By Gabriela Cultelli on December 14, 2023
“-Guatemala, to see you lying in the street,
your chest red, one wing broken between death and life!”
-from Guatemalan ballad, by Nicolás Guillén
Guillen’s poem reminds us of centuries of ignominy with barely a respite that did not reach the decade between 1945 and 54 with the Arévalo and Arbenz governments ended by the CIA in a sea of blood.
70 years later, and through the ballot boxes, a change of course has been imposed there, when the people of Guatemala opted for “life” as the poet mentioned and another Arévalo, this time Bernardo (the son) won with a wide 58% marginand a strong anti-corruption discourse. In short, touching from the stands, to what today is already an economic power, to these peculiar dark forms of capital that in the last right-wing government, are no longer alien to us in Uruguay either.
The New York Time itself said on December 11: “When Bernardo Arévalo, an anti-corruption advocate, won a landslide victory in Guatemala’s presidential race, voters flocked to the capital of Central America’s most populous country to celebrate. But the mood on the streets has shifted as Arevalo’s enemies intensify efforts to prevent the president-elect from taking office in a few weeks.” And the OAS itself, architect of the last coups d’état in Latin America, was moved this time approving a day later a third resolution deepening the use of its “democratic charter” that this time it remembered to take out, recalling for example and without going any further, its lamentable action before the coup d’état of 2020 in Bolivia.
The handover of power, or succession of power between the outgoing Búcaro and Arévalo would have to take place on January 14 as already validated by the Supreme Electoral Tribunal of Guatemala, so that if this does not happen, we would be facing another coup d’état in the Patria Grande. As we reported before (Maste Amargo 30/8 and 23/11/2023), the Public Prosecutor’s Office of Guatemala is carrying out diverse and controversial legal processes quickly taken out of a galley, against the Semilla party, its members and Arevalo himself. “These actions are generating a wide condemnation both nationally and internationally, as they are considered to threaten the transmission of the presidential command scheduled for January 2024”, reports Prensa Latina (PL) onDecember 13.
In those days a shameful budget 2024 was approved for the purpose, on the one hand, of complicating the new president, Arévalo, who lashed out harshly against it, while on the other hand, and far from being linked to the needs of the country, it increased amounts for the Public Ministry (MP), last minute allocations for Communications (more than partners, already part of the power today), including non-governmental organizations with links to congressmen and politicians. “The legislative blocks of the political forces Movimiento Semilla and Winaq considered the document unconstitutional, which multiple local entities rejected after its approval and qualified as nefarious and illegal” concluded PL.
The people of Guatemala are alert and mobilized, as the sole guarantor of their election.
Gabriela Cultelli, BA in Political Economy (University of Havana), MA in Economic History (UdelaR), writer, columnist and co-director of Mate Amargo. Coordinator of the Uruguayan Chapter of the Network of Intellectuals and Artists in Defense of Humanity (REDH).
Source: Mate Amargo translation Resumen Latinoamericano – English