.
Half of the
population across the region is being called to cast ballots.
Here are
the main points of note concerning the polls in regional economic heavyweights
Brazil and Mexico, as well a newly pacified Colombia and troubled Venezuela.
Corruption: the roots of wrath
The
Odebrecht scandal, an affair of tentacular graft involving a Brazilian
construction firm that is alleged to have paid millions of dollars in bribes to
Latin American government officials to secure juicy public contracts, has
rocked the region.
It has led
to Ecuador's vice president being imprisoned for six years, and last week
nearly resulted in Peru's president being impeached.
But the
scandal is just part of a much bigger picture of corruption, according to
Gaspard Estrada, director of an Observatory of Latin America at Paris's
Sciences-Po institute.
"Corruption phenomena are deeply rooted in the region, and persist," he said.
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| A corruption scandal involving Brazilian contractor Odebrecht is roiling politics in Latin American countries like Peru where President Pedro Pablo Kuczynchi barely escaped impeachment over graft allegations |
"Corruption phenomena are deeply rooted in the region, and persist," he said.
"This
will have an impact on the next political cycle," said Fiona Mackie, in
charge of Latin America for The Economist Intelligence Unit. The Odebrecht
scandal, she added, "is really shaking up the political scene."
The
disheartening multiple cases of embezzlement and personal enrichment by
officials in region has engendered "an impatience now in the electors,
because they are so fed up," Mackie said.
"Elections
in Brazil, Colombia, and Mexico will be dominated by voter anger against the
political establishment and demand for change, making them hard to predict and
opening up room for negative surprises," the Eurasia consulting firm said
in a recent report.
"Candidates
that better capture this sentiment will be the most competitive, and the risk
of negative surprises is high," as attested to by an unexpected surge for
the left in a recent Chilean presidential election, the report said.
That
"should serve as a reminder not to underestimate voter frustration,"
it said.
 |
Outsiders
like right-wing soldier-turned-politician Jair Bolsonaro in Brazil have
gotten
a lift from a wave of public disgust with corruption-tainted political elites
|
A boon
for outsiders
The
electoral landscape in Latin America in 2018 is dotted with an increasing
number of candidates from outside the political system.
This can be
put down to public disgust over the many instances of graft that has
"disqualified the traditional political class," Estrada said.
He deplored
a regional "leadership crisis" and feared political outsiders would
fuel discourse that undermines democracy, as in Brazil where an extreme-right
soldier-turned-politician, Jair Bolsonaro, has emerged as a contender.
Some
traditional politicians were presenting themselves as outsiders "because
that's a good thing to do in term of popularity, but they are insiders,"
Mackie said.
"An
outsider needs to ally with a party that has a machinery. You need to have a
political movement behind you," she added.
Eurasia
said Mexico "is headed towards its most uncertain and consequential
elections in decades on 1 July."
A leftwing
candidate, Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, appears best placed for a win right
now, it said.
A former mayor
of Mexico City, Lopez Obrador is aiming for the presidency after a long
political career. He has spurned the traditional leftwing PRD party to start
the Movement for National Regeneration, known as Morena.
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| Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, seen here at an event in Cuba this month, leads the country with the region's worst economic crisis but analysts predict he will win re-election next year in a tightly controlled process |
Tilt to
the right
The victory
of conservative billionaire Sebastian Pinera as president-elect in Chile after
a mid-December runoff has confirmed a general right-leaning tilt to the region,
building on the stewardship of Mauricio Macri in Argentina, Michel Temer in
Brazil and Pedro Pablo Kuczynski in Peru.
But for
Estrada, "it's not really a question of left or right -- it's just the
government that had been in place, on the left, had flagged, which encouraged
the parties on the right. What happened was a phenomenon of alternation."
More than political
labels, 2018 will be decided by economic issues "because the economy is
doing badly," he said.
"With
a few notable exceptions, the policy and economic outlook for Latin America
looks set to continue improving in 2018," Eurasia's report said.
But
political dynamics could determine whether that "positive trend slows or,
in some countries, is derailed," it said.
Eurasia
predicted that in Venezuela, the Latin American country with the most severe
economic problems, President Nicolas Maduro "will likely remain in office
and win the presidential election in a tightly controlled process."
But, it
added: "The government will also likely stumble into default, further
complicating an already bleak economic outlook."
Half of the population across Latin America will be called to cast ballots in 2018 https://t.co/p2AqV75uaR pic.twitter.com/YxUgh4vHCb— AFP news agency (@AFP) December 30, 2017
