#496 – The Gringo Advantage and the Politics of Corruption in Latin America

Automatically transcribed from the original recording; names and wording may contain errors.

[00:00] South of the border down Mexico way That's where I fell in love when the stars above came up to play and now I wonder Hello there all you expat wannabes. I'm Johnny Mueller and you're listening to the expat files living in Latin America The show that tells you just what it's like to live work play and or retire down here in Latin America It's a mix of the good the bad the ugly and the great and it's all right here. So let's get started Now if you remember last week I started with a question and an email people occasionally asked me if I ever get in trouble for the things I say and do Latins down here in Latin America get upset or irritated when I talk about the gringo advantage and how hard I sometimes come down on

[00:49] Latins when I talk about how lax they are with the details Well, you know You could summon up by saying that Latin's love everything and anything first world in gringo and they tolerate people who are rough on him Like me because well when you're off the tourist trail anyway, any gringo has the gringo advantage You know, I often say being off the tourist trail down here is like being a be great rock star You get invited to all the backstage parties, but no one really knows your name Well, that's perfectly alright with me and it should be with you, too And as one longtime expat said being off the gringo tourist trail is exactly the opposite of what it was like for him When he was in high school up in the States a guy that just blended in with the woodwork He remembers it was kind of a thrill in high school and one of the jocks or one of the cool kids

[01:34] Playing in a band or whatever said hi Or maybe even acknowledged him by name in the hallway or got to sit next to the guy at a game a dance Or a party like he said even if the cool guy was really a jerk Yeah, couldn't help but want to sit next to him and be his friend So yes to answer that question the gringo advantage works for all gringos even part-time jerks like me And by the way when finishing up, I remembered a pertinent story which brings up another question People always ask me Johnny. Are you ever gonna run out of stories? Nope Not when I've got friends like expat Eddie and Captain Mango. Anyway to finish off last week's topic People ask me Johnny has anyone ever tried to censor you, you know, tone you down force you into a groove. Whatever

[02:20] Here's what I have to say about that. Yes people have tried In fact before you knew me as kindly good-hearted Johnny Mueller host of the expat files living in Latin America I did a lot of radio and a little TV in Latin America I mean I was the morning drive time gringo voice in Costa Rica, Guatemala Panama, Colombia and syndicated throughout Latin America, too And I did a stint for a couple of years as the afternoon drive time gringo voice, too Way back when when I started in Latin radio except for Costa Rica and Panama I was heard way off the gringo tourist trail, but it was a huge market I mean there's cities down here that have five even ten million people huge cities where you could walk all day and not see One gringo and back then gringos stationed in Latin America were just starved for gringo radio

[03:12] And though ten or fifteen years ago everyone up north could get streaming radio by the internet down here at that time The internet was in its infancy and no one streamed radio yet So gringos living in Latin America were stationed in Latin America at embassies or whatever Had to get their dose of gringo radio live or syndicated and back then in all the major cities There was at least one big FM station that had a gringo voice like mine Just for two or three hours during drive time blathering on about all things Latin and gringo anyway ten or so years ago I worked a long time for a very big radio station chain in Latin America That was owned by a Korean family and the boss spoke no English and believe me when he tried to speak Spanish She slaughtered that too so as you might have figured there was absolutely no censorship

[04:00] I could say and do as I pleased cut up on all the pretentious Not-nosed rich people and their kids and rip on the military and the embassies and all the postulate political pinheads with impunity Hmm now, there's a descriptive turn of phrase for you. I think I'll write that down now this rich Korean guy who owned I think it was 36 radio stations in Latin America including a bunch of Evangelical Christian ones if you could believe that I mean this guy had a statue of Buddha on his desk Nope, not the Bible. I guess if it works and makes money anything goes right anyway this rich Korean guy I think he was in his 60s had three daughters. He sent him to universities up in the States So they came back perfectly bilingual or rather trilingual

[04:45] That would be Spanish English and Korean and when they did come back to Daddy's enterprise to work They'd gotten business degrees at US universities So when they came back they actually listened to my show for the very first time and heard what I was talking about And soon enough they called me in for a meeting I knew the axe was gonna fall and here's what they said Johnny. We like you the people love you You got good ratings you got great sponsors. You can say everything in anything you want You can even cut up on the Catholics But lay off the evangelical Christians and at that time there was so much else to cut up on I said alright I won't nail them because I knew that their family was putting on more and more of a jellicle Christian Programming and there was no way for me to win that battle Okay flash forward a couple years I'm working at another station owned by a pompous ass Criollo guy and his family a

