Party of Former Leftist Guerillas Wins El Salvador's Presidential Election

Interview with Max Garcia, Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador, conducted by Scott Harris

After being involved in a bloody civil war that killed over 75,000 people, and spending 20 years in political opposition, El Salvador's leftist Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front, or FMLN, won a historic presidential election victory on March 15. Voters in the Central American nation cast ballots for FMLN presidential candidate Mauricio Funes, a well-known television journalist, defeating his opponent Rodrigo Ávila of the right-wing Nationalist Republican Alliance, or ARENA, by a slim 2 point margin.

The ARENA party was founded by notorious death squad leader Roberto D'Aubuisson during El Salvador's civil war. Among D'Aubuisson's thousands of victims were Catholic priests, nuns, lay workers and San Salvador Archbishop Oscar Romero, who had advocated for El Salvador's poor. The Reagan and first Bush administration provided military, economic and political support to successive conservative governments in El Salvador fighting the FMLN guerillas. After a peace agreement was signed between the government and rebels in 1992, the FMLN formed a political party where they won legislative seats and controlled municipal governments.

Before the March 15 election, several U.S. Republican congressmen had attacked the FMLN, accusing them of being allies of Iran and al Qaeda, and threatened to halt $40 billion in remittances sent back home from Salvadorans living in the U.S. After winning national power for the first time, the FMLN now faces a global economic crisis, extreme disparity between the rich and poor and high crime and murder rates. Between The Lines' Scott Harris spoke with Max Garcia, coordinator of the New York chapter of the Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador or CISPES, a U.S.-based group founded during the civil war. Reached in San Salvador after observing the election, Garcia reports on the historic nature of the FMLN victory and the challenges ahead for president-elect Mauricio Funes and his running mate Salvador Sánchez Cerén.

Contact the New York chapter of the Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador by calling (202) 521-2510 or visit their website at www.cispes.org

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"Between The Lines" is a half-hour syndicated radio news magazine that each week features a summary of under-reported news stories and interviews with activists and journalists who offer progressive perspectives on international, national and regional political, economic and social issues. Because "Between The Lines" is independent of all publications, media networks or political parties, we are able to bring a diversity of voices to the airwaves generally ignored or marginalized by the major media. For more information on this week's topics and to check out our text archive listing topics and guests presented in previous programs visit: www.btlonline.org
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