(Guatemala) The ousting of several favorites in the presidential election in Guatemala casts doubt, one month before the first round, on the impartiality of the institutions, accused of maneuvering to preserve an authoritarian and corrupt regime based on co-optation by the ruling elites.
The last to be dismissed from the race is the businessman Carlos Pineda (right), whose candidacy was “suspended” by the courts and the Superior Electoral Court (TSE) at the request of a competing party which invoked irregularities in the procedure.
The 51-year-old businessman, who was the favorite in the polls, saw his appeal dismissed on Friday as “without object” by the Constitutional Court.
“Corruption won, Guatemala lost,” he commented on his Twitter account after the Constitutional Court ruling. The ousted candidate then joined dozens of his supporters who demonstrated outside the seat of the Court.
He was placed in the lead in the last poll published by the daily Prensa Libre with 23.1% of the voting intentions. According to the same opinion poll, he was followed by 67-year-old Social Democrat and former first lady Sandra Torres (19.5%), former UN official Edmond Mulet, 72 (center, 10 ,1%), and Zury Rios, the 55-year-old daughter of a former dictator (conservative right, 9.2%).
A total of 22 candidates remain in the running for the presidential election. This number, usual in Guatemala, virtually prevents any chance of election in the first round, June 25, since the winner must obtain more than half of the votes. The second round is scheduled for August 20.
Before Mr. Pineda, the TSE had already eliminated two serious candidates: Thelma Cabrera (left, 52), from the Mayan indigenous peoples who constitute at least 40% of the population, and Roberto Arzu (right, 53), son of former President Alvaro Arzu, in power from 1996 to 2000.
The 9.3 million Guatemalan voters will be called upon to appoint, for a single term of four years, the successor to the right-wing president Alejandro Giammattei, aged 67. The latter, who had promised during his election “not to be another son of a bitch”, left office with 75% of unfavorable opinions, according to another poll published by Prensa Libre.
“Occult Powers”
For analysts and ousted personalities, there is no doubt that the “fraud” does not lie in the manipulation of the results of the ballot, but consists in imposing candidates co-opted by the ruling elites.
The eviction of candidates by the courts puts “in danger […] the rule of law, democracy, guarantees and freedoms of the entire population”, denounces to AFP Edie Cux, the director of Citizen Action, local version of the anti-corruption NGO Transparency International.
“There is a preconceived scheme for (appointing) candidates, discarding those who are awkward and keeping those who are favored by the system,” he explains.
The state is using “the judicial structure” to commit a new form of “electoral fraud” by excluding candidates, adds Jordan Rodas. Himself, who was running for the vice-presidency of Mme Cabrera, was dismissed on corruption charges and all of his appeals were dismissed.
Democratic decline
For many analysts, the country has been experiencing a democratic setback since the early termination in 2019 of the UN anti-corruption mission CICIG, on the orders of former President Jimmy Morales (2016-2020), who was himself in his collimator.
The CICIG had brought to light resounding cases of corruption, even leading to the resignation in 2015 of President Otto Pérez.
Since Mr. Giammattei came to power, several anti-corruption prosecutors who had worked with the UN mission have been arrested, while others have gone into exile.
The prosecution was ordered by Attorney General Consuelo Porras, a close associate of President Giammattei, herself listed by Washington on a list of corrupt personalities.
The “dictatorship of a group (united) by economic interests, corruption and even organized crime” imposes its views, according to the former UN rapporteur for freedom of expression Frank La Rue. He describes a political scene where “we see the director, the president, move his pawns. But what we don’t see is who is writing the script and who is financing the play”.
Woe to those who try to penetrate the secrets of power: José Ruben Zamora, the founding director of the newspaper El Periodico, which has published numerous investigations into corruption cases, is accused of money laundering and blackmail. Imprisoned since July 29, 2022, he faces a sentence of six to twenty years in prison and his newspaper has been forced to close.