The Foreign Service Journal, September 2012

that were effectively bankrupting the government. He had also rejected a proposed gold-mining venture by Pa- cific Rim Corporation, putting him in the same camp as environmentalists, anti-business activists and the Catholic Church. Saca’s foreign policy alignment was, however, withWashington: El Salvador sent a battalion of troops to Iraq, for example, and refused to recognize the Fidel Castro regime in Cuba. For its part, the FMLN had put down its weapons in 1992, and gradu- ally gained seats in the legislature and mayoralties around the country. Re- cent mayoral and other campaigns were grounded more in local issues and folklore and less in ideology. Even the oil deal that some FMLN mayors negotiated with Venezuela’s state-owned oil company, PDVSA, was as much about money as ideology. The resulting consortium, called “Alba- Petroleos,” has generated campaign funds for the FMLN that would be il- legal if El Salvador had a modern cam- paign finance law; but it doesn’t, so the oil and money keep flowing. Over the years, some moderate FMLN figures had bailed out, or were expelled, leaving the leadership in the hands of hardline former guerrilla commanders still loyal to Castro (and now Hugo Chavez). However, the party’s next generation of leaders had come of age after the civil war, and even some of the former guerrillas have mellowed over time. Having learned that they could not win the presidency running one of their own members, the FMLN leadership ap- proached Mauricio Funes to join the party and head their 2009 ticket. Funes was a celebrity journalist with broad name recognition, who had contemplated running for president well before he was nominated. His TV news fame had coincided with the rule of successive ARENA-led govern- ments, which Funes targeted regularly in muckraking stories. A Marriage of Convenience? The Funes/FMLN “marriage” was based on each side’s conviction that the other was its vehicle to power, and de- cisions about how to share power after victory were postponed. FMLN hard- liner Salvador Sanchez-Ceren was named Funes’ running mate, generat- ing much speculation. One conspiracy theory even postu- lated that the FMLN would assassi- nate Funes just after he was sworn in, leaving Sanchez-Ceren in charge. Such fears were allayed by pledges that Funes would uphold the Sal- vadoran constitution, which ascribes considerable powers to the president of the republic. (Sanchez-Ceren now looks like the FMLN standard bearer in 2014.) Meanwhile, ARENA experienced its own nomination controversy. Pres. Saca, who had also been a media per- sonality before taking office, believed he could engineer the process in a way that looked fair, but in the end pro- duced the candidate he wanted all along. Vice-President Ana Vilma Es- cobar made exactly that allegation, publicly, even before she and Saca left office. Although it would be hard to find ARENA members, or even Sal- vadorans in general, who do not like Rodrigo Avila, a former chief of the na- tional police and legislator, his presi- dential candidacy got off to a poor start as a result. As the March 15, 2009, election date neared, polls showed a tightening race, fueled by impassioned, smash- 42 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / S E P T E M B E R 2 0 1 2 As the March 15, 2009, election date neared, polls showed a tightening race, fueled by impassioned, smash-mouth campaigning by both sides. Chargé d’Affaires Robert Blau and Mrs. Blau (to the right) congratulate Salvadoran President Mauricio Funes and Mrs. Funes (to the left) on election night in 2009. Sarah Currlin