I wish I had the time to study my Masters in Governance, Management and Political Management at the same time I was fully involved in political journalism, back in the 90s. Also, that many of my colleagues then, and now, would have that specialized training, as profitable.

Between 2018 and the pandemic, under the tutelage of Olilia Carlier and with the agreement of the Catholic University of Guayaquil and George Washington, in the US capital, the myths and truths of political negotiations. And many “impossibles” that were running around in my head at that time began to loosen up to the point of being recognized as “possible”, when – leaving aside evaluations of all kinds – it is about achieving a political goal.

And Santiago Basabe, the “chef of politics,” was the one who launched the chili peppers into a mid-class debate: Should the government agree to specific bureaucratic administrative demands to get votes? Horror! It was heard from the back of the room, from where those who flinched at the very mention of “political negotiations” fired. “Kuharu” still seemed like a valid ingredient, an ace up your sleeve that you have to know how to use at the right time, as it happens in our country and in the world. And he abounded in examples, actual cases that occurred between Carondelet and the old Congress, in times of mobile majorities, and of actions taken because some party leaders were given the “gift of desire.”

Politics is, among many things, the art of facilitating improbable agreements. Let those who had “extreme” ideological positions, “incompatible” social demands and ancestral discomforts and minimal pacts sit at the table.

Politics is, among many things, the art of facilitating improbable agreements. That they… reach minimum agreements…

Something like that is happening right now around the political process against President Guillermo Lass, a process that seems very intellectually questionable, but which has forced the political apparatus of negotiations to be launched, with the mission of obtaining votes that avoid censorship, in a process in which arguments and whether there is evidence it will count for little, but it will be defined in the “dictatorship” of the absolute majority, if the opposition manages to maintain it.

Can we ask the Minister of the Interior who had to face this kind of crisis from the very beginning? I do not think so. This is precisely the most extreme side of his job and it seems, from what is revealed, that he is doing well, although for this he admits to co-rules that two years ago sounded impossible. It is a job of political goldsmithing, the likes of which Laso has never had before.

Co-governance, if implemented effectively, should in no case mean a blank check for corruption or propaganda, but rather the possibility of showing one’s ability even though one’s image is inevitably projected by government work.

When you do it, is it good, but when the person in front does it, is it bad? This criterion usually comes into play. And the question becomes easily replicated when communicators take the radical view that this negotiation is satanic. The corruption they see every day in their reports has made them, and us, untrustworthy. (OR)