Democracy in Guatemala

While regular elections that are generally free are held in Guatemala, corruption and organized crime severely impact the functioning of government. Victims of rampant violence and criminal extortion have little recourse to justice. Activists, journalists, and public officials who confront corruption, crime, and other sensitive issues risk attack and judicial persecution.

Guatemala’s 2023 presidential elections were definitely a turning point for the nation. Despite a playing field tilted to favour the governing elite, voters elected Bernardo Arévalo, whose Movimiento Semilla (Seed Movement) promised to break the nation’s cycles of corruption, restoring democracy and the rule of law. The kleptocracy pushed back very hard, putting to use their control of the public prosecutors’ office to open bogus investigations and pursue unsupported claims of electoral fraud.

The key issue during the 2023-24 electoral process was whether Guatemala’s government should serve all citizens universally or continue to provide favoured treatment for those in power. Thirty-seven years post the 1986 elections ended long spell of military-dominated rule, Guatemalan democracy teetered atop extreme disparity and exclusion, a weak state inflicted by corruption and reigned by authoritarians, and an economic model heavily dependent upon migration and remittances. Conventional political and economic leaders had run out of ideas beyond their narrow self-interest.

A year earlier, no one in Guatemala anticipated the so-called “pacto de los corruptos,” or the “pact” hereafter — an alliance of politicians, government officials, prosecutors, party financiers, judges, state contractors and some wealthy families — would face defeat in the elections. They had the most renowned candidates, they had wealth and they controlled — or so they thought — the electoral authorities and judiciary. Over eight years of increasingly mediocre and corrupt governance had reinforced voters’ basic assumption that all parties were equally faulty.

But as the boxer Mike Tyson opined, “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.” The pact disregarded or misinterpreted mutually reinforcing factors resulting in their electoral loss. They misjudged rising citizen resentment of the status quo and dismissed Arévalo and the Semilla Movement as a credible alternate. They underestimated the determination of Indigenous authorities to defend the electoral results and of journalists and civil society to inform and rally citizens, despite terrorization and arrests. They also failed to anticipate that some judicial and electoral authorities would defend the electoral results tooth and nail even in the face of strong pressure. And finally, they disregarded or dismissed the impact of international pressure, including U.S. sanctions and outreach.

In early 2023, it seemed that incumbent President Alejandro Giammattei and his supporters controlled not only the executive branch, the judiciary, the Congress and the Attorney General’s office (also known as the Public Ministry), but even the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE), the Comptroller’s office and the Human Rights Ombudsman. They had very much secured the backing or the neutrality of most of the wealthy elite, including a private sector umbrella group termed the Coordinating Committee of Agricultural, Commercial, Industrial, and Financial Associations (CACIF).