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Guatemala – Central American Crime Capital
During his 2007 presidential campaign Guatemalan president Alvaro
Colom Caballeros was well aware of the crime epidemic that afflicted
the country and the lack of effective existing security. The
security situation has now become so grave that the Guatemala Times
has reported that “already the villages, who suffered the most
during the civil war by the hands of the military, are asking the
military to come back and establish military bases to ‘protect’ the
people.”
With little more than a year in office, and marred by high crime
rates and major security dilemmas, Colom has made a concerted, but
largely lackluster effort to improve upon Guatemala’s security
problems, pledging to tackle them head-on.
Drug Cartel Stronghold in Guatemala
Guatemala can grimly claim one of the world’s highest per-capita
murder rates, which amounts to more than 5,000 killings a year.
According to the National Civilian Police (PNC) of Guatemala, there
were 5,682 registered deaths in 2007 and 6,200 in 2008. Accordingly,
the Economist Intelligence Unit’s January 2009 Guatemala Country
Report establishes that these statistics for the year 2008 translate
into an average of 17 deaths a day - in a country whose population
numbers approximately 13 million people (estimated as of 2008).
Experts insist that this proves to be an exorbitantly high rate.
Moreover, the report adds that with only 382 individuals detained on
murder charges, the Guatemala’s impunity rate ranks abnormally high,
making its deterrent factor to committing a crime almost minuscule.
LatinNews attributes Guatemala’s preponderate security dilemma, as
it pertains to crime, to the actions of Mexican drug cartels and
Guatemala’s corruption-riven army. Additionally, Guatemala’s weak
security apparatus, hampered by the effects of a prolonged
thirty-six year civil war and an ill-trained and venal police force,
combined, have enabled the drug cartels to develop a significant
stronghold on the country. In fact, the drug crisis that Guatemala
currently finds itself in is due primarily to spillage from Mexico.
Barbara Schieber of the Guatemala Times, observes that “the increase
in violence, mainly caused by the invasion of narcos into the
country from Mexico and the consequent infiltration of every sector
of society and government, has complicated the security challenge
that this government inherited.”
In December 2008, Carlos Castresana, Head of the United Nations
International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala, stated “if
the Guatemalan authorities are unable to stop the infiltration of
Mexican drug cartels in two years they could take over Guatemala
City.” Furthermore, the drug cartels seem to have no regard for
innocent victims or bystanders when engaged in their drug clashes.
In a recent incident that occurred in the city of Huehuetenango,
Guatemala, situated on the Mexico - Guatemala border, 17 individuals
fell victim in a clash that occurred between Guatemalan and Mexican
drug cartels.
In yet another incident last year, the BBC reports that 11 people
were killed in a gang shoot out that occurred in front of a hotel in
the city of Zacapa. Drug analysts believe that traffickers perceive
Guatemala to be an ideal “paradise” for the narcotics trade. This
“paradise” is attributed to the country’s under-populated and
spottily policed border with Mexico, its remote areas and its access
to the waterways of the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific Ocean.
Moreover, with an annual averse transportation of 200 tons of
cocaine from Colombia through Guatemala into Mexico and finally to
the United States, and a mere 2 percent of murder cases reaching
complete resolution, the narco-traffickers operating in Guatemala
are all but certain that they will not be indicted by its legal
system, where prosecution is exceedingly unlikely. Either way, the
drug cartels operating in Guatemala have proven that they are a
force to be reckoned with.
Discontent Prevalent in Guatemalan Civil Society
In securing his presidential post, Colom obtained 52.77 percent of
the Guatemalan population’s vote. However, according to a poll
administered by Vox Latina and released by Prensa Libre, Guatemalans
are dissatisfied with their leader’s first year as president. When
asked the question, “Do you approve or disapprove of Álvaro Colom’s
performance as president during the first year of his
administration?,” 54.4 percent of respondents registered that they
disapproved of Colom’s performance, while 44.8 percent approved.
Those who disapprove of Colom indicated that they were dissatisfied
with him for a number of reasons, most notably, his lack of
achievement in successfully confronting Guatemala’s principal
problems. According to Prensa Libre, a majority of those who
disagree with Colom are landowners or intellectuals and live either
in the southern or central regions of the country. Disillusioned
Guatemalans point to Colom’s unfulfilled promises promulgated during
his presidential campaign. They also note few results regarding
security factors and improvement of the standard of living in
Guatemala, and claim that twelve months is a sufficient amount of
time to visually witness substantial outcomes. Another compliant
worth noting, is that Colom has not fulfilled his campaign promise
that within the first eight months of assuming his presidential
post, he would have secured major advances in the realm of security.
Furthermore, 66.4 percent of respondents believe that Guatemala, as
a state, is currently worse off than it was a year ago.
Preliminary Actions Undertaken by President Colom
There have been numerous measures taken by President Colom to
strengthen Guatemala’s security policy. In December 2008, he fired
Marco Franco, his Defense Minister, and accordingly replaced him
with Abraham González along with Francisco Jiménez, his Interior
Minister, whom he had replaced with Salvador Gándara. Other changes
include replacing Carlos Fernández with Roberto Sánchez as Deputy
Defense Minister, switching Ronald García with Juan Morales, and
appointing Carlos Méndez as Deputy Chief of National Defense, and
Aníbal España as Inspector General of the Armed Forces. Reported by
the Guatemala Times and El Periodico, Alvaro Colom has stated that
he has conducted all these changes “with the objective of improving
the fight against crime in his country, as well as both fortifying
and harmonizing the institutionalistic realm of the Ministry of
Defense and the Ministry of the Interior so that they may combine
forces to fight against crime.” Ever attentive to the formidable
drug trafficking forces, Colom has secured congressional approval
for his security budget of $1 billion in 2009 with which he intends
to introduce an operation that combats drug gangs as well as
strengthening Guatemala’s National Civilian Police.
The crime epidemic in Guatemala is generously fueled by the drug
trade, and has now been turned into a transnational arrangement,
whose effects are not only felt by Guatemala but also by other
regional countries. Given the rising concern regarding the
insecurity felt in their countries by local populations, a number of
Latin American regional leaders have recently met to establish
policy in their neighboring territories in order to collectively
tackle security and related issues. On January 16, 2009 Colombian
President Álvaro Uribe, Panamanian President Omar Torrijos and
Mexican President Felipe Calderón and Colom of Guatemala met in
Panama to “address the urgent problem of organized crime and drugs
in their respective countries.” All of these presidents “agree that
organized crime is a scourge that keeps their nations in distress.”
At the meeting, President Colom stated that “that the effort of the
four countries together will begin the strengthening of democratic
security.” Key resolutions adopted at the meeting included the
exchange of information and interconnection of databases among
intelligence agencies as well as a strengthened resolve for the
effective prosecution of cases and the immediate appointment of key
prosecutors as vehicles for the exchange of legal assistance and
prosecution.
Other Effective Crime Strategies
At a news conference in October 2008, Colom stated that “Guatemala’s
security is dying in an intensive care room and exceptional actions
must be taken to recover the remains and the people’s trust and
credibility.” This begs the question: are the changes Colom has
implemented constructive enough to create a much desired improvement
upon Guatemala’s security milieu to ameliorate it? Much of
Guatemala’s current security dilemma, which is shared by many other
Latin American countries, stems from a combination of a stronger
presence of transnational crime syndicates and ill-trained and often
corrupted security forces. While it would be premature to analyze
the effectiveness of the measures implemented by Colom thus far, the
measures drafted at the “Presidential Summit of Colombia, Guatemala,
Mexico and Panama to Fight Organized Crime” could serve as an
example to other Latin American leaders who aspire to combat
security issues in their own countries.
Even though President Colom has demonstrated that activism combined
with a commitment to strengthen a country’s governmental security
apparatus play an instrumental role in combating security problems.
But it is also imperative that Guatemala City implement immediate
judicial changes, for the core of the drug-crime problem in that
country may be due to a weak and ineffectual judicial system.
Strengthening the latter by enforcing the law, seeking more reliable
system of justice and holding criminals legitimately accountable for
the crimes committed, as well as obliging that sentences be
announced and enforced, could be the beginnings of an effective
anti-crime strategy, if Colom is truly committed to act upon
eradicating the stronghold that the cartels increasingly have on his
country.
This analysis was prepared by COHA Research Associate Maya Wilson
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