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REPORTS: GUATEMALA ELECTIONS |
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Second
Round Without Ríos Montt
José
Eduardo Mora
SAN JOSE,
(IPS) - Guatemala's presidential
election will be decided in a late
December runoff between right-wing
candidate Oscar Berger and centre-right
candidate Alvaro Colom, who left
former dictator Efraín Ríos Montt
far behind in Sunday's poll.
The partial results from Sunday's
election put Berger, the candidate of
the Great National Alliance (GANA),
ahead Monday with 38.4 percent of the
vote, followed by the National Union
of Hope's (UNE) Colom, with 27.6
percent.
Retired general Ríos Montt, the
founder of the corruption-tainted
ruling Guatemalan Republican Front (FRG),
took just 11 percent.
Since no candidate garnered more than
50 percent of the vote, as needed to
win outright, the two front-runners
will go to a second round on Dec. 28.
The Supreme Electoral Court reported
that 70 percent of the country's 5.7
million registered voters turned out
for the elections, which were marred
by irregularities and several violent
incidents, but not to the extent that
local and foreign election observers
questioned the results.
Three people were killed Sunday in a
fight that broke out in a voting
station.
Among the complaints filed with
authorities were the burning of ballot
papers, allegedly by the paramilitary
Civil Self-Defence Patrols (EXPACS)
set up by de facto military
governments in the 1980s to help fight
leftist guerrillas and supposed rebel
''sympathisers''. The EXPACS have been
revived by the FRG.
Attempts to print ballot papers were
also reported, as well as problems
with registration which purportedly
kept hundreds of citizens from voting.
According to election observers and
analysts, the most significant outcome
of the first round of elections was
the downfall of the 77-year-old Ríos
Montt.
Ríos Montt governed this impoverished
Central American nation in 1982 and
1983 after overthrowing General Romeo
Lucas García in a coup d'etat. He
ruled over the bloodiest period of
Guatemala's 36-year civil war, which
was brought to an end by a peace deal
in 1996.
The armed conflict left a death toll
of 200,000, mainly civilians,
according to a United
Nations-sponsored truth commission
report, which held government forces
responsible for the great majority of
the deaths.
In a ''scorched earth''
counterinsurgency campaign carried out
by Ríos Montt's de facto regime,
hundreds of rural villages were
completely destroyed and tens of
thousands of Mayan Indians massacred.
The retired general unsuccessfully
tried to run for president in two
previous elections, but he was blocked
by a constitutional clause that bans
former coup-leaders from standing as
candidates. However, he got around the
ban this time thanks to a Supreme
Court ruling.
Local political analysts say the
former dictator's weak performance
Sunday spelled his political death.
''That will be the first big victory
for Guatemalans: the burial of the
myth of Ríos Montt,'' Marco Barahona,
with the Association of Social
Research and Studies, predicted before
the elections in an interview with IPS.
Tumbling down along with Ríos Montt
is his party, whose government, headed
by President Alfonso Portillo, is
coming to an end amidst accusations of
corruption and supposed ties with
businessmen linked to the drug trade.
The left, represented by the former
guerrilla National Guatemalan
Revolutionary Unity, and the New
Nation Alliance, led by lawmaker
Nineth Montenegro, made a poor showing
as projected.
Over the next two months, Guatemalans
will witness a struggle between
businessmen Berger and Colom, whose
campaign platforms contain few
differences.
Colom has the backing of a number of
small parties, including the National
Advance Party, the National Union,
National Change, the Unionist Party
and the Guatemalan Christian Democracy
party.
In addition, political analysts like
Barahona and Francisco García at the
Central American Institute of
Political Studies say there is a
possibility that Ríos Montt's FRG
will throw its support behind UNE,
which would further improve Colom's
chances.
Both García and Barahona agree that
the new political panorama that will
take shape from now until the runoff
will give Colom a strong possibility
of winning in December.
Berger, a conservative businessman and
landowner identified with the
traditional ruling elite, and Colom, a
textile industrialist, have both
indicated their interest in making
progress towards implementation of the
1996 peace accords that put an end to
nearly four decades of armed conflict.
Analysts say compliance with the terms
laid out in the peace deal would be
the best way to set up a national
agenda that would broaden the
participation of Guatemala's
impoverished indigenous majority, who
account for around 60 percent of the
population. An estimated 80 percent of
Guatemalan's 12.3 million people live
below the poverty line.
But García and Barahona agree that no
matter who wins, the best that can be
expected over the next four years is
for the new government to lay the
bases for a ''real transition to
democracy.''
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