Peasants announce marches to demand resignation of Paraguay’s president

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Agricultural worker organizations announced this Monday, March 22nd, that they will mobilize this week in Asunción to demand the resignation of the president, Mario Abdo Benitez, and the vice president, Hugo Velazquez, due to the “ineptitude and corruption” of the government in the management of the pandemic, which has overwhelmed the public health service of the country.

The protests announced by the National Coordination of Peasant and Indigenous Organizations coincide in time with the March of the Poor Peasantry which every March 25 is carried out in the capital by the National Peasant Federation (FNC).

Representatives of the Coordination claimed, in an act in the center of Asunción, that for this Tuesday they expect that some 5,000 people from all over the country will congregate to continue the rest of the week with the demand for the exit of Abdo Benitez and Velazquez, both from the conservative Colorado Party.

The organization said in a communiqué that the marches will concentrate on denouncing a government which “was responsible for squandering the resources to confront the pandemic” and which they hold responsible for a “serious health, social and economic crisis which today is already unsustainable”.

Some of its leaders told the media that the only solution to this situation is the resignation of the President and asked for the support of the government as a means to overcome the current situation.

Read: Analysis – Rise in coronavirus cases in Paraguay precipitates political crisis

This is in reference to the fact that the ruling party voted last Thursday as a block in the Chamber of Deputies against the proposal of the opposition to initiate an impeachment trial against Abdo Benítez and Velázquez for poor performance of their duties in the context of the pandemic.

The resignation of both is also part of the demands that the FNC, Paraguay’s largest farmers’ organization, plans to make this Thursday in Asunción.

“For land, health, work and sovereignty. For land, health, work and sovereignty”, is the slogan of what will be the 27th march of the FNC, after it was suspended a year ago due to the health crisis.

In the presentation of this year’s mobilization, its leaders pointed out that they will again denounce the Government for the “absence of land distribution policy and health policy”.

They also called for a citizen debate to build a “national development model” and the installation of an “Emergency Government” after a hypothetical departure of Abdo Benítez.

The President is undergoing political erosion due to a health crisis marked by the lack of supplies and medicines for covid patients in public health centers. In addition, the population is still lacking vaccines, which have so far reached the medical personnel, when the country is in a red health alert due to the increase in the number of cases.

These factors led to massive citizen protests in Asuncion in the middle of the month to demand the resignation of the president and vice-president.

The Ministry of Health reported last week that all respiratory and intensive care unit beds are occupied.

The pandemic, which has Asunción as one of its focal points, has so far left a total of 3,730 deaths and 194,122 infected in the country, which has a population of some 7 million.