The three countries will elect their new leaders. Political polarization and the fragmentation of society have become recurrent in Latin America.
Latin America lived in 2021 a year full of electoral appointments. Ecuador, Peru, Nicaragua, Chile, Honduras elected their new leaders and legislators, while in Argentina and Venezuela sectional and regional governments were renewed. In the year that is about to begin, it will be the turn of Costa Rica, Colombia and Brazil, with these three countries the ideological map of the region will be defined. which has undergone profound changes in recent years.
“2021 and 2022 are electoral years for Latin America and each election is an important process for each country and marks a before and after … I think there is a common thread in the elections in the region and that is that they are looking for a kind of center, of pragmatism, because I believe that all the countries of the region have experienced processes of the left, of the right, of economic crises, ”says political scientist Arianna Tanca.
Costa Rica, in February
The first to go to the polls It will be Costa Rica on February 6, 3’517.971 Costa Ricans are summoned to the electoral appointment in which they will elect a new president, two vice presidents and 57 deputies of the Legislative Assembly.
Until now 24 candidacies for the Presidency have been registeredAccording to data from the Supreme Electoral Tribunal, and if none of the candidates for the election obtains more than 40% of the votes, a second round will be held on April 3 with the two candidates voted.
Despite the fact that the elections are barely two months away, polls carried out a few weeks ago reveal that the number of undecided reaches 53%, so it is still difficult to have a clear trend on who could succeed President Carlos Alvarado Quesada, from the center to the center-left, collects CNN.
Former president José María Figueres, of the National Liberation Party, would reach 13%; Lineth Saborío, from the Christian Social Unity Party, 10%; and José María Villalta, from the Broad Front, with 6%. All three are the candidates who would achieve the highest intention of votes.
For Tanca, this country has one of the strongest democracies in the region and consider that it will remain in that line.
A country covered with quality internet from border to border would be a magnet for foreign investment, as well as the home of a generation of students who, faced with new challenges, would never be left behind. We will achieve this management with experience and leadership. pic.twitter.com/1DbmUYRKVt
– José María Figueres (@figuerescr) December 22, 2021
Colombia, in May
One month and seven days later, it will be Colombia’s turn. On March 13, more than 37 million Colombians will go to the polls to elect senators and representatives for Congress. After just over two months, on May 29 they will choose their new president.
It is expected that President Iván Duque will not stand for election since the Constitution does not provide for reelection.
Leftist Gustavo Petro, who lost to Duque in 2018, has confirmed his participation after the country’s Constitutional Court ordered in September the National Electoral Council (CNE) to recognize the legal status of its political movement Colombia Humana.
Sergio Fajardo, former mayor of Medellín and also a former candidate in 2018, is another of the politicians who will seek to reach the Casa de Nariño. Fajardo hopes to be the option of the Centro Esperanza coalition, which will soon hold its internal election.
The ruling Democratic Center party will be represented by Óscar Iván Zuluaga, economist, businessman, politician and former Minister of Finance in the second term of Álvaro Uribe’s government (2006-2010).
The second round to define the contest, if necessary, is scheduled for June 19.
Regarding the neighboring country, Tanca emphasizes that his situation “is similar to that of Chile, since this year it went through a cycle of social protests, highly influenced by the southern country and that Ecuador must be attentive since much of the agenda in common could be affected, such as the fight against drug trafficking, among other issues ”.
Brazil in October
In the last quarter of 2022 it will be Brazil’s turn. The largest country in Latin America will elect a president, senators and deputies for the National Congress.
The first round will take place on October 3 2022, and in the event that no candidate exceeds the absolute majority of the votes, as indicated in the country’s Constitution, the second round will be on October 30.
According to figures from the Supreme Electoral Tribunal, a total of 147’918.483 Brazilians are eligible to go to the polls.
President Jair Bolsonaro is expected to seek re-election and also that he faces former president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (2003-2010), who has expressed his intentions to run and would be a strong rival, according to experts.
According to several polls that came to light last month, Lula would lead the voting intentions with 48%, followed by Bolsonaro with 21%.
The former judge and former Minister of Justice Sergio Moro and the lawyer and former candidate Ciro Gomes would also seek to reach the Palacio de la Alvorada and would obtain around 8% of the votes.
The same polls reveal that in the event of a second round, Lula would reach 57% of the votes, compared to 21% for Bolsonaro.
Tanca considers that Brazil is a special case since it has been in “ups and downs of the left and right and rampant corruption.”
“Bolsonaro’s leadership also marks a kind of a right wing with more authoritarian features … then we could speculate that a scenario like that of Chile will occur,” says Tanca, referring to the triumph of the leftist leader, Gabriel Boric, who imposed the December 19 to the far-right José Antonio Kast.
“Radical leaders generate radical positions and reactions, we see that in Chile, in Ecuador. Ideological polarization and the fragmentation of society complicate governance and that is why a pragmatic leadership, a kind of center, is what Latin America needs to navigate these crises that are not only political, they are social and health due to the COVID-pandemic. 19 that aggravates everything, ”he says.
Ideological map of the region changed in 2021
In April, Ecuador went to the right when it elected Guillermo Lasso as president, who won by five points over the option of the correísmo Andrés Arauz.
Much narrower was the margin in Peru, where leftist professor Pedro Castillo and right-wing Keiko Fujimori clashed in a close vote on June 6 that was not resolved until a month and a half later, with Castillo’s proclamation amid accusations of fraud from the opposition.
Other changes to the left in 2021 were that of Honduras with the triumph of former first lady Xiomara Castro de Zelaya and that of Chile with the election of Boric, 35, which aroused an explosion of jubilation among his supporters. AFP.
However, the electoral year was also marked by irregularities due to what happened in Nicaragua. The November 7 elections strengthened Daniel Ortega in power, although they were deemed illegitimate by the international community, given the prior imprisonment and repression of opponents. (I)
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