Social Democrat Bernardo Arévalo is set to assume the presidency of Guatemala on Sunday, having faced a relentless judicial onslaught attributed to his promise to rescue the fragile Guatemalan democracy from the corrupt elite he claims clings to power.
This 65-year-old ex-diplomat and sociologist, who denounced this offensive as an attempt at a “coup d’état”, will be sworn in at the Miguel Ángel Asturias National Theater, in a solemn session of a Congress that will be averse to him.
Since he advanced to the runoff in June against all odds, he has evaded attempts by the Prosecutor’s Office to lift his immunity and annul the electoral result, but he will have to face the suspension of his Semilla party and the risk that his deputies have little room for maneuver.
Supported by the United States, the European Union, Latin American countries, and international organizations, Arévalo will replace the right-wing Alejandro Giammattei, whom his followers accuse of supporting Attorney General Consuelo Porras, the spearhead of the judicial onslaught.
The task ahead will be immense. “He will govern coexisting with the prosecutor who has attacked him and affected democracy to unimaginable levels,” said Edie Cux, director of Acción Ciudadana, the local version of Transparency International.
Arévalo has raised enormous expectations in a society weary of corruption, plagued by gang and drug trafficking violence, and where six out of ten Guatemalans live in poverty.
“Undoubtedly, it is a huge responsibility. But people know that it is not a task that is resolved overnight,” Arévalo commented at the end of December.
Rebuilding Democracy
Son of Guatemala’s first democratic president, Juan José Arévalo (1945-1951), a promoter of social reforms, the future ruler promised to close the tap of public money that has enriched the elites, while the population suffers hardships.
One in two children under five years of age suffers from malnutrition, and illiteracy is at 18%. Central America’s largest economy expels tens of thousands each year in search of work in the United States, whose remittances help sustain the country (20% of GDP), according to official data.
But to advance socially, according to Arévalo, it must start with a “sustained and gradual fight” to rescue institutions he says were “co-opted” by the “corrupt elites”, such as the Prosecutor’s Office, Congress, the courts, or the Comptroller. “It’s a systemic problem,” he maintains.
His strategy includes the creation of a commission that proposes reforms to curb illicit enrichment and political clientelism in a Guatemala that ranks 30th in Transparency International’s corruption ranking of 180 countries.
“He has a very important and urgent task of rebuilding democracy” and achieving governance, commented former Human Rights Prosecutor Jordán Rodas, exiled in Washington.
His experience in conflict resolution, says Rodas, may help. Arévalo is also a philosopher, studied in Israel and the Netherlands, and speaks five languages.
Born in Montevideo and having lived as a child in Venezuela, Mexico, and Chile in his father’s exile after the coup orchestrated by Washington against the progressive Jacobo Árbenz (1951-1954).
A Besieged President
For months, there was fear that the onslaught of the Prosecutor’s Office, which even raided electoral tribunal headquarters and seized ballots, would prevent Arévalo from taking power.
Along the way, several were arrested and exiled, a pile of legal actions for and against Arévalo, and a battery of sanctions from Washington against prosecutors, judges, officials, and about 100 deputies accused of corruption and undermining democracy.
The Constitutional Court had to demand guarantees for the transfer of power, and even on Thursday, it granted “protection” to the elected vice president, Karin Herrera, amid rumors of an arrest warrant.
Arévalo states that one of the first things he will do as president will be to ask for Porras’s resignation. But analysts warn that the offensive against him is far from over.
“They will have the president ambushed, at the first oversight, they will want to lift his immunity and remove him,” stated Manfredo Marroquín, co-founder of Acción Ciudadana.
On his path to the inauguration, Arévalo had decisive support from young people, very active on social networks, and indigenous people, historically marginalized, who make up 40% of the 17.8 million Guatemalans.
Sleeping outdoors, groups of indigenous people remained for more than 100 days in front of the Prosecutor’s Office to demand Porras’s resignation.
“He will have to meet their expectations. But one cannot pretend that he comes with a magic wand,” affirmed Rodas.
