Uncertainty in Guatemala after party suspends candidate for second round

Political crisis in Guatemala. This Wednesday, the Central American country experienced several frantic minutes that greatly affected the democratic system. On the one hand, Supreme Electoral Court confirmed that the candidacies of the former first lady are advancing to the second round of the presidential elections scheduled for August 20 Sandra Torres and a social democratic academic Bernardo Arevalowho surprised in the first round on June 25 when he slipped on the ballot when polls placed him in sixth place.

Almost at the same time, the Public Ministry (MP, Guatemala’s Prosecutor’s Office) announced that it was politically suspending the party Movement of seedswhich Arévalo postulates, supporting the decision on the alleged forgery of part of the signatures that confirmed the creation of the formation.

The representative’s action was characterized by various social organizations as an attempt at an “electoral coup” similar to a “coup d’état”. “We are in an election game. We are moving forward and we will not allow ourselves to be distracted by these illegal acts, this corrupt group,” Arévalo said at a press conference yesterday.

The center-left candidate denounces that groups linked to corruption want to throw him out of the presidential race. In particular, it targets prosecutor Rafael Curruchiche, who gave a proxy statement and was sanctioned by the US in 2022 after he was accused of fabricating false charges against other prosecutors handling corruption cases in Guatemala, an important part of the cases currently in exile, as well as dozens of activists and politicians.

Semilla’s suspension order was signed by the Seventh Criminal Court, which ordered the jailing of critical journalist José Rubén Zamora, whose case led to the departure of dozens of informants from the country and the imprisonment the newspaperthe publication he ran.

“We must come together to reject this action, which is nothing more than a technical strike”Arévalo said in an interview with the Guatevisión news program.

The election process was already in doubt after Justice eliminated three leading candidates from the race, with different ideologies — from the hard left to the populist right — whose link was criticism of the system and its leaders. Semilla, a party born out of the anti-corruption demonstrations of 2015 that ended with the ouster of President Otto Pérez Molina (2012-2015) and his imprisonment for corruption, was saved from that incineration.

Problems for the social democratic formation arose after the sudden passage to the second round. Just five days after the election, the Constitutional Court ordered a review of the electoral records after several parties denounced inconsistencies, but the audit ultimately found no major discrepancies and thus the electoral court confirmed the runoff between Torres and Aréval.

Yesterday, the Prosecutor’s Office raided the premises of the Supreme Electoral Court, allegedly in search of Semilla’s signature books. The judges of that body had 24 hours to confirm the suspension of the social democratic party, but many lawyers warned that the court’s verdict is not legal, because the Guatemalan electoral law itself, of constitutional rank, makes it impossible to abolish any political party with the upcoming elections.