2023-08-21 02:15:00
Presidential election
Bernardo Arevalo elected president of Guatemala
With 59% of the vote, Bernardo Arevalo fairly easily won the second round of the presidential election this Sunday in Guatemala once morest Sandra Torres.
Posted21 August 2023, 04:15
Bernardo Arevalo is the son of the country’s first democratically elected president, Juan José Arevalo (1945-1951).
Surprise candidate Bernardo Arevalo won the second round of the presidential election in Guatemala on Sunday, according to a count by the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) of 95% of the votes cast.
“Fortunately, we already have an extremely important trend,” said Irma Palencia, president of the TSE, announcing that Bernardo Arevalo, the subject of attempts to be disqualified during the electoral campaign, had obtained 59% of the votes. Her rival, former First Lady Sandra Torres, garnered 36%, according to this official tally.
The ballot took place without any “significant incident” being reported, indicated the TSE, emphasizing without further precision a “historic percentage of participation”. The two candidates in the running, Bernardo Arevalo, 64, and Sandra Torres, 67, both claim to be center left.
But if the first crystallizes hopes for change in a deeply unequal country, her rival is considered the representative of the establishment. At the head of the National Unity of Hope (UNE) party, Sandra Torres has promised social assistance programs and various subsidies for the poor. However, she won support from the right and evangelists and multiplied conservative rhetoric.
Repression
The former wife of former left-wing president Alvaro Colom (2008-2012) enjoys the silent support of outgoing president Alejandro Giammattei, whose mandate was marked by repression once morest magistrates and journalists who denounced corruption. It also has the support of the powerful economic elite allied with the government.
According to the latest poll on Wednesday, Bernardo Arevalo was credited with 50% of the voting intentions, well ahead of Sandra Torres, several times unsuccessful candidate for president in the past, with 32%. Sandra Torres made no statement following inserting her ballot into the ballot box.
Qualified to everyone’s surprise in the first round, Bernardo Arevalo crystallizes hopes for change, especially among young people who represent 16% of the 9.4 million registered. “We have been the victims, the prey, of corrupt politicians for years,” he said Wednesday.
This sociologist and former diplomat is the son of the country’s first democratically elected president, Juan José Arevalo (1945-1951). The one who focused her campaign on the fight once morest criminal gangs and once morest poverty, multiplied the attacks once morest her rival, whom she described as a “foreigner” because she was born in Uruguay during her father’s exile.
“Data Corruption”
In the home stretch of the campaign, on Friday, she even questioned the bias of the electoral process, saying she was “concerned regarding any alteration of the data” for counting votes by authorized people from the TSE.
Bernardo Arevalo’s spectacular breakthrough is causing concern among the country’s economic and political elites, who see him as a danger to their interests, and the public prosecutor has stepped up proceedings once morest him.
On the advice of the prosecution, a judge ordered on July 12 the suspension of his Semilla party for alleged irregularities during its creation in 2017. The Constitutional Court suspended this decision, canceled on Friday by the Supreme Court. The day before, the prosecutor Rafael Curruchiche, sanctioned for “corruption” by Washington, had announced possible arrests to come from leaders of Semilla.
(AFP)Show comments
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