[05:35] Criollo by the way is a Latin guy who looks a lot like an Anglo-Saxon American or Northern European Because their parents grandparents great-grandparents Whatever came over from the old country Italy French Germany Spain wherever and never intermarried with Latino or indigenous locals They just stuck to their own kind keeping the bloodline kind of pure so they remain looking white even blonde or reddish Haired with blue eyes and green eyes, too. However, they're 100% Latins-classist racist womanizers macho guys to the hilt though always well educated and big-time property and business owners They're usually called the top 20 families the top 20 that own 80% of everything and believe it or not some of these guys will trace their lineage all the way back to some Spanish or Portuguese

[06:25] royalty who gave their great-great-great-grandfather or grandmother a land grant and that's why they first came over that makes generation upon generation of classes pompous horses asses Anyway, I'll never forget one of the meetings. We had at the station all us radio announcers are sitting at a roundtable Listening to our pompous Criollo boss. He has a German name by the way He told us how all the radio stations in Latin America work He said most stations break even or actually lose money for three years in a row then in the fourth year They just clean up and that fourth year is when election times come you see that's when like in the states all the candidates Bombard the airwaves TV radio and newspapers and spend millions in slick campaign ads down here in Latin America

[07:12] They don't have election laws like they have in the states. I take that back They do but no one observes or enforces them. So it's as if there weren't any anyway Since there are always some front-running candidates who take big-time and narco money under the table You see millions and millions being spent often. It seems like they've got bottomless pits of money So anyway, he said firmly to us minor league radio personalities that he didn't want any of us saying anything negative or bad or controversial about the candidates because the big money will soon be flowing in and He wanted no candidate to feel his dough wasn't welcome at the station now You might think that every media outlet print TV radio has its bias for a particular candidate

[07:59] Well down here in Latin America Remember sometimes there are up to a hundred freaking candidates for mayor and for president maybe 10 even 15 That's a hell of a lot of advertising dough And so the station manager said we'll welcome all their ads and all their money So we won't take sides or offend anyone. Is that understood? So did any of that stop me from hammering on those scumbag candidates? No, I toned it down a bit at first, but I came on strong later and in reality I was always fighting with this guy and his useless pretentious kids who by the way had do nothing jobs and plush corner offices With fake titles on the door par for the course, huh? So eventually I got in a real tussle with the boss and he fired me and I quit at the same time now

[08:45] You did hear me say that a lot of narco money goes into presidential races down here Especially in fact just reading a recent report from that International Investigative Commission called CICIG That's seagig the one that's been investigating corruption in Guatemala for the last seven years It said in some cases up to half of all the money donated to a presidential congressional or mayoral campaign Comes from tainted dodgy or narco money though Normally throughout Latin America about 25% of campaign funds come from tainted money So there's always some powerful pressure group or business interests trying to buy their candidate into office That way to get all the political favors in the world once the guy gets in what kind of favors you might ask

[09:32] well suppose a huge construction company or huge car dealership or appliance or Electronic store chain a company that brings in millions and millions of dollars of imported goods every year they might donate a couple million to a presidential campaign and When their horse wins suddenly they get an import tax exemption or maybe a 10-year tax holiday or better yet What recently happened in Rio Brazil a 10 million dollar contract went out to put security cameras on government buildings and street corners in certain intersections and it turned out it was a no-bid contract and when analyzed later was Determined that the contract was really only worth five million in the other five billion went right back into the coffers of the business

[10:17] That donated a couple of million to the presidential campaign That's exactly how business is done in Latin America because there's really no transparency That said don't think all of these systems are totally malignant In fact just lately everybody's been talking about Guatemala because they managed to toss out even put on trial some of the worst scumbag pus-brained politicians in existence now as far as the extent of narco money in presidential campaigns down here ex-president Alvaro cologne he was about three presidents ago in Guatemala and by the way his scumbag dragon lady ex-wife is in the running for President right now in Guatemala. Anyway, he said in an interview just a few weeks ago that yes All Latin American presidential candidates get dirty money narco money

