Patricia Paputsakis
Diana Patricia Paputsakis Burgos is a Bolivian lawyer, politician, and former student leader who served as secretary of women and family of Tarija from 2015 to 2019. Prior to her service in the municipal government, Paputsakis served as a substitute member Chamber of Deputies from Tarija, representing circumscription 45 under Víctor Hugo Zamora from 2010 to 2014 on behalf of the National Convergence alliance. In the 2019 general election, Paputsakis was elected to represent Tarija's circumscription 40 on behalf of Civic Community, but never took office, owing to the annulment of the electoral results and the coalition's decision not to re-nominate her in 2020. Paputsakis later contested the 2021 Tarija mayoral election, finishing sixth in the polls.
Early life and career
Patricia Paputsakis was born on 23 April 1986 in Tarija to Pedro Paputsakis Flores and Agueda Burgos Añasgo. Through her father, she is of Greek descent; Constantino Paputsakis—her grandfather—immigrated to Buenos Aires from the Kingdom of Greece in 1910, later settling in Tarija. Paputsakis was raised in a politically active family; her father, Pedro, represented the Revolutionary Left Front in the Chamber of Deputies from 1979 to 1980 and 1982 to 1985 and in the Senate as a substitute senator from 1989 to 1993. Agueda Burgos also counted a political career, representing the FRI on the Tarija Municipal Council for three terms between 1987 and 1993.Paputsakis studied law and political science at Juan Misael Saracho University, graduating with a diploma in pedagogical theory and practice and another in gender violence and women's human rights. Additionally, she holds a master's in administration of justice with a specialty in child human rights and restorative criminal justice. During her time at university, she became active in student leadership, serving as a member and later executive of the Law School Student Center from 2006 to 2007.
Chamber of Deputies
Election
As with many former student unionists, upon leaving university, Paputsakis sought to enter the political field, joining United to Renew, the party of Tarija Mayor Oscar Montes. In 2009, as part of UNIR's alliance with National Convergence, she was elected to represent Tarija's circumscription 45 in the Chamber of Deputies, serving as a substitute under Víctor Hugo Zamora. Aged 23, Paputsakis was one of the youngest legislators in the Plurinational Legislative Assembly.Tenure
Throughout her term, Paputsakis's work focused on projects in favor of Tarija's university system and legislation expanding administrative decentralization and departmental autonomy. Together with Zamora, she participated in drafting a total of forty-three bills, of which four passed into law. During this time, she also served as vice president of the Union of Women Parliamentarians. In the leadup to the 2014 general election, Zamora resigned to run for higher office, allowing Paputsakis to assume office as the titular deputy for circumscription 45 for the remainder of her term.Commission assignments
- Planning, Economic Policy, and Finance Commission
- * Budget, Tax Policy, and Comptroller's Office Committee
- Rural Native Indigenous Peoples and Nations, Cultures, and Interculturality Commission
- * Coca Leaf Committee
- Amazon Region, Land, Territory, Water, Natural Resources, and Environment Commission
- * Environment, Climate Change, Protected Areas, and Forest Resources Committee
Later political career
2015 municipal election
In late 2014, nearing the conclusion of her term, Paputsakis was nominated by UNIR to run for a seat on the Tarija Municipal Council. Throughout the campaign, Paputsakis's political prospects remained continually in doubt, given the legal ambiguity of her candidacy. In December, the Supreme Electoral Tribunal had issued a controversial ruling barring all legislators who held office in the outgoing legislature from running in the 2015 elections. The court argued that their permanent residence in the last two years had been La Paz and not other regions, contravening the Constitution's residency requirements for candidates. The TSE's determination was opposed by ruling party and opposition parliamentarians alike, including Paputsakis, who stood to be disqualified despite only having spent a week a month in La Paz during her tenure.In January, the TSE opted to exclude substitute legislators from its ruling, reasoning that, on average, they resided more in their constituencies than their full-time counterparts. Though this temporarily allowed Paputsakis to continue in the running, her candidacy remained mired by legal battles. Finally, on 19 March, just ten days before the election, the Departmental Electoral Tribunal of Tarija disqualified Paputsakis, stating that since she became a titular deputy following Zamora's resignation, she was subject to the TSE's ruling. The electoral authority's decision came in response to a "semi-anonymous suit" filed by Daniela Aspiazu, which El País interpreted as a "maneuver" born from UNIR's leader, Montes, who quickly moved to replace Paputsakis's name on the ballot with that of Ruth Ponce, his own wife. Ponce's sudden designation was understood to be a sign of simmering mistrust between Montes and his elected mayoral successor, Rodrigo Paz, with Paputsakis's deposition being the "first hostile act" in their eventual schism.
Tarija Mayor's Office
Shortly after assuming office, Paz established the Secretariat of Women and Family, appointing Paputsakis to head it on 3 June 2015. Paputsakis's administration focused its efforts on combating violence against women and children across the Cercado Province. As outlined by Paputsakis, her office structured its work on two pillars: prevention and attention to cases. In prevention, the Secretariat collaborated with educational institutions and school psychologists to improve public understanding of subjects related to domestic violence, child sexual abuse, teenage pregnancy, and human trafficking, with the aim of reducing such problems. In 2017, Paputsakis launched a family development program seeking to encourage assertive communication, dialogue, and respect between family members. As part of this, the Secretariat deployed Municipal Prevention Brigades in over seventy educational institutions, offering workshops to primary and secondary students to train them in recognizing signs of sexual abuse and violence by or between parents.Together with other social organizations, Paputsakis developed a municipal plan that united various institutions in combating excessive consumption of alcohol and illicit substances, especially by minors. The plan established an observatory on addictions and the supply of alcoholic beverages, expanded the amount of educational material on the matter, and launched a public campaign of prevention throughout the province. The project made Tarija the first municipality to implement an alcohol and drug prevention plan, for which the municipal government was given the National Sobriety Award.
Shortly thereafter, Paputsakis released a plan to reduce teenage pregnancies through three lines of action: comprehensive sexual education, promotion of sexual and reproductive rights, and the expansion of sexual and reproductive health. By 2019, the project had reduced the rate of pregnancy among adolescents in Cercado to below eighteen percent, a significant development given that surrounding provinces often registered prevalence rates above fifty percent. The program's successes led the Secretariat to present its plan to the United Nations Population Fund.