GUATEMALA CITY, June 23 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Guatemalans go to the polls Sunday with two popular candidates disqualified and several prosecutors and journalists detained or in exile amid a government pushback on anti-corruption efforts.
Twenty-two candidates are in the running with three in a clear lead: a former first lady, a UN diplomat, and an ex-dictator’s daughter.
Center-leftist Sandra Torres — the ex-wife of deceased former president Alvaro Colom — leads with 21.3 percent, according to the most recent poll by the Prensa Libre newspaper, followed by career diplomat Edmond Mulet with 13.4 percent.
In third place, with 9.1 percent, is Zury Rios, daughter of former military strongman Efrain Rios Montt.
The candidate of President Alejandro Giammattei’s party, Manuel Conde, is fourth with 5.8 percent.
The polls indicate a high possibility that the election will go to a runoff on Aug 20, with no single candidate likely to obtain the 50 percent minimum share of votes required to win in the first round.
Two serious candidates have been ruled out of contention by the Superior Electoral Tribunal (TSE), in decisions critics have condemned as flawed.
Carlos Pineda, who was the poll favorite at the time, lost a Constitutional Court appeal in May against his disqualification by the TSE for alleged irregularities in the registration of his candidacy.
Also out of the running, over allegations of financial impropriety against her vice-presidential running mate, is Thelma Cabrera — a representative of the Mayan Indigenous group that makes up 40 percent of Guatemala’s population.
Some 9.4 million of the country’s 17.6 million people are eligible to take part in the election to replace Giammattei, accused of increasing authoritarianism.
About three-quarters of the population disapprove of his leadership of a country riddled with poverty, violence and graft.
The country has a one-term presidential limit.
Under Giammattei, several former prosecutors of the International Commission Against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG), a UN-backed entity closed by the government in 2019, have been arrested or forced into exile.
Earlier this month, the founder of a newspaper critical of the government was sentenced to six years in prison on charges of money laundering dismissed as fake by press freedom groups.
The newspaper founded by Jose Ruben Zamora has been forced to close, and several of its journalists have fled the country.
Giammattei’s Attorney General, Maria Consuelo Porras, is on a US list of “corrupt actors.”
Guatemala is one of the most unequal countries in Latin America, according to the World Bank.
More than half its inhabitants live in poverty and half of all children under five suffer from chronic malnutrition, according to the UN.
Insecurity is another major election issue. Guatemala’s homicide rate is 17.3 per 100,000 inhabitants — almost three times the world average, according to the UN.
In 2022 there were 4,274 murders, half of them attributed to drug trafficking and gangs that are mainly engaged in extortion and contract killings.
Thousands of Guatemalans flee the country every year in search of a better life abroad, many of them undertaking the dangerous, illegal journey to the United States only to be deported.
Polling stations will open at 7:00 am Sunday and close 11 hours later, with the first results expected within hours.
There will also be voting for 160 members of Congress, 340 mayors and 20 delegates to the Central American Parliament.
Voting is not compulsory. — NNN-AGENCIES