[11:04] And when he answered that question, he looked at the journalists like what a dumb question you didn't know that in fact in his case He said he may have taken 20 or 25 percent dirty money, but he wasn't in charge of collecting campaign contributions He didn't know the figures. It's don't ask don't tell until someone calls in a favor So then how does that differ from the US presidential and congressional campaigns? Not a bit Presidents and congressmen are bought and paid for too. They take huge corporate money and gifts from big corrupt twisted organizations Like banks insurance companies oil companies and drug companies So when the horse they bought wins, they call in their favors, too Like for example Halliburton who goes into war zones and cleans up after the US has destroyed the place

[11:50] I mean you do know that US servicemen out in the field in the Middle East get their laundry done by a Contractor to the tune of one hundred dollars a bag now I don't know what it costs up in the States to get your laundry done But down here in Latin America, I could have a bag clean starts to impress for three or four bucks So you've got big corruption down here and you've got big corruption where you live. What's the difference really now? I don't want to digress here So for all you listeners who've been sending emails wondering about how this grand presidential blowout in Guatemala is gonna end now to keep You up to date the president and vice president are on trial for a big-time corruption. They've been kicked out There was a presidential election a couple weeks ago since no one candidate won decisively

[12:36] There'll be a runoff election next month now as in most Latin countries for president For example, they have an election and if one candidate doesn't get 50% of the vote plus one vote Then they have a runoff between the two top contenders Now the reason why I'm bringing up the Guatemala election again is because it's been all over the international news since something happened in Guatemala That's absolutely unprecedented in Latin politics now traditionally in Latin America It turns out almost always the guy who spends the most amount of money for the election campaign wins Or at least gets in that runoff election where they run off the two top contenders now as you know the people in Guatemala are really really really fed up and pissed off about their electoral system and all the same name

[13:23] Candidates and usual suspects for that reason. I'm not an advocate of voting in any state or national election What you're doing is giving a vote of confidence to a corrupt system I believe the only place your vote counts is at the local and county level However in Latin America people are addicted to voting for one reason It's a free day and everybody gets free food and free handouts and free bus rides So it's a huge party on election day kind of like Christmas all over again I mean you can go to any small town and see somebody handing out 10 20 even $50 to buy someone's vote Right out in the open to again Like I said, there might be election rules against doing that kind of stuff, but man I'll tell you nobody's listening or paying attention In fact, I've actually got photos of that stuff that I showed my ex-pat wisdom seminars just to show people it's really happening

[14:12] So anyway when I get into any kind of discussion about politics with a local Latin person It's futile because they're all used to voting for the lesser of two three or ten thieving psychopaths And they all love the day off in the free party and the stupid nationalism that goes along with it And of course, they're not gonna listen to a gringo about their election politics Except I do try to make it simple and drive one point home if I can't I tell them if they'll listen If you're gonna vote, there's only two ways you're gonna better the system one is to vote NOLO Which means for no one that's NULO and it's on the ballot and they count those votes You know so in the end if there's enough NOLO votes, which are almost never enough It would send a signal to politicians that they really have to change But that's not gonna happen the second way you could make some kind of impact on the system is to vote for someone

[15:02] You've never ever heard of before Someone who's not entrenched in the system someone who's not connected and doesn't know anybody now doing that you might be pissing into the wind too But at least it's someone who's not connected at least not overtly with all that crooked cronyism and 99% of the time when I mentioned That option latin's don't listen because they have their favorite candidate the guy that's giving away things or promising stuff He'll never come through with but people have really short memories Except this one historic moment that's happening right now in Guatemala in fact It's really amazed everyone throughout the third world and here's what's happened Just lately since I gave that report on the elections just a couple weeks ago Well, they had the presidential election and no one got that required 50% of the vote

[15:50] so next month there will be a runoff and guess who's in the runoff a guy who got 24% of the vote a complete 100% unknown who's never held a political office before in his life. He does not have a government job He's not a big Criollo coffee plantation or beer company owner born with a silver spoon in his mouth he's a guy with a business administration degree and a masters a small business owner whose main hobby is acting and theater a guy who occasionally goes on stage in comedies and plays a clown and such That's why when people started putting his posters up around the country and by the way He had no TV or radio coverage because he was very short on funds and had no big powerhouse supporters

