Paraguayan president admits he has a 2 year-old son

Asunción, Paraguay, Apr 14, 2009 / 08:45 am

The president of Paraguay, Fernando Lugo, admitted Monday he was the father of Guillermo Armindo Carillo Canete, a two-year old boy he fathered in a relationship with Viviana Carrillo, who recently filed a paternity suit against the former Catholic bishop.

The former bishop of San Pedro and follower of Marxist liberation theology, admitted that he had a relationship with the woman, whom he met when he was still a bishop and she was 16. He acknowledged he was the father of her son, born in May of 2007.

“Before my conscience and out of respect for all of the people who have placed their trust in me, I state with the utmost honesty, transparency and sense of duty, with regards to the controversy caused by a supposed paternity suit, that it is true that there was a relationship with Viviana Carillo,” the president said.

“In response,” he continued, “I assume all of the responsibilities that derive from such a fact, acknowledging the paternity of the child,” the president said during a press conference at the Government Palace.

In her lawsuit, Carrillo details the beginnings of her relationship with Lugo when he was still a Bishop and claims she was still his companion during the electoral season. “In 2006, at the same time that he was Director of the Divine Word College of Asuncion, I moved to the capital at his request, where we continued to see each other, but in secret because he was very well-known, and because of that he became involved in politics, visiting me from time to time at San Lorenzo,” she said.

“The last straw for me, the reason for this lawsuit,” Carrillo continued, “was that the last time we saw each other, we were sitting inside the plaintiff’s vehicle arguing again about his lack of care for his son, and after pointing out to him that I couldn’t be begging him every month so that his son could eat, and that apparently he didn’t love him, he slapped me on the face and told me never to say that.”

Fernando Lugo, who was a member of the Missionaries of the Divine Word, resigned in 2005 as Bishop of the Diocese of San Pedro. Soon after he began to lead demonstrations and announced his candidacy for the 2008 elections. In 2006 he renounced the clerical state, but the Vatican ordered him to respect his priestly commitment and to abstain from entering political life.

After winning the elections last year, Lugo was stripped of the clerical state on July 30, 2008, by a decree from the Congregation of Bishops. He was also dispensed from his religious vows, from the vow of celibacy and “the other obligations required of the clerical state.”