EL SALVADOR: FMLN'S "FULL-COURT PRESS" AGAINST

C O N F I D E N T I A L SAN SALVADOR 001643

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/22/2016
TAGS: ES PGOV PREL KMCA
SUBJECT: EL SALVADOR: FMLN'S "FULL-COURT PRESS" AGAINST
MCA PROJECT

Classified By: DCM Michael A. Butler, Reasons 1.4 (b) and (d)


1. (C) SUMMARY: The hard-left opposition party Farabundo
Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN) has launched an
offensive against the Salvadoran Government's proposed
Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) project. An FMLN
delegation to be led by FMLN Deputy Jose Salvador Arias plans
to travel to Washington to lobby against funding the proposed
northern road, the backbone of the proposal; the delegation
will also meet with representatives of the World Bank and
International Monetary Fund (IMF) to voice opposition to
loans in the amount of $357 million needed for El Salvador's
2006 federal budget. The FMLN junket is part of a larger
effort to block the ruling ARENA party's agenda at every
turn, in hopes that President Saca's inability to move ahead
in addressing the country's pressing social problems will pay
off at the polls in 2009. A legislative insider told the
Ambassador June 21 that the MCA project enjoys support among
FMLN local leaders, but that the party's leadership was
campaigning against it (and other GOES priorities) in an
effort to extract political concessions. END SUMMARY.


2. (SBU) The FMLN has launched a domestic and international
strategy to gut the Salvadoran government's proposal for a
compact with the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC).
President Saca announced in early June that he had formally
presented the proposal to develop the country's northern zone
through human and productive development activities made
possible by the completion of a backbone east-west highway
facilitating travel and trade throughout the region. On June
15, FMLN deputies proposed a motion in the Legislative
Assembly to eliminate the highway, and reorient the funds to
environmental activities. The motion was made in the name of
the Salvadoran Ecology Union (UNES) and the Environmental
Action Network, and was sent to committee (in this case,
chaired by the National Conciliation Party, an ARENA ally)
for deliberation.


3. (C) The FMLN has alleged that its mayors in the region
and other stakeholders were not adequately consulted on the
proposed MCA project, and that in any event the project is
only intended to benefit wealthy business interests. In
fact, mayors across the country, representatives of NGOs, and
political parties were included in the lengthy and
comprehensive consultative process conducted by the National
Development Commission and the Government's MCA core team.
Several themes did emerge as concerns, among them the impact
of the project on a region that is the source of the vital
Lempa River, and these concerns are being addressed. While
the official record of those consultations is still being
compiled, it is clear that FMLN mayors as well as their ARENA
counterparts recognized the project as a concrete opportunity
to finance a road discussed for decades, which would help the
area catch up with the nation's more-developed central and
coastal regions. After it became clear that its mayors in
the region supported the MCA project, the FMLN leadership
moved to invoke tighter internal discipline and obedience to
the Front's larger national agenda, which includes the
reintroduction of the Colon, and opposition to mining
development as well as the construction of new ports,
hydrolectric projects, and a San Salvador beltway.


4. (C) Ambassador raised the question of FMLN opposition
during a June 21 conversation with former Assembly President
Ciro Cruz Zepeda Pena. (Zepeda, who was not reelected in
March, continues as a formal adviser to his party, and has
maintained his role as deal-maker among El Salvador's
political leadership.) According to Zepeda, the FMLN's
opposition was formal and political rather than substantive,
part of an "all-out opposition" approach deployed by the FMLN
to win concessions from Saca's government. Zepeda believed
there was support for the project among FMLN leaders in the
North, and that the FMLN central leadership's opposition
would not threaten the project.


5. (C) COMMENT: Having witnessed FMLN hardliners' 2005
expulsion of all dissenting voices and abolishment of open
primaries, the northern-region mayors may be convinced to toe
the party line, notwithstanding their earlier enthusiasm for
the project. However, the FMLN's latest moves to oppose so
vigorously the nation's continued development could backfire.
Past polls have shown that voters are far more perspicacious
than the FMLN thinks when it comes to recognizing who is
creating gridlock and forestalling the nation's progress.
END COMMENT.
Barclay