[16:36] Anyway, when his posters came out, guess what? The other two traditional big money parties did a dirty deed They sent out kids with spray guns to paint a clown nose on every one of his posters So he looked like a jerk clown in spite of that He still won first place 25% of the vote and he spent a total of $200,000 on his campaign all tiny little donations and guess who came in second place the ex-wife of the president I just mentioned who did that interview just recently saying that almost all presidential candidates take at least 25% narco or dirty money for their campaign Well, it figures that his horrid two-faced dragon lady ex-wife is running for president and she came in second place

[17:21] Guess how much she spent on her campaign around 5 million US dollars now I know that doesn't sound like much when you're comparing it to US campaigns, but she spent 25 times more. That's 2500% more than the front-runner Jimmy Morales coming in second place with about 19% of the vote So it'll be Jimmy Morales and her in a runoff election next month and she's attacking him in the press already She's going on interviews saying he has zero experience in how to run a country and the idiot Interviewers and the media people are so stupid. They don't have the correct comeback. I would say well That's exactly what you don't want in government experience because all it is is experience in knowing how to steal and

[18:08] Manipulate people that's the kind of experience. You don't want that would be a perfectly concise and pointed answer But I've heard no one give that kind of response yet Even that dark course front-running candidate Jimmy Morales when asked that question by reporters and such how you gonna run the country You haven't got any experience even his handlers if he's got any haven't figured out how to properly answer that question Well, it's simple. The last thing you want in government is an experienced politician Period. All right. So next month those two candidates will be having a runoff and Hopefully Jimmy Morales will be laughing all the way to the presidential palace because after all he is a clown, right? But here's the topper the third running candidate who had just under 19% of the vote a guy that won't be on the runoff

[18:56] Next month. His name is bald is on by the way a self-professed Evangelical preacher aren't they all right? Anyway, it's been estimated that he spent 20 million US dollars on his Presidential campaign now since he got whooped he's been in hiding except to give one big interview where he looked scared Shaky and overly medicated why you might ask well Rumor has it and it's been in the papers that he's received more than 25% of his funding from big-time narcoes If you remember I mentioned on a past show that he's the guy they caught plagiarizing his doctorate theses the guy's a real sociopathic scumbag Perfect presidential material. Anyway, the word in the most knowledgeable circles

[19:44] Is that he felt he was an absolute shoe-in for the presidency since he outspent his nearest competitor by 400% and history has shown that the people who do that always win and of course the narcoes that supposedly funded his campaign figured he'd be a shoe-in too and now he's nothing not even in the Run-off and Rumor has it the narcoes want their money back. So how's that gonna happen? You know narcoes and mob types don't take losses. They get their money back and have a lot of collateral So what's that collateral? Well, let's just say this guy bald is on owns huge tracts of farmland and that Evangelical man of God flies around with an entourage in a five million dollar helicopter Looks like he stands to lose all that and most probably will flee the country

[20:34] How would you feel if you owed the mob or a cartel that kind of dough? Would you sleep tight and have sweet dreams or would you be on Prozac and packing your bug out bag? Oh, and by the way more good news on the Guatemalan election front The socialist candidates got a kick in the teeth, too You know Latin America is just full of socialist candidates and it's good news to hear that in Guatemala The socialist candidates for president gained less than 2% of the vote now remember socialist candidates in any third world Latin country have as a platform to align themselves with countries like Venezuela Cuba Ecuador and Bolivia and Sometimes they throw in Uruguay, too Not a club most people would want to belong to that's for sure unless you've been brought up to live on government handouts and promises

[21:21] Now that's not to say that gringles and expats don't thrive well in those more socialistic countries They do but as for the locals slowly But surely you and I can watch with startling predictability The exact same dependency on handouts beginning to happen And by the way, the only socialist countries in Latin America that sometimes Somehow make good on their promises are the ones that have big oil Socialist countries with huge oil reserves like Venezuela do provide a lot of social benefits at first But then politicians will be politicians and soon enough They see how easy it is to enrich themselves their friends and their cronies until they've pretty much totally squandered their country's resources Now speaking of political promises politicians will never deliver on listen to this

[22:09] The headline here is and I'm translating taxi drivers in Colombia strike over uber competition Let me read excerpts of this it says taxi drivers across Colombia went on strike Wednesday to protest the app-based Taxi booking service uber the strike coincided with protests by bus drivers to authorities in Bogota a city of seven million with major Congestion issues announced commuters beyond high alert because taxi drivers and buses will be blocking the roads it says Luis Romero leader of the national taxi drivers roundtable said of the 52,000 taxis in Bogota the capital at least 10,000 are taking part in the strike demanding they make the competition of uber illegal because it offers taxi service using partners rather than employees as drivers thus avoiding payment of health benefits and

[23:00] Colombian taxes which makes the service much cheaper now. Here's the key Boca Taz Leftist administration said it was willing to mediate between the taxi drivers and the national government trying to figure out how to severely Regulate uber then it ends by saying taxi drivers and other major Colombian cities like Medellin Barranquila and Cartagena also announced similar protests in the near future now regarding that here's something I'm sure you never knew during last year's Colombian presidential campaign President Juan Manuel Santos and candidate Rafael Pardo and candidate Herman Vargas Liras Appeared at a campaign stop where they addressed over 10,000 government public service workers

[23:47] Including a thousand unionized taxi drivers at that meeting each presidential candidate promised to remove or make illegal all smartphone apps that promote unlawful behavior and interference Citing companies like uber as well as similar competitive taxi services like Lyft Lyft curb and other unlawful non-union Transportation competitors to counter that British expat businessman in Colombia Paul Graham said services like uber are so obviously a good thing that you can measure how corrupt a city is by just how hard They push to suppress it now as for taxi service in Colombia a lot of gringos and Europeans think they're Reasonable even cheap compared to first world prices

[24:35] What you didn't know is they pay an absurd percentage of taxes to the government in fact on weekends and holidays in big Colombian cities The government adds an additional thirty percent surcharge, which of course is passed on to the customer Oh, and by the way, it says San Francisco based uber has clashed with established Taxi union groups in several other cities where it operates including London Berlin and Mexico City But Bogota is the first city where protests have turned violent It says uber's fastest growing areas are in crime-ridden capitals according to a Washington DC based group called inside crime Caracas Venezuela Bogota Colombia and Mexico City are the three most dangerous cities in which to take a taxi as it turns out uber is attractive to security conscious Colombians because

[25:23] The company checks that its drivers have clean criminal and driving records and the app gives users the driver's photo license plate and phone number For women who take taxis There's a lot to be frightened of in Colombia one taxi crime known as the millionaires ride Involves stopping the car to enable an armed person to enter and they take you to an ATM machine and empty your bank accounts Last year for example Colombia extradited seven of their citizens to the US accused of knifing to death US DEA agent in their country in a botched taxi robbery Hey, wait a minute. Did that article say a DEA agent kidnapped robbed and then put out of his misery? Hmm. I knew a few expats who would think that was progress. Oh, and by the way

[26:08] I'm sure you didn't know that Bogota Colombia has the most dangerous public transportation system in the world for women travelers according to a poll conducted by Thompson writers foundation Which goes a long way to explain why 60% or more of uber's Colombian users are women now The big reason why Colombian taxi drivers are pissed off is because they have to buy an official medallion like they use in New York City For around 40,000 bucks in the end one Cartagena woman uber user says that she uses the service Because it's eminently safe and they automatically calculate your fare ahead of time based on the GPS route Whereas she said before uber she'd been ripped off many times in common scams such as rigged taxi meters fake surcharges

[26:54] Concealed price tables and pretending not to have change the oldest one in the book when by the way I have to add when people come to my expat wisdom seminars I always recommend a completely legit and safe taxi service owned by none other than Captain Mango himself so when people come to my seminars and take side trips or stay on for any reason at all Captain Mango's taxi service gets my 100% seal of approval meaning no need to use uber in Guatemala And by the way, I get no fee kickback or commission from the captain though He's always quick to treat me to a tequila and mango. So next time Kevin Mango make it a double You've been listening to the expat files living in Latin America coming to you twice a week from somewhere south of the border

[27:42] Email me the expat files at gmail.com And don't forget to check out expat wisdom calm to sign up for your free reports on Latin America See you next time. No swaymos