SATURDAY 17 JUNE 2017

Luis Alberto Lacalle Herrera, former president of I am 75 years old. I am from . I am a patriot, and I was the president of my coun- Mujica enjoys very good press coverage here. Because he lives on a farm and makes a big thing try. I am married to Julia Pou, who is of Catalan descent, and we have three children and five of driving around in an old car. This is all very grandchildren. I am a member of the (previously known as the Partido Blan- nice. Mujica has built up a legend of being the co or “White Party”): capitalism with a social conscience. I am a Catholic of the Jesuit school poor “Robin Hood” president. Did Mujica leave the country in a better state than he found it? No. He failed to abolish a single one of my reforms, which he had criticised so heavily. He “You won’t make a decent put Uruguay back into debt and managed to get people accustomed to living on public money. Subsidies? president if all you do is tweet” I believe he took on as may as 60,000 civil servants, amounting to 2% of the population! The whole thing has become a fossilized establishment Between Trump and resistant to any kind of innovation, which has turned the left into a conservative bastion of China clientelism. Use austerity against But he met the urgent needs of the poor. corruption. This is Getting people used to receiving public money is the chosen solution of harmful, and creates a poverty trap. Lasalle Herrera, who Define the poverty trap. It involves using the poor to create a culture of is proud of that fact poverty for purposes of electoral advantage. that international rat- The level of rivalry was quite clear... ings consider Uruguay Three parcels arrived at my house one day, each to be “free of that containing two bottles of wine. I shared them scourge”. The coun- out among the members of my team, without suspecting anything... try's former president Without suspecting what? has proposed the ban- That the wine was poisoned. ning of electoral TV How do you know? commercials to make One member of my team was also a cousin of campaigns cheaper mine. The following day his wife drank a glass of the wine... and died of poisoning. ou were ... I started out in the local neighbourhoods (and to encourage So the poisoned wine was meant for you? Yes. For sixty months, from 1990 in 1954, at the age of 14, and became a televised debates). He Obviously. I actually uncorked one of the bottles toY 1995. How time-consuming of me, to senator in 1985... that night, and poured myself a glass to drink count my stint in months! How are current relations with the Valle was a friend of the with the tripes that we were having for dinner. I What did you do for your country? family? late Manuel Fraga and was about to take a sip, when my wife shouted: Exactly what my grandfather taught me I am proud to say that I’m a friend of admits to being close “Don't drink it!” And I did as I was told, on that to do: “Leave the house a bit better than Jorge Valle, in contrast to the enmity be- to José María Aznar occasion... when you found it”. tween our respective great grandfathers. (two leading figures in You didn't drink it. So what state did you leave it in? Can you describe the environment that I did not. My wife had saved my life. I turned a 7% deficit into a surplus, and you grew up in? Spain’s conservative Do you know who sent the bottles? cut the rate of inflation from 129% to In the country, on horseback, as a true Popular Party). He is We never found out. My mother told me that God 42%. I liberalised trade... South American Gaucho, in touch with critical of Trump’s protected me so that I could do something in this For whose benefit? the people and their virtues of austerity isolationism: he does world... For the general good. I expanded public and simplicity. In fact I still raise livestock not see it getting Are you still in politics? health and state education, and reduced to this day. I’ve retired to make way for my son Luis Alberto, the poverty rate from 12% to 6.5%. A very bucolic vision, but Uruguay anywhere, particularly a future candidate for the presidency. What attracted you to politics? suffered from guerrilla war and dicta- with respect to China, What presidential advice would you give him? Do you see this ring? My grandfather torship. “which is in no hurry, Don't use Twitter. on my mother’s side received it from his The Tupamaros guerrillas managed to as it has always been Trump does. mother, before passing it on to me. destroy democracy, which gave rise to an there”, and is set to Disastrously. I prefer to heed my grandfather, who And? infamous military dictatorship. And there always advised sleeping on important decisions, He brought me up. There are two highly was repression. I myself was arrested... dominate everything. whatever they might be about. The less you talk, politicised families in Uruguay, who have Why? He explains it in his the less ammunition you give to your opponent. been rivals for more than 180 years: the For setting up a clandestine newspaper book Latin America, We have a master of the art here: Mr Rajoy. Valle family (of the Colorado, or “Colour- that spoke out in favour of democracy. between Trump and The Galicians, so Celtic, so wreathed in mist, and ed”, party) and the Herrera family (of After that, bloody dictatorial persecution China (published by always so astute. the Blanco, or “White”, party). The Valle tended to strengthen the left. What do you think of the Catalan referendum? family have produced four presidents. We What were the consequences of this? Aguilar), a copy of My wife, who is of Catalan descent, advised me of the Herrera family have always been A broad left-wing movement, known as which he gives me not to get into such controversial matters. And I the opposition! the Frente Amplio and inspired by Fidel just before being intend to obey her, as she has already saved my Until you arrived. Castro, won the elections in 2005, and we admitted as a member skin on one previous occasion. Yes, I am the first Herrera to become were governed by former Tupamaros who of the Royal European VÍCTOR-M. ÁMELA president had kidnapped, tortured and murdered. Would you call President Mujica a Academy of Doctors criminal? (RAED). He defeated me at the ballot box, and he was president from 2010 to 2015. But he had been part of the Tupamaros, and of all the madness of death and destruction which that entailed.