MSG061G/01E GUATEMALA: Strange Bedfellows Seek to Prevent Dictator’s Comeback

By Fabiana Frayssinet Reprint | | Print |

Fabiana Frayssinet

GUATEMALA CITY, Mar 14 1995 (IPS) - Unlikely alliances are among the alternatives as parties from across Guatemala’s political spectrum seek to defeat former dictator Efrain Rios Montt in his controversial bid for the presidency.

The retired general’s de facto regime (1982-1983) saw one of the Central American nation’s cruelest genocidal campaigns.

The Guatemalan Constitution, enacted in 1985, prohibits anyone who has participated in a coup or taken power as the result of one from becoming president or vice-president of the country.

Currently the President of Congress, Rios Montt argued that he may be prevented from taking office, but that there is no reason he can not participate as a candidate for president. He is supported by his Guatemalan Republican Front and the Christian Democratic Party.

Although the Electoral Tribunal has not yet agreed to inscribe him as a candidate, polls show Rios Montt as a favourite for the election – to be held in late 1995 – and other parties have already launched campaigns against the former dictator.

Strategies have centred on the possibility of a traditional left-wing front or a broader centre-left coalition strong enough to defeat him.

The latter idea is supported by the fragmented social democratic movement, indigenous groups, unions, farmers and the rebel Guatemalan National Revolutionary Unity (URNG).

Although the URNG advocated abstention in previous elections, the guerrillas have announced plans to participate actively and non-militarily in this year’s electoral process.

“As a political force, we are not only going to present programme ideas for electoral struggle, but also promote a national front for the establishment of a truly democratic system,” rebel commander Pablo Monsanto announced in February.

Recent survey by the daily “La Republica” showed that 19 percent of the electorate would vote for a URNG candidate, if the guerrilla movement were to put one forth.

Efforts to prevent a Rios Montt comeback have led to other creative political mixing and matching: the right-wing businesses of the National Advancement Party (PAN) are considering alliance with the Autonomous Mass Movement led by former guerrilla Danilo Rodriguez.

Meanwhile, political analyst Gabriel Aguilera of the Latin American Faculty of Social Sciences hoped for a broader front, able to attract at least a fifth of the 80 percent abstention traditional in Guatemalan elections.

“The alternatives do not satisfy the left. On one side is General Rios, and on the other (his leading rival) the PAN, a modern party, yes, but also a right-wing one,” he told IPS.

A Social Democratic leader, Aguilera explained that “the idea is to create a third alternative … in order to look ahead to the policies that will be necessary in the 21st century.”

Guatemalan intellectuals such as writer Mario Monteforte Toledo also came out in favour of a broad coalition.

Monteforte said the front should include sectors ranging from marginalised Mayan indigenous groups to members of the business community who believe that the current economic system keeps Guatemala from achieving holistic development.

The coalition should promote “a capitalist regime like those practiced in civilised regions of the world,” according to the author.

However, he warned that “capitalism must always be understood to include an end to medieval exploitation systems, protectionism for the plutocracy, postponement of social programmes, poverty wages and ownership of all the land by a handful of families.”