A surging anti-corruption candidate in Guatemala’s troubled presidential election said in an interview that a move by the country’s top prosecutor to suspend his party ahead of a runoff next month amounted to a “coup.”
And he warned that if Guatemala suffers a “loss of democracy” economic conditions in the country would further deteriorate and “increase the push for people to go to the United States.”
But Bernardo Arevalo urged his supporters to “stay calm” and avoid street demonstrations “that could be infiltrated by agitators” and used as a pretext for the government to suspend Guatemala’s political process.
In the interview, conducted by phone with USA TODAY, Arevalo strenuously dismissed allegations made by Rafael Curruchiche, a discredited special prosecutor in the country’s attorney general’s office, that his Seed Movement party violated laws when it collected signatures it needed to form. Arevalo rejected the claims as “completely absurd” and said they stemmed from a complaint that the Seed Movement itself had made to Curruchiche’s office seeking an investigation into what it suspected was a single case of a forged signature.
He said that investigation never took place.
Arevalo’s comments came as the U.S. and European Union said the unfolding events in Guatemala represented a grave threat to democracy and the nation’s former first lady Sandra Torres, the top voter getter in the first-round vote, suspended her campaign activities Thursday in solidarity with Arevalo and his party.
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Guatemala’s presidential election runoff is scheduled for Aug. 20. However, the move by Curruchiche to suspend Arevalo’s party and an earlier decision by a court to order a review of first-round vote tallies despite little-to-no evidence of voting irregularities has cast doubt on when the runoff would be held and who would be in it.
It was not immediately clear what Curruchiche’s last-minute intervention means for the runoff. However, it drew criticism from western officials. Brian Nichols, an assistant secretary of State, tweeted that the U.S. was “deeply concerned” by threats to Guatemala’s democracy. “Institutions must respect the will of voters,” he said.
Curruchiche and his boss Attorney General Consuelo Porras have long faced corruption allegations. In the past, both officials have been sanctioned by the U.S. State Department.
Curruchiche was named as someone who has “obstructed investigations into acts of corruption” and made “spurious claims” against government officials, prosecutors and attorneys, in a 2021 State Department report.
The next few “days will be crucial to the future of Guatemalan democracy,” said Emily Taylor, who researches Latin American history at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and is currently in Guatemala observing the election.
Arevalo, a 64-year-old sociologist and son of former President Juan Jose Arevalo, defied the doubters by grabbing a top spot behind Torres in the first round of Guatemala’s presidential election last month. He has vowed to crackdown on corruption in a country long plagued by graft.
Ahead of the first round polls showed Arevalo to be a distant outsider.
Yet came in second behind Torres, with just under 12% of the vote, a result that experts say amounts to crushing it in a race where no candidate won more than 16% of votes. Arevalo did so partly because several more popular candidates – both right and left wing – who represented a challenge to the status quo were barred from running on various alleged technicalities. And partly because, with nearly a quarter of all ballots left blank, his left-of-center Seed Movement party likely benefited from public discontent with the other candidates.
More than 220,000 Guatemalans crossed into the U.S. via the Mexico border in 2022, according to Border Patrol figures. In June the U.S. and Guatemala announced a pilot program intended to “manage the historic irregular migration challenge impacting both countries.”
The move was part of the Biden administration’s push to restrict migration and asylum seekers.
“We already have an exodus of people leaving Guatemala because they see no future in the country. There are no ways for them to make a living and so they go north to find work and support their families. I can only think that if (the election does not go ahead as expected) the situation will get worse,” Arevalo said.
