Uruguay's Vice President Resigns and Is Replaced by Former First Lady.

AutorGaudin, Andres

It took four years, but Uruguay's conservative opposition finally managed to rattle the government of President Tabare Vazquez and force the resignation of Vice President Raul Fernando Sendic, a leading next-generation figure who was expected to represent the governing Frente Amplio (Broad Front, FA) coalition in the October 2019 general elections.

All the right needed, it turned out, was a steady flow of misinformation--disseminated by anonymous authors operating in cyberspace and amplified by the country's major news outlets--and the unexpected "complicity" of the governing coalition itself, which to preserve the country's institutional integrity and protect its reputation for ethics and honesty in politics, didn't hesitate to condemn one of its best-positioned figures to the political gallows.

President Vazquez described the misinformation campaign as "bullying" and "the most shocking cruelty I've seen in my life." Deputy Carlos Coitino, leader of one of the FA's smaller member parties, reserved his criticism for the coalition's handling of the situation, saying that "many colleagues, in their eagerness to distance themselves from Sendic, don't seem to realize that it wasn't the vice president the right kept attacking, but the governing coalition as a whole." The conservative opposition, he said, is using a "dirty campaign" to accomplish what they've been unable to do at the polls since 2004. "Although they don't want to see it, Uruguay itself is one of the targets of the neo-liberal restoration campaign underway throughout the region," Coitino added.

Smooth transition

The final phase of this crusade played out in just 96 hours and not in the way the conservative Partido Blanco (White Party)--eager to take political advantage of the situation--had hoped. The Blancos, also known as the Partido Nacional (National Party), are the leading right-wing force in Uruguay. The other major conservative group is the Partido Colorado (Red Party) (NotiSur, June 23, 2017).

Sendic resigned before midday on Sept. 9, a Saturday. That same day, just hours after the news went public, the Partido Blanco's leading figure, Sen. Luis Lacalle Pou, gathered reporters together in the solemnity of the deserted congressional building --which was empty only because it was a normal day off--and defined the unfolding events as a "serious political and institutional crisis." Other party leaders, however, weren't warned or informed about Lacalle Pou's dramatic...

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