Alfredo Stroessner

Alfredo Stroessner Matiauda (Spanish: [alˈfɾeðo esˈtɾosneɾ]; 3 November 1912 – 16 August 2006) was a Paraguayan army officer, politician and statesman who served as President of Paraguay from 15 August 1954 to 3 February 1989. Stroessner led a coup d'état on 4 May 1954 with the support of the army and the Colorado Party, with which he was affiliated. After a brief provisional government headed by Tomás Romero Pereira, he was the Colorado Party's presidential candidate for the 1954 general election, and was elected unopposed since all other parties were banned from 1947 to 1962.

Stroessner officially assumed the presidency on 15 August 1954, quickly suspended constitutional and civil rights, and began a period of harsh repression with the support of the army and the military police (which also served as a secret police) against anyone who opposed his authoritarian rule. Even when opposition parties were legalized in 1962, they were barely tolerated, and the repression continued. On 25 August 1967, he introduced a new constitution enabling him to re-elect himself; in 1977 he modified that constitution to permit himself to be re-elected indefinitely. He was fraudulently re-elected seven times from 1958 until 1988; approximately six months after the 1988 general election, he was overthrown in the coup d'état of 2 and 3 February 1989, led by his most trusted confidant, Lieutenant general Andrés Rodríguez Pedotti, with the support of the army.

On 5 February 1989, two days after the coup, Stroessner was exiled to Brazil, where he spent the last 17 years of his life. He died in August 2006 at the Santa Luzia Hospital in Brasília after suffering from pneumonia. He was buried in the Campo da Esperança Cemetery.