CENTRAL AMERICA

 

El Salvador's President-Elect Seeks Close U.S. Ties
BY BLAKE SCHMIDT

El Salvador -- In a clear sign that maintaining close U.S. ties will be a top priority, El Salvador's newly elected leftist president met with U.S. embassy officials soon after stripping power from the ruling conservative party, which had enjoyed 20 years at the helm and a solid alliance with Washington.

Mauricio Funes of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front, or FMLN -- a former guerrilla movement -- met with U.S. Embassy Charges d'Affaires Robert Blau after declaring victory in a raucous election that split the nation between those who support continuity over a new face in the political spectrum.

David Munguia, a Funes security advisor and former colonel in the Salvadoran army, said the president-elect has sent clear messages he will maintain close U.S. ties.

''These messages will allow us to build a government that doesn't seek confrontation,'' said Munguia, who is part of Funes' 12-member transition team. First contact is to be made this week with a visit by U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Thomas Shannon.

Munguia said the transition team will seek to ensure investor confidence as they prepare for the country's first FMLN government. Funes said the FMLN has erased doubts about whether the ruling Nationalist Republican Alliance, known by the Spanish acronym ARENA, would turn this fledgling democracy into a one-party hegemony.

''El Salvador is now ready for alternating governments,'' Funes said.

After losing three elections to ARENA, FMLN leaders selected a former TV journalist to head their campaign. Though critics say FMLN hardliners will shift the country's loyalties from Washington to Caracas, even former guerrilla leaders say they will seek to keep close ties to the superpower to the north.

''Obama wants a new foreign policy,'' said Sigfrido Reyes, the FMLN party spokesman who will likely be tapped as Funes' foreign minister. ``He wants to give diplomacy a relevant role instead of war.''

ARENA, whose candidate Rodrigo Avila conceded defeat after preliminary results gave his opponent a 2.5 percent lead with 90 percent of votes counted, had been one of Washington's staunchest allies in Latin America.

During the 1980-1992 civil war, FMLN guerrillas battled the U.S.-backed ARENA government, which maintained an oppressive and militarized state and held close links to right-wing death squads.

But since the war, El Salvador's economy has become intricately linked to the U.S. economy. The ARENA party opened the economy to trade and investment, replaced the colon with the U.S. dollar and privatized key industries.

El Salvador was the first country to ratify the Central America Free Trade Agreement CAFTA, which later was amended to CAFTA-DR to include the Dominican Republic, and most of the nation's trade is with the U.S.. About 2.5 million Salvadorans who live in the U.S. send an estimated $2.3 billion in annual remittances to relatives in El Salvador.

In a victory speech Sunday, Funes promised to protect private property, and said he'll reach out to the country's business community. But he has also promised to crack down on tax evaders, enforce protections for factory workers and increase the state's role in private enterprise. His calls to stop tax evasion among the rich have drawn fire from business leaders, who say they've always paid.

After he told exuberant fans early Monday morning that El Salvador has begun a new stage in its history, Funes met behind closed doors with party leaders and took congratulatory phone calls from leaders around the region, including Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, Nicaragua's Daniel Ortega and Chile's Michele Bachelet.

Reyes said the FMLN will continue to work closely with the U.S. on trade, drug enforcement and the Millennium Challenge account. El Salvador is set to receive some $46 million in development aid projects and will also benefit from the Merida initiative, which will pump funding into El Salvador's national police force.

Funes says he will purge the national police force of corruption before launching a crackdown on crime that has given the country a reputation as one of the world's most violent.

Murders between rival gangs in El Salvador's barrios has boosted the country's murder rate to one of the world's highest and enforcement efforts have caused the prisons to overflow with gang members who maintain close contacts with their organizations via cell phones. Part of the Merida initiative would support a transnational anti-gang prevention center here.

After Funes claimed victory Sunday night, celebrators took to the streets waving red flags and blowing whistles. They said their show of support was proof that change is underway as such demonstrations for the FMLN were previously dispersed by police.

''This is a peaceful revolution. This is a new revolution,'' said student Danilo Rosales, 21. ``This is a democratic revolution.''