by the El Reportero’s wire services
The ex-president and current senator José Mujica will be the main speaker at the launching on Saturday of the election campaign of his wife, Lucía Topolansky, for the Administrative Division of Montevideo.
The municipal elections will be carried out on next May 10 in 19 departments of the country.
In the capital, Topolansky competes with another two precandidates of the leader Frente Amplio (FA), and the Partido de la Concertación (Party of the Agreement), which gathers the opponents parties National and Colorado.
Nevertheless, other candidates of the FA, Daniel Martínez and Virginia Cardozo, also will be present in what has been described as a ‘united gesture’.
Topolansky heads the most recent surveys to replace by a period of five years the current Governor Ana Olivera, also from the FA.
The organizers of the event, which will be carried out in the central Square Líber Seregni, announced the presence of outstanding artists, such as the folklorist Rubén Rada.
Experts in Guatemala urge to fight exclusion in LatAm
Delegates and experts from 15 Latin American and Caribbean countries urged last week governments, international-cooperation organizations and social movements to fight poverty and exclusion in the region.
After three days of discussion, the participants in the annual Assembly of National Platforms and NGO Networks in Latin America said in a communiqué that democracy in Latin America still does not offer any social or economic answer to the population.
They concluded that the common factor was exclusion of indigenous populations, especially women and youths.
Inequality is a problem in the region, because wealth is concentrated in few hands, while poverty is highly extended especially in the rural areas, said the text signed by several Latin American and Caribbean organizations.
To fight poverty, the Assembly recommended the United States, international cooperation organizations and social movements to encourage development that protects the environment, water sources, woods, and respects the rights of aboriginal people.
Argentina’s Unions support decision to nationalize railroads
Argentina’s railroads unions have described as historical President Cristina Fernandez’s decision to re-nationalize railroads in the country, announced last Sunday.
During her address to the Congress on March 1st, the president announced she will present a bill to make the company Ferrocarriles Argentinos, a State company, which will be in charge of passenger and cargo transport services as well as infrastructure.
Next day, Minister of Transport Florencio Randazzo informed all private operators that the State would take control of the sector once the concessionary period had ended.
The Government has been paying railroad workers from main metropolitan lines since last year and has subsidized all services. However, private companies have failed to comply with the investment plans.
Technical sub-commission to end conflict in Colombia in session
A technical sub-commission begins today to debate the issue End of the conflict in Colombia, as part of the peace talks in this capital between the government of President Juan Manuel Santos and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia-People’’s Army (FARC-EP).
