Galo Plaza Lasso

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Galo Plaza Lasso

Galo Plaza Lasso (born February 17, 1906 in New York City , † January 28, 1987 in Quito ) was an Ecuadorian diplomat and politician. He was President of Ecuador from 1948 to 1952 and Secretary General of the Organization of American States from 1968 to 1975 .

Live and act

Plaza was born in New York in 1906 (at Marlton House in Greenwich Village ) while his father, General Leonidas Plaza Gutiérrez , who had been President of Ecuador from 1901 to 1905, was in exile there. Galo Plaza's mother, Abelina Lasso, was also an Ecuadorian. From 1912 to 1916, Plaza Gutiérrez was again President of Ecuador.

Plaza Lasso graduated from high school in Quito and then studied agriculture at the University of Maryland , economics at the University of California, Berkeley, and finally international law at the Georgetown University Diplomatic School . The end of his studies coincided with the Great Depression (1929), so that Plaza, contrary to his original plans, returned to Ecuador.

There he began his political career as a councilor in the capital Quito at a time of great political instability in his country. In 1938 he became Minister of Defense under President Aurelio Mosquera Narváez . In 1940 he founded the bilingual (Spanish-English) high school Colegio Interamericano de Quito in the Ecuadorian capital . From 1944 to 1946 he was the Ecuadorian ambassador to the United States during Velasco Ibarra's second presidency . In 1945 he signed the United Nations Charter for his country . After that he was a member of the Senate of Ecuador.

After Velasco had been overthrown in 1947 and Carlos Julio Arosemena Tola, who was elected interim president, announced elections for 1948, Plaza joined them for the Liberal Party and was elected with a narrow margin of around 3800 votes over Manuel Elicio Flor ( PCE ). He took office on September 1, 1948. His presidency was marked by an economic boom and especially by a rapid increase in agricultural exports. This included the strong increase in the cultivation and export of bananas , for which Ecuador is known worldwide today. As a trained farmer and owner of haciendas, Plaza actively supported the modernization of Ecuadorian agriculture. He was the first president since José Luis Tamayo (1920-1924), whose term of office was regularly ended.

During his presidency, on August 5, 1949, the city of Ambato was shaken by an earthquake that killed about 8,000 people and caused great damage in the provinces of Tungurahua and Cotopaxi . Ambato and the small towns of Pelileo and Pillaro in particular suffered severe damage. Plaza commissioned the architect Sixto Durán Ballén with the state planning for the reconstruction .

After the end of his presidency he worked as a mediator for the United Nations in conflicts in Lebanon (1958), Congo (1960) and Cyprus (1964–1965). In 1960 he ran again in the Ecuadorian presidential elections, but was defeated by Velasco Ibarra. He became General Secretary of the Organization of American States in 1968 and held this office until 1975.

In addition, Plaza was for many years president of the Ecuadorian Holstein-Friesian breeders' association, founded in 1942, and as such held an important position in agricultural policy, especially in setting milk prices. The Hacienda Lasso in the province of Cotopaxi, which comes from his maternal family, is still known today for its high-quality dairy products and as a hacienda hotel.

Web links
personal data
SURNAME Plaza Lasso, Galo
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Ecuadorian diplomat and politician, President of Ecuador (1948–1952)
DATE OF BIRTH February 17, 1906
PLACE OF BIRTH New York City
DATE OF DEATH January 28, 1987
Place of death Quito