By Gonzalo Ortiz
QUITO, Jan 9 1997 (IPS)

“Idiots,” “clowns,” “louts,” “insensitive simpletons who scorn the poor,” he started.

“Obstinate beggars,” “thieves,” “rascals,” he continued moving up a tone to finish with: “mafiosos,” “shameless villains,” “berks.”

These were not the insults thrown in a street brawl, but those used by Ecuador’s colourful president, Abdala Bucaram, railing against the opposition.

The new passtime of Ecuadorans – a nation who are undergoing a sort of collective depression follwing the change of government – is to keep tabs the insults launched every day by the leader and the ministers who oppose him.

When he found 42 of the 82 Deputies in Congress were forming an opposition front, Tuesday, Bucaram said he would send them to the frontline as “cannon-fodder” if war breaks out with Peru again.

He also said he would have no trouble signing an executive decree to this effect, “to see where the manliness and patriotism (of these) cowards goes when they are face to face,” on the border.

One of his favourite targets is the press, and the controversial Energy Minister Alfredo Adum, said reporters “have an agreeable lifestyle considering they spend it writing idiocies.”

In a letter published in Ecuadoran daily “Hoy” Wednesday, Adum said a journalist’s life “means sitting around drinking coffee, talking on the phone, being a pain to everyone else, winning themselves a bribe from time to time and ultimately talking and writing stupidities.”

His declarations were unanimously rejected by the press and the reporters’ unions, who were Thursday planning a march from Congress to the Government Palace in protest against the violent attitudes of the government officials, and to present Bucaram with an open letter.

The problems with the media have been so numerous that the Inter-American Press Society (SIP) expressed concern over the reduced press freedom in Ecuador.

The newspaper “Hoy,” one of the regime’s harshest critics, has been attacked by both Bucaram and Adum, the latter of whom said he would keep buying shares in the daily until he could take it over.

Meanwhile, head of the Central Bank board of directors, Alvaro Noboa, criticised the Guayaquil daily “El Universo” – the most widely-read national paper – for allegedly publishing false news on the economy.

Bucaram himself described the leader-writers who oppose him – which means most of those who write in the papers – as; “four fools who believe they own the truth,” “intellectual frontmen,” and “miniscule leader-writers who shamelessly write outrageous things.”

He also called them “small journalists who write for second- rate papers and want to increase their circulation at any cost.”

But the press comes second to the political opposition, when it comes to inventive insults.

For Bucaram has often described former president Rodrigo Borja as a “dunce” and a “coiffured owl,” adding that he has “a nose like tailor’s chalk.”

He classed former president Duran Ballen as a “liar” and dubbed the Radical Alfarist Front – his ally in Congress until late December – as the “Robber’s Associated Front.”

The Social Christian party, of Febres Cordero and former presidential candidate Jaime Nebot – beaten by Bucaram in the second round of voting in July 1996 – has also come in for a tongue-lashing.

“Six,” the number of this party on the electoral list, “is the number of the Beast, of Nebot, that mediocrity that lost the elections to me,” said Bucaram last week.

According to the President, the Social Christians are “a bunch of poofters used to eating filet mignon and shrimps in garlic,” luxury dishes which contrast with humbler local dishes, like “guatita” – cow’s stomach with peanut sauce.

The indigenous leader are “in the pay of the oligarchy and the union movements,” and Deputy Luis Macas – a Quechua from the mountains and long term director of the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE) – is a “thief,” a “poor representative for the indigenous people,” and a “liar.”

The union leaders are “mafiosos” and “shameless,” “using unionism for robbing and pillaging,” worthy only of being “liquidated and pulverised.”

He has circulated bawdy posters of the supposed sexual attributes and preferences of both opposition members and journalists.

In response to Bucaram’s attacks, Borja said even a small boy of nine would show more imagination in inventing insults, and Nebot said he would reply to the President in terms similar to those used against him.

The leader-writers, meanwhile, expressed their concern over what will be the long-term effects of this situation on Ecuadoran democracy itself.

However, others are perfectly sure the democratic institutions will survive this singular political experience perfectly well.

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