Con Sole Se Puede? Paraguay’s Opposition Sets Sights on Asunción City Hall

The Weekly Post | 24.02.26

Johanna Ortega (centre left) and Soledad Núñez (centre right) now join forces to take the fight to the Colorados in October (Photo: @solenuasu).

TOP STORY

Soledad Núñez Wins Poll to Lead Asunción Mayoral Bid

The opposition alliance Unidos por Asunción has chosen Soledad Núñez as its unified candidate for mayor of Paraguay’s capital, following an open poll designed to avoid the kind of fragmentation that has long benefited the ruling Colorado Party.

In a survey of 1,000 homes over the weekend, ex-housing minister Núñez emerged as the clear winner over Johanna Ortega, a centre-left congresswoman, who conceded defeat and pledged Núñez her support. The poll was less a primary than a show of unity ahead of the race for City Hall, due to be held on October 4, that could serve as a bellwether for national elections in 2028.

Núñez, 42, is no newcomer to high office. A trained architect, she served as Senavitat minister under former president Horacio Cartes between 2014 and 2018, where she oversaw social housing projects and urban development programs. In 2023, she ran as a vice-presidential candidate on an opposition ticket against her former boss’s protégé, current president Santiago Peña. Before entering politics, she worked in the private sector and civil society on urban planning and public policy, building a technocratic reputation that she has sought to translate into cross-party appeal.

Her campaign message is blunt: Asunción is not doomed to decay. Núñez argues that the capital suffers less from lack of resources than from mismanagement and entrenched interests. She has pledged to “retire the outdated model” of municipal governance, promising administrative reform, transparency in public spending, and a professionalization of city services. Cleaning up public finances and restoring basic service delivery — from waste collection to infrastructure maintenance — sit at the center of her pitch.

She has also placed urban recovery high on the agenda, vowing to reclaim neglected plazas and public spaces, some of which she says have effectively fallen under the control of party-political groups. Improved public transport, safer neighborhoods, and a revitalised historic center are recurring themes. Núñez has warned that “putting a bankrupt institution in order” could ruffle feathers, signalling that she would confront racketeering, clientelistic networks accustomed to operating within City Hall.

Whether this unified front holds will determine much of the race’s trajectory. Asunción has grown weary of dysfunction, yet remains politically fragmented. Núñez’s challenge now is to convert a poll victory into a durable coalition — and to convince skeptical voters that managerial competence can triumph over grubby politics-as-usual in the madre de ciudades.

THE POST TAKE:

The opposition’s polling experiment was not a primary in the formal sense. There were no binding rules, no televised debates, and no obligatory participation beyond political goodwill. Yet it passed a basic legitimacy test: every major political force that signed up to the mechanism accepted the result. In Paraguay’s fractious opposition ecosystem, that’s no trivial achievement.

Still, it would be generous to call this a full-blooded electoral dispute. The lack of debates deprived voters of a direct clash of ideas. Ortega, for her part, outperformed expectations, finishing roughly 15 points behind Núñez — close enough to demonstrate a consolidated base and a capacity to mobilise beyond the activist niche.

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Also in this issue:
Nationwide blackouts · Paraguay’s AI gamble · BCP trims rates, again · Underemployment issues · An EPP kidnapping? · “Narciso” wins big in Berlin · US military mission · Trump flirts with “handsome” Peña

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