Yamandú Orsi was elected president of Uruguay in the second round held on Sunday. The candidate of the Frente Amplio (FA), an alliance that brings together the main left-wing and progressive parties in the country, managed to win against the official candidate Álvaro Delgado, of the Blanco Party. His victory confirmed the good results obtained in the first round, with the majority in the Senate and two deputies achieving it in the Chamber of Deputies.
“It is a night of many thanks,” said Orsi when speaking before the many people gathered on the coastal promenade of Montevideo. “Many thanks to those who made political militancy an example, let us be aware that forty years ago there had been such a long period of uninterrupted democracy (…) the country of freedom, equality, solidarity and respect triumphs once again “, he stated when celebrating an election with high participation, with 2,231,065 votes cast on a register of 2,727,120 qualified.
Orsi spoke after the vice president-elect, Carolina Cosse, mayor of Montevideo from 2020 until this year, spoke. The next president also sent a message to those who did not vote for him: “There is another part of our people who, like us a while ago, today have a different feeling. These people will also have to help us build a better country, them too.” “We need them.”
Orsi’s words were framed in the tone of a campaign marked by respect between the parties, something increasingly unusual in some elections on the continent. The quick reactions of the current president Luis Lacalle Pou, as well as the defeated candidate, reflected this climate: “I want to send from here with this entire coalition a big hug and greetings to Yamandú Orsi and the Frente Amplio,” said Delgado in the face of a defeat confirmed shortly after the polls closed.
The reasons for victory
“It is the victory of a rebellious people, who when it was thought to be very difficult because they beat us in advertising 3 to 1, not a little more advertising, but 3 to 1, and yet the Frente Amplio is the force with the most votes, has the majority in the Senate, 48 deputies. And when they said that things were very even, there is clearly a greater difference,” said Fernando Pereira, president of the FA, to Público, when the result was known, which showed a result different from the very close one that was announced. most anticipated of the polls, with finally about 4 points, that is, about 70,000 votes, in favor of the progressive candidate.
“This is the merit of thousands of men and women who worked in each territory, in each locality, each city, who gave us accommodation so that the FA tours were more economical. Houses of colleagues, sometimes the children slept in their parents’ beds next to their parents so that we could have accommodation,” said Pereira in reference to the organizational work of the FA in the different territories of the country, particularly in the almost five hundred Base Committees.
These Committees were particularly visible during the election weeks in Montevideo, a city with a progressive majority, with FA flags hanging on balconies and cars, as well as numerous walls painted with the names of Orsi, Cosse, and the main slogan: “The safe change”, reflection of a campaign marked by moderation and political centrism.
“It is also thanks to our wives, our companions, our people who helped us make this miracle called Frente Amplio, which is supported by thousands of militants,” said Pereira, excited like many on a night where the celebration of the winners arrived sooner than many imagined.
“The truth is that it is a barbaric joy, because suffering so much, waiting five years that were very bad with the other president, this is pure celebration. Yamandú Orsi won for the people, the people knew what they had to vote for, they realized what what the other president had done,” said Cristina, 60, with her FA hat and flag in front of the stage where they spoke about who will be in front of the Executive from March 1st.
Progressivism to come
Orsi will take office after five years of government of the White Party, headed by Lacalle Pou, allied with other right-wing parties such as the traditional Colorado Party. The outgoing government was marked by corruption scandals, such as the one involving the former head of custody of Lacalle Pou, Alejandro Astesiano, convicted of conspiracy to commit a crime, or the well-known case of the Uruguayan drug trafficker Sebastián Marset, indicated for possible links with the government for a irregular situation of delivery of an express passport while he was in prison.
Lacalle Pou, however, maintained an approval rating of over 45% according to some surveys, a high rating in the context of governments in the region that often have difficulty maintaining their mandates with a positive image. Delgado presented himself as a continuation of Lacalle Pou, in a sober style in contrast to the new rights, with vindication of the role of the State in matters such as housing or health.
Orsi will now have the challenge of leading a new FA government, which already governed between 2005 and 2020, with Tabaré Vázquez, Pepe Mujica, and again Tabaré as presidents. Mujica, who is undergoing treatment for throat cancer, was particularly active in the final stretch of the presidential campaign, giving his support to Orsi in interviews and participating in some events.
Pereira, when referring to the next challenges, told Público that it will be “clearly development, growth and distribution, and the FA is going to put all its resources into that. There cannot be a retiree, a pensioner with 17,000 pesos of income “There cannot be 570,000 workers who earn less than 25,000 pesos. We have to go to solve this problem, it will not be overnight but clearly we are going to solve it.”
A complex neighborhood
Orsi will be president in a different region than the one left by the last Vázquez government, who died in 2020. One of the first points in focus will be the relationship with Argentina, Uruguay’s neighbor governed by Javier Milei, who has been leading a policy abroad with chronic diplomatic tensions with progressive actors in the region, and which announced last week a, for now uncertain and unconfirmed, Free Trade Agreement with a United States.
This Milei policy of regional disintegration headed by Milei is in contradiction to the foreign policy that the FA announced that it will carry out, as can be read in the Programmatic Bases 2025-2030, which indicates, for example, that it must “strengthen and expand Mercosur as the first block of regional integration in the political, cultural, social, economic and commercial areas.”
Orsi will instead have an ally in Brasilia, governed by Lula da Silva, in a context of uncertainty due to the upcoming arrival of Donald Trump to the White House with a pre-announced aggressive policy towards Latin America, headed by the next Secretary of State, Marco Rubio.
Uruguay will begin a new progressive five-year period, led by one of the oldest experiences of unity in Latin America such as the FA, founded in 1971, before the last dictatorship that lasted between 1973 and 1985. A government in a political system that showed a democratic solidity, as well as large areas of consensus, something that makes the country of 3.5 million people between Argentina and Brazil an increasingly atypical place in the region.
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