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ASUNCIÓN, Paraguay. Paraguay welcomes a new government into a political landscape marked by hatred and gender-based disinformation. After the Colorado Party consolidated its hegemony, adding five years to its nearly uninterrupted 75-year rule, President-elect Santiago Peña and his team are presenting measures that could eliminate the Ministries of Women, Children and Adolescents, and the Secretariat of Youth. He also announced that he will enact an agreement repealing a treaty with the European Union for education funding.

With speeches based on the “defense of life and family,” the “loss of parental rights,” and the specter of “gender ideology” in education, 70 members of parliament, mostly from the Cartes faction, voted in favor of repealing Law 6.659/20 on August 9. This law approved the financial agreement with the European Union (EU) that granted 38 million euros to the Ministry of Education and Culture (MEC), funds that were earmarked for school supplies, meals, and infrastructure expenses. 

At the end of 2022, in the midst of the election campaign, the repeal bill received preliminary approval but lacked the necessary quorum in the Senate for its final ratification. Last week, after nearly three hours of debate, legislators voted and reaffirmed their initial position. There were six votes against and one abstention.

The bill to repeal the agreement with the EU returns to the Senate, where an absolute majority (30 votes) is required to pass or veto it. This morning, President-elect Santiago Peña announced that he will enact the repeal of the agreement.

The current Minister of Education and Culture, Nicolás Zárate, expressed his opinion regarding the Chamber of Deputies' decision that by repealing the aid, "they are taking away school lunches" from the children. "This issue really makes me angry, it bothers me immensely. Because of the insensitivity of the deputies, who failed to live up to what the people are asking of them, they have repealed a donation, money that belonged to the children," he said in an interview.

"They want to attack rights"

Despite the fact that the project 'Approving the financing agreement between the European Union and Paraguay for the program to support the transformation of the educational system in Paraguay' does not intervene in the curriculum of public education in the country, the ruling party has been spreading lies since the internal party elections last year.

Among the most serious accusations, they claim there is an attempt to "homosexualize" the country's children and adolescents through the implementation of "gender ideology" in education. This, they argue, is a response to the demands of anti-rights movements , with Pastor Miguel Ortigoza as one of the main spokespeople for this falsehood.

Senator Blanca Ovelar's stance went viral due to the forcefulness of her arguments against representatives of the Cartes faction within her own party. "I want to tell society, it's a lie that they're going to manipulate your children, it's a lie that they're going to teach them to be homosexual. It's an irresponsible absurdity from people who are uneducated and fanatical, driven by electoral interests," she stated.

He also explained in this statement that the lies were fabricated as part of the last electoral campaign for the Colorado Party primaries in December 2022 to win votes. “They mix their far-right agenda with religious beliefs. And they want to attack the rights of minorities, people with disabilities, women's rights, and people with different sexual orientations. What we need is a society that respects people's freedom, people who have existed since the beginning of time. What alternative do they offer? To kill them all?” he said.

Congressman Yamil Esgaib, a member of the Colorado Party, stated at a press conference that the word "gender" is "used to distort" the concept, and that gender "is either male or female. " "We are not going to approve this because it conditions the future of my children," he affirmed. In the Chamber of Deputies, he asserted that in Paraguay, "we do not allow handouts or donations conditioned on the future of our children, of our families." He also said that the European Union cannot "teach them" how to raise their children and that in the new administration, "there will be plenty of money." This comes despite the fact that the repeal will leave a debt of 110 billion guaraníes in the Ministry of Education and Science (MEC) that the next government will have to cover.

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50,000 students in Asunción without school lunch

This is money already committed to ongoing programs, such as school supply kits and textbooks. The legislators who voted to repeal the agreement did not propose an alternative source of public funding. They demonstrated that they are not seeking to address the needs of the 476,872 children and adolescents who are currently outside the education system. If this repeal is approved, some 50,000 students in Asunción will be left without school lunches starting in September of this year.

Following the bill's passage in the lower house, Senator Basilio Núñez, a member of the Colorado Party known for his sexist and hateful remarks, stated : "The battle began on November 22nd of last year. I was one of the legislators who introduced the repeal of that law that enshrined gender ideology. Anyone who wants to come out of the closet should do so at 18 and leave our Paraguayan children and families alone ."

Basilio Núñez said that “the agreement will be repealed and a new agreement will be reached with the EU.” In his view, everything can be solved by “improving public spending,” and that is why they are considering laying off state employees. “This government hired 70,000 public employees; we are going to lay off 30,000, and instead of having ghost employees, we will use those funds for children,” he stated. Although there are other “alternatives” proposed by Vice President-elect Pedro Aliana, such as an addendum, budget adjustments, or a new agreement with the EU, it remains unclear how they would implement these changes. 

Several organizations that defend children's human rights spoke out against the position taken by the members of parliament. The Coordinator for the Rights of Children and Adolescents (CDIA) published a statement Aireana , a lesbian rights group, and the feminist mental health organization Psicofem also issued statements .

A law that prohibits “gender ideology” in education

On August 1st, at the inter-institutional meeting of the Commission on Children, Adolescents, and Youth , the bill that “prohibits the promotion, encouragement, or teaching of gender ideology in educational institutions” was debated. The bill was sponsored by Senators Lizarella Valiente, Gustavo Leite, Natalicio Chase, Carlos Giménez, and Orlando Penner, all members of the Colorado Party. At that meeting, Valiente stated that “Paraguay is not sexist” but rather that women “spoil men.” Several of her lies were subsequently exposed.

According to Lizarella Valiente, her intention is to penalize “homosexual indoctrination” within the education system through this bill. In other words, she wants to criminalize education with a rights-based perspective and education on gender and sexual diversity. However, “gender ideology” was not defined in Lizarella Valiente's original bill. Furthermore, she herself, while serving on the Committee on Children, Adolescents, and Youth, corrected herself and acknowledged that the term was poorly worded. The problem is that the term was replaced with “gender perspective,” but even with this modification, the initiative has serious technical flaws.

Lawyers Mirta Moragas Mereles, María José Durán Leite, and Cecilia Balbuena del Pino, from the Feminist Legal Clinic (CJF), analyzed the proposed legislation and explained that prohibiting a category of analysis used in the social sciences to study power imbalances between genders is unconstitutional . Among other reasons, they cited Article 26, which guarantees freedom of expression and freedom of the press, as a violation. Furthermore, the law would violate treaties ratified by Paraguay, such as CEDAW, and the bill fails to establish an enforcement body or procedure. According to the lawyers, the proposal to promote this prohibition is part of a broader strategy aimed at fueling a “moral panic.”

But Lizarella wasn't the only one spreading misinformation. Dannia Ríos Nacif, a lawyer and assistant prosecutor in Ciudad del Este, identified as a hate-monger and gender-based misinformation spreader by the media outlet El Puente , said that children are being mutilated and subjected to "immunizations" in other countries. "Girls have their breasts removed, boys their genitals. Girls have their ovaries and uteruses removed. We see this in countries like Spain, where the Ministry of Health is already being sued for promoting this in children. In the United States, doctors who have already removed breasts, ovaries, and uteruses are being sued. I think Paraguay still has time to stop this madness," she stated.

Ríos Nacif is a founder of the National Life and Family Party. She ran for senator in the 2023 general elections while continuing to work as a judicial official. Furthermore, as we reported in this article , on April 19th she presented a citizen-initiated bill titled “Gender Ideology is Child Abuse,” which proposes amending Article 135 of the Penal Code. Its objective is to include as “child abuse” the promotion of materials or activities that alter “children’s natural perception of their sexuality.”

While the Chamber of Deputies debated the repeal of the agreement with the EU, Senator Valiente marched in the Plaza de Armas wearing a "We Are Many, Many More" t-shirt, alongside Miguel Ortigoza, with a group of fundamentalists and conservatives who called themselves "pro-life." Messages such as "pro-life politicians," "no to gender perspective," and "no to gender equality" were prominent among the signs held by the demonstrators.

Why merging the ministries would be a setback for rights

Another decision that aligns with the Cartes administration's "pro-life" discourse against "gender ideology" is the planned merger of the Ministry of Children and Adolescents, the Ministry of Women, and the Secretariat of Youth to create the "Ministry of the Family." The new Speaker of the Chamber of Deputies, Raúl Latorre, announced on July 7 that the creation of the "Ministry of the Family" is among the projects that President-elect Santiago Peña intends to promote.

“The president-elect also spoke to me about his intention to present the bill that creates the Ministry of the Family; following his guidelines, his policy, the party's position regarding the defense of life from conception and the defense of the family as the first nucleus of formation and support of Paraguayan identity,” he said at a press conference. 

The Paraguayan Human Rights Coordinating Committee (Codehupy) expressed its concern regarding the possible elimination of the aforementioned ministries and secretariats and their replacement by a proposed Ministry of the Family. They believe this would represent a significant setback in the progress made regarding the rights of women, children, and youth, which in turn could undermine the country's democracy.

“We are concerned that this implementation could be used as a tool to intensify hate speech against vulnerable communities, such as Indigenous families and the LGBTI community. The denial of the diversity of families existing in our country and the exclusion of human rights for all people without distinction are alarming,” they stated in a press release.

One question, noted feminist lawyer and human rights activist Emilia Yugovich, is the Ministry's definition of "family." It can be assumed, based on the position held by leaders of the Colorado Party, that this refers to families consisting of "father, mother, and children," the only type of family they recognize. 

It is also unclear what role the Ministry of the Family will play and who will be in charge. It is unknown what will happen to the public policies implemented over the years by the Ministry of Children and Adolescents (MINNA) and the Ministry of Women. “If these ministries were to be downgraded and placed under another ministry focused on something broader, it would extend to these other two groups—children and women—within the framework of ‘family,’ leaving people out, leaving people neglected by the State,” she reflected. 

#TheOther15A: for our rights and against narco-politics

Under the slogan “By fighting we will be better off,” various social, political, labor, human rights, peasant, indigenous, women's, and feminist organizations marched in a day of protest called “The Other August 15th.” The mobilization took place in the context of the inauguration of the new government of Santiago Peña. 

The organizers stated: “We are convinced that unity and mobilization are the effective way to stop the violation of rights, narco-politics, and the arbitrary takeover of positions of power by Cartes supporters.” In addition to the march, there was a fair, an open mic, artistic performances, music, and a large communal meal.