The Making of a President

By Thomas A. Sancton

In response to U.S. prodding, the assembly names a moderate

He was no stranger to politics, but he had never run for public office before. While his backers portrayed him as a competent moderate, his enemies in the ultraright Nationalist Republican Alliance (ARENA) denounced him as "the biggest thief in El Salvador." But when the votes were counted in San Salvador's linoleum and plate-glass Legislative Palace last week, the members of El Salvador's newly elected constituent assembly had chosen Alvaro Alfredo Magana, 56, a U.S.-educated economist and banker, as the country's provisional President by a vote of 36 to 17.

For all the controversy surrounding the choice, Magana's election came as no surprise. Indeed, it was part of a compromise worked out by the major political parties after strong prodding from the Salvadoran military and the U.S. embassy. The same agreement also led to the election of three Vice Presidents instead of one. Representing the largest parties in the assembly, they were Raul Molina Martinez of the rightist National Conciliation Party (P.C.N.), Gabriel Mauricio Gutierrez Castro of ARENA, and Pablo Mauricio Alvergue of the centrist Christian Democrats. The result gave at least the appearance of a political consensus. Declared U.S. Ambassador Deane Hinton: "A government of national unity is good news for El Salvador. Democracy is at work."

Perhaps. But it was a fragile democracy of byzantine complexity that put Magana in the Presidential Palace. The selection of a provisional head of state capped a month of cutthroat political maneuvering that began with the March 28 election for a constituent assembly. That ballot had given 40% of the popular vote to the Christian Democratic Party, led by outgoing junta President Jose Napoleon Duarte and supported by the U.S. because of its progressive land and banking reforms. But a right-wing coalition headed by ARENA and the P.C.N. won control of 34 of the assembly's 60 seats and boldly moved to seize power. It gave the assembly presidency to ARENA Leader Roberto d'Aubuisson, 38, a former army major with alleged links to the country's notorious death squads, and then sought to put one of its own men at the head of the new provisional government.

The right's relentless drive for total control of the new government was blocked only at the last minute. Weeks of none too subtle pressure from the U.S. had convinced the country's military commanders that a rightist monopoly of the most important jobs in the government might cause Congress to cut off military aid. Without Washington's largesse, which is expected to total $362 million in 1982, the military would be hamstrung in its fight against the leftist guerrillas seeking to topple the government. The generals therefore insisted on a respectable moderate as provisional President. Their preferred candidate was Magana, who was also acceptable to the U.S. and to a faction of the P.C.N., the old political arm of the military regimes that ruled the country from 1961 until the October 1979 coup that ultimately brought outgoing President Duarte's civilian-military junta to power.

Though isolated from its main coalition partner on this issue, ARENA refused to give up the fight for a right-wing President. According to some Salvadoran observers, D'Aubuisson saw the struggle as a "machismo" exercise to prove that he was tougher than the generals and the U.S. embassy combined. The boyish-looking former intelligence officer was encouraged by the gaggle of mostly female supporters who packed the assembly gallery each day to shout their support and hoot down the opposition. Before Magana's selection, ARENA Leader Mario Redaelli boasted that he had told the U.S. embassy's political counsellor: "Maybe we should set up special ballot boxes for [U.S.] Senators and Congressmen to come down and vote directly."

D'Aubuisson's forces got their way at the assembly's first working session on Monday. After teasing and baiting the Christian Democrats for 6 1/2 hours, the rightists rammed through "Decree No. 3," granting broad governing powers to the assembly. In addition to naming the top provisional government officials, the right-dominated assembly will ratify all Cabinet appointments, exercise all legislative authority, write a new constitution and organize new national elections, perhaps as early as next year. In effect, the decree seemed likely to make D'Aubuisson and his coalition partners in the assembly the country's dominant power, reducing the government to a subordinate role.

Meanwhile, the army commanders stepped up their pressure in favor of Magana's election. On Tuesday, D'Aubuisson and other political leaders were summoned to high-command headquarters and bluntly warned that the military might mount a coup if the right did not go along with the army's demands. Faced with that ultimatum, the politicians quickly hammered together the deal that led to the election of Magana and his three Vice Presidents.

El Salvador's new President is a short, balding man with black horn-rimmed glasses and a reputation for political shrewdness that belies his gentle, unassuming manner. He studied economics at the University of Chicago from 1951 to 1955, and subsequently worked for the Washington-based of American States. Magana's nomination by the army reportedly stems from his practice of giving preferential interest rates to military officers during his 17 years as president of El Salvador's Banco Hipotecario. Said to have a flexible attitude toward the land-and banking-reform programs and a willingness to negotiate an end to the country's civil war, Magana sees his new role as that of an "administrator" and "adviser."

Just how much real power Magana will wield from the Presidential Palace will become apparent as he begins to assemble his Cabinet. With only two months remaining before Congress again reviews El Salvador's human rights record, Washington policymakers were hoping that Magana's election would bring real improvement. Said one State Department official: "The government will look good. The nagging doubts are whether it will act well . "-- By Thomas A. Sancton.

Reported by Timothy Loughran/San Salvador and Johanna McGeary/ Washington

With reporting by Timothy Loughran/San Salvador, Johanna McGeary/Washington

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