Asunción mayoral candidate Soledad Núñez called for firing municipal employees who, she said, do not perform their duties, and proposed abolishing the Municipal Traffic Police (PMT). She made the remarks at a meeting with students from the Catholic University, organized by the university’s Student Federation.
“Anyone who says it is impossible to fire ghost employees is lying; I’ve done it,” Núñez said. She was housing minister under former President Horacio Cartes. The candidate of the Together for Asunción Alliance also listed fighting corruption as one of the pillars of her municipal administration platform.
The debate over the city government’s structure comes after it was disclosed that the municipality has more than 9,000 employees whose whereabouts or duties, according to the report, have not been clarified by officials. At the meeting, Núñez did not specify the criteria or procedures she would use to identify and dismiss the employees she mentioned.
Asked how she would govern if the Municipal Council, the local legislative body, had a majority from the Colorado Party (ANR), she urged young people to take part in the October 4 election. She said she was seeking 13 seats for her alliance and argued that consolidating council candidacies could reduce the dispersal of votes.
Núñez compared the contest with the election five years earlier: she said there were 22 candidate lists for the Municipal Council in that election and 40,000 votes went unrepresented. According to her, the unity built this time aims to prevent votes from being lost among separate lists.
The candidate also criticized the municipal administration associated with Óscar “Nenecho” Rodríguez, from the Honor Colorado faction led by Cartes. “The same group that broke the municipality has no chance of rebuilding it,” she said. The remark reflected her political assessment; she did not present figures at the meeting to quantify the responsibility she attributed to the group.
Alongside reorganizing the workforce and abolishing the PMT, Núñez said she intends to bring about a transformation in the city government and the city. The meeting with university students was part of the campaign for Asunción’s municipal election.