Democracy under siege in Guatemala

Guatemala celebrated its sixth consecutive presidential election on Sunday since the return to democracy in 1986. Centre-left candidate Alvaro Colom, who headed the polls throughout, beat his main rival former general Otto Pérez Molina by four percent of the vote. Despite the victory, Colom failed to get the support of more than half the electorate and so faces Molina again on November 4 for a second round of voting.

The voting transpired with such calm that Diego García-Sayán, Peruvian observer for the OAS, insisted there was a state of “tranquility across the width and length of the country.” The burning of at least seven urns in Santa Rosa province and evidence of vote buying elsewhere were put down to ‘incidents.’ Despite the relative calm, Guatemala is still a long way off from calling itself a stable democracy. Election participation was down, election related violence was not. Both are cause for concern.

First of all the turnout – 58 percent – was worryingly low for a country where voting is compulsory. Bad weather is a possible explanation. Hurricane Felix hit Guatemala hard at the beginning of last week, leaving around 5000 families homeless. Heavy rains persisted over the weekend, turning dirt roads into barely navigable lanes of mud.

Lousy weather, however, doesn’t tell us why more than 20 percent of those who should be registered to vote, aren’t, making the real turnout even lower. Carlos Cabrera, who runs the blog EleccionesGuatemala.com puts it to a lack of civic culture. Many Guatemalans, he says, don’t care for politics or simply feel that their vote doesn’t count.

If they did, maybe Nobel peace laureate Rigoberta Menchu would have more than 3 percent of the vote. In a country where two thirds of the population belong to an indigenous community and where racism is rampant, the only candidate of Mayan descent was left in sixth place. That’s a staggering defeat for someone who theoretically could be the Central American equivalent to Nelson Mandela. Menchu’s problem, say some commentators, is she sounds more like an NGO spokeswoman than a presidential candidate. The real reason though, may be the fact that Rigoberta is not perceived as tough on crime in a country where violence is a daily affair.

Violence is also the main reason not to place too much importance on a calm day of voting. The killings, which preceded it, were simply horrific. Over the past 15 months more than 50 murders of candidates, their supporters and relatives have been linked to the elections. Take, for instance, the case of Armando Sanchez. A candidate for Guatemala’s Congress, he told the Washington Post he attended seven funerals in six months. All of them candidates or political workers. Hector Montenegro, another congressional candidate, sorely misses his 15-year old daughter. Three weeks ago, her throat was slit before she was stuffed into the trunk of a taxi.

Most of those killings can be put down to the drug cartels way of reminding voters and candidates that they are also stake-holders in the country’s future. It’s part of a pattern. Last year saw 6000 murders in Guatemala. This year the killings include the gunning down of three El Salvadorian lawmakers and their driver along a remote highway, followed by the brutal murder of the four policemen accused of the killings in the very police cell where they were being detained.

The cartels are waging a battle for control over Guatemala’s institutions. Helen Mack, a human rights activist, insists they have infiltrated political parties. Along the border with Mexico drug money finances candidates, irrespective of their ideological outlook, in a bid to ensure a free run of the frontier zone. They build landing strips, plant opium and marijuana and run the place like feudal overlords, holding their puppet mayors by the strings. The drugs, mostly cocaine originating in South America, are destined for the US market.

Ironically, it was the silent will of US consumers that first sent Guatemala into turmoil over 50 years ago. In June 1954 American bomber pilots backed an invasion masterminded by the CIA. The aim, to topple an elected government threatening the interests of the United Fruit Company. What followed was a series of military dictatorships and a civil war, which lasted until 1996. Over 200,000 people are estimated to have died during the conflict.

This time round things are a little different. The current president, Oscar Berger, is a firm ally of the Bush administration. He even went so far as to send troops to Iraq. In return Bush confirmed his intention to help the country fight crime during a visit in March of this year. Hopefully, that intention will materialize and Guatemala can expect some of the same assistance Colombia and now Mexico receive. Because as long as violence and intimidation continue, the kind of civic culture needed to bolster democracy is unlikely to take root in Guatemala.

Latam Watch for the Buenos Aires Herald