August 26, 2010. Copyright 2010, Graphic News. All rights reserved

Profile of Fernando Lugo, President of Paraguay
By Joanna Griffin

LONDON, August 26, Graphic News:  His election in 2008 was seen as revolutionary but Paraguay's ailing President Fernando Lugo is languishing in the popularity polls as he struggles to make headway in reforming a country as well known for government corruption as it is for its high levels of poverty.
 
A recent poll published in La Nacion newspaper found that just 31 percent of Paraguayans rate their leader's performance as good while 39 percent consider it merely average. While he hardly swept to power with a huge share of the vote, the former bishop carried his nation's hopes that it might finally shake off the shackles of the past: his Patriotic Alliance for Change ended more than 60 years of rule by the rightwing Colorado party.
 
But progress was always going to be slow. Lugo has delivered on pledges to make health and education services more available, and renegotiated the terms of a crucial deal over the shared Itaipu hydroelectric dam with Brazil, tripling payments to Paraguay. But he had to ask for patience after frustration with the pace of land reform led to protests.
 
It is justice for the rural poor that has always driven Lugo. Born in Encarnacion in 1951, he was ordained in 1977 and, after working as a missionary in Ecuador, spent a decade as a bishop in the poor region of San Pedro. It was in this role that he began flexing his political muscles, leading the landless to demand their rights. Pope Benedict XVI reluctantly let the "red bishop" leave the Church to run for president.  
 
Since the start, he has made his allegiances clear: he wore sandals to his inauguration and refused to accept a presidential salary. But he describes himself as a moderate and resists being lumped with the region's more vocal left-wing leaders, Venezuelan Hugo Chavez and Evo Morales of Bolivia, while nurturing ties with Brazil's Lula and Vasquez of Uruguay.
 
He is famed for his honesty but is not exactly squeaky clean: as president, he has faced paternity suits from three women who say he fathered their children (Lugo has admitted to one of these). Doubtless, the media fuss over this has been an unwelcome distraction but, in a macho society, it is unlikely to have done too much damage to his reputation. More seriously, he was recently diagnosed with cancer and is undergoing treatment.    
/ENDS