Álvaro Magaña

Álvaro Magaña

Álvaro Alfredo Magaña Borja (October 8, 1925 in Ahuachapán, El Salvador – July 10, 2001) was the President of El Salvador from 1982 to 1984.

Biography

He received his master's degree from the University of Chicago in 1952. He was president of the largest mortgage bank of El Salvador (Banco Hipotecario) before the 1982 election. He was sworn in by Roberto D'Aubuisson.

His inauguration as president on May 2, 1982, marked the beginning of elected government in El Salvador after the junta of 1979-1982.

In 1982, the Salvadoran political parties decided that it was time to move on from the rule of the Junta Revolucionaria de Gobierno, or JRG, and decided to install Magaña as head of state.

Soon afterward, both political parties met at Magaña's farm in Apaneca and decided that under Magaña's provisional government, both parties would share in the ministerial posts.^[1]

José Napoleón Duarte willingly relinquished his power as head of state and head of the Junta to Magana briefly and instead focused on building up his own Christian Democrat Party with the help of the United States and planned to take back power in the 1984 elections.^[2][3]

References

1. Stanley, 232
2. Stanley, 233
3. Stanley, William (1996). The Protection Racket State: Elite Politics, Military Extortion, and Civil War in El Salvador. Philadelphia: Temple University Press. pp. 218, 232, 236. ISBN 1566393922.