GUATEMALA: Elections Demonstrate Resurgence of Left

By Fabiana Frayssinet Reprint | | Print |

Fabiana Frayssinet

GUATEMALA CITY, Nov 13 1995 (IPS) - A mysterious power failure that left Guatemala in darkness meant the ballots cast in Sunday’s elections could not begin to be tallied until early Monday morning, but it was unable to conceal the resurgence of the left.

While opinion polls had put the New Guatemalan Democratic Front (FDNG), the country’s budding left – made up of unions, peasant and human rights organisations and indigenous groups – in fifth or sixth place, the party came in third.

The Supreme Electoral Court reported that Alvaro Arzu, candidate for the right-wing National Advance Party, took first place, at least in the capital.

And Alfonso Portillo, a former Marxist and Christian Democrat who stood for former dictator Efrain Rios Montt’s Guatemalan Republican Front, came in a distant second.

Both leading candidates admitted that they failed to win the “half-plus one” of the votes needed to avoid a second round, which will be held on Jan. 7.

Arzu told IPS that his party will not seek alliances for the second round, but said it will look for support among social organisations.

Sunday’s elections, in which the offices of president, vice- president, mayors and national and Central American deputies were voted on, demonstrated once more how far off opinion polls can be.

The centre-left FDNG made a much better showing than expected, in spite of an intimidation campaign directed against its members, and the scarce financial resources with which it promoted its candidate, economist Jorge Gonzalez del Valle.

The FDNG denies having ties with the guerrilla forces, as accused by the government of Ramiro de Leon and the army.

The big losers on Sunday were the traditional Christian Democratic and Democratic Socialist parties and the Union of National Centre, which joined together in the National Alliance headed by former Foreign Minister Fernando Andrade.

According to preliminary results, the Alliance came in fourth.

The power cut was preceded late Sunday night by an attack on the headquarters of the United Nations Mission for Verifying Human Rights in Guatemala (MINUGUA).

MINUGUA was created to oversee compliance with the human rights accord signed by the government and the insurgent Guatemalan National Revolutionary Unity (URNG) as part of a peace dialogue that aims to put an end to 35 years of armed conflict.

The guerrilla forces, which for the first time supported an electoral process, declared a ceasefire to last until midnight on Monday, in order to help promote a peaceful poll.