There was a distinct whiff of boot-polish in the spacious corridors of jailed presidential candidate General Lino Oviedo's Asuncion campaign HQ, when I called there last month. Shortly afterwards, the Supreme Court confirmed Oviedo's prison sentence and forced his Colorado Party to substitute his deputy, Raul Cubas, the likely winner of last Sunday's elections, as its candidate. But Oviedo remains the real power behind the Colorado victory, which will probably result in the general's release.
At the HQ, volunteers were dusting down their leader's trophies in a special room dedicated to his achievements. There were sabres, sashes and gold trophies displayed behind glass cases, while another wall was dedicated to Oviedo's ascent through the military, from cadet (1962) to general (1990).
A matronly campaign chief, Blanca Delgado, (her husband a military man) steered me through several offices, introducing me to everyone who crossed our path. There was a retired general, a colonel, the wife of a colonel, the son of a brigadier general, all working flat out to make Oviedo the next president of Paraguay.
They were undeterred by the fact that an army tribunal had sentenced their candidate to a 10-year sentence for a failed coup attempt in April 1996, the same charges which were thrown out of a civilian court last year. They were still confident that the Supreme Court - or "the people" - would free him before election day.
General Oviedo, (55), is nicknamed the Bonsai gentleman due to his diminutive size. He won national recognition when he arrested the dictator Alfredo Stroessner in 1989, ending 35 years of authoritarian rule. General Andres Rodriguez, Stroessner's son-in-law, was subsequently elected president and named Oviedo head of the armed forces.
Oviedo built a new military hospital, schools and sports centres for his troops, but his most memorable work was the Linodrome - an enormous salon built for army parades. Oviedo held a party for 20,000 supporters and arrived on the shoulders of his admirers, dressed up as his favourite historic characters. One time he was Julius Caesar, the next Al Capone. Women were asked to dress as prostitutes.
Paraguay's parliament ordered an investigation into the Linodrome, which was illegally built on education ministry lands at a cost of $500,000 (financed by sources unknown). Oviedo used his position to create a network of contacts around the country and worked as campaign chief for Juan Wasmosy, the outgoing president, also a member of the Colorado Party. Wasmosy fell out with Oviedo when the latter refused to bow to civilian authorities, telling anyone who cared to listen that his army would never surrender its authority to civilian rulers.
President Wasmosy finally retired Oviedo after the 1996 coup attempt, but even then he offered him the post of defence minister. Thousands of Paraguayans took to the streets, forcing Wasmosy to renege on his promise. Oviedo took off around the country, rallying support for this year's electoral campaign and won the Colorado party nomination, defeating Wasmosy's preferred candidate. The Colorados have ruled Paraguay for the past 50 years, in that they were the political vehicle for Stroessner's dictatorship. Under the campaign slogan `People Have The Power', Oviedo made 361 trips into the Paraguayan countryside, visiting forgotten villages where no politician had ever set foot. Oviedo rallied curious crowds of peasant farmers, speaking in native Guarani, promising land, food and justice for all. "He spoke peasant to peasant, in simple, direct language," said Enrique Gonzalez Quintana, who accompanied him on the rural trips.
Oviedo's strategy became known as the `blender vote' as thousands of electrical goods were given away at campaign rallies, insuring a huge turnout. Oviedo controls dozens of lucrative businesses. The army is known to manage most of the cocaine, luxury cars and other contraband goods that pass through Paraguay's leaky borders, a trade worth twice the legal gross national product.
Oviedo changed his speech to please all sectors, particularly the extreme right. In Hohenau, an area controlled by a powerful German colony, Oviedo spoke to wealthy farmers in fluent German, promising to maintain the status quo and prevent land occupations. A week later, he returned to meet with peasant farmers who work in virtual slavery on the same farms run by the Germans he met a week earlier. This time Oviedo spoke in Guarani and pledged "to execute every last nazi" who exploited their labour.
Oviedo is macho and proud of it, telling his followers that "a good Paraguayan Colorado should be a womaniser" and expressed the hope that he might emulate the Colorado party founder, General Caballero, who had 87 children. Oviedo's wife, who has taken to the stump in her husband's absence, said she was proud of his machismo, but that "the factory was closed". Oviedo has at least six children with three different women.
Back at Oviedo's campaign HQ, I was introduced to Blanca, head of his youth movement. Here at last might be a fresh perspective on the general's appeal.
"What this country needs is a government which is half-military and half-democratic," she said. Blanca had nothing to say about the general's plan to redistribute wealth and end poverty. "You'd have to talk to him about that." But she was clear on the consequences of a negative decision by the supreme court.
"The people would have to take him out of prison," she said, smiling. "I can't see the army taking the decision lying down." How did she know? "My brother is an army captain, all of his pals support Oviedo."
Oviedo has pushed all the right buttons in this impoverished nation, the poorest in the region and one of the poorest on the planet.
"I'll tie up the delinquents myself," he told his cheering troops before being hauled off to jail, "and I'll whip them senseless in front of the international press."
Oviedo's campaign is an example of how democracy functions in Latin America: false promises, veiled threats of force, anti-yankee rhetoric, election time giveaways and a firm promise to crack down on street crime and government corruption. From Venezuela to Paraguay this is the winning election ticket in 1998.