In the 1980s the countries in the Central American isthmus were characterised by great instability (the only exception being Costa Rica). There were civil wars in Guatemala and Salvador, the ContrasSandinistas conflict in Nicaragua with repercussions in Honduras, while Panama was under the Noriega dictatorship.
All of these situations were then gradually settled and national reconciliation began to take place. Now the only country still with armed guerrillas and no signed peace agreement is Guatemala. In this article we should like to offer a brief analysis of the Guatemalan situation, also in light of the recent election of the new president Alvaro Arzú.
Guatemala has a number of specific features typical not only of Central America but also of Latin America: in addition to the continuing presence of the guerrillas, by now demobilised in almost all the other countries, Guatemala is emblematic for its mixed population. Sixty per cent is of Maya origin, while twenty-two different languages are spoken. At times the native Indian speakers do not know Spanish. The Maya population is concentrated in the northern and western parts of the country, characterised by slower development and greater poverty.
In Guatemala there is an economic, social and cultural gap between the easterncentral-Pacific area and the northwest: the former is much more developed economically, more urbanised (albeit concentrated in the great urban agglomeration of the capital city), it has more fertile land and is mainly inhabited by the Spanish-speaking Creole population. In this region the administrative state is present to some degree. The poorer region, on the other hand, is on the fringe of the state, outside the circuit of modern economics, and is mainly an unknown entity for the rest of the country. Guerrillas control most of this territory whose land is parcelled out in unproductive small holdings.
The presence of a large Maya population, basically excluded from modern life, is the main structural feature conditioning the situation in Guatemala.
The history of Guatemala has long been characterised by authoritarian military controlled governments. The major exception was the period 1944-1954. But from 1954 (the year President Arbenz was deposed) until 1985 there was a series of military governments. The guerrillas first became active in 1962.The civil war then reached its height in the years 1975-1983. The Unidad Revolucionaria Nacional Guatemalteca (URNG) is still very much active and controls a number of areas.
Thirty-four years of armed conflict has takena toll of 100,000 deaths and 40,000 desapercidos. The civil war also forced around half a million of mainly Mayaorigin people to abandon their homes and move to other areas, even across the Mexican border (these are the so-called desplazados). The most bitter fighting took place during the eleven months of the General Rios Montt government (1982-83). He pursued the merciless repression of the Maya areas causing many civilian victims.
Significantly, the ex-dictator Montt is still a leading figure on the Guatemala political scene. The party founded by him, the Frente Republicano Guatemalteco (FRG) won a qualified majority in the legislative elections following President Jorge Serrano’s attempt to rule by decree in June 1993. Rios would have stood in the recent presidential election (with a good chance of wining) had he not been barred by a special ad hoc constitutional law excluding former dictators. Alfonso Portillo, considered simply Montt’s mouthpieceby many, reachedthe second ballot, winning 48.78 per cent of the votes compared to the 51.22 per cent obtained by Alvaro Arzú the candidate of the Partido de Avanzada Nacional (PAN).
This paradox of the dictator’s popularity may partly be explained by the split between the two Guatemalas. In fact most of the population lives completely oblivious to the political system, as was amply demonstrated by the turnout of only fifteen per cent for referendum on the dissolution of Congress promoted by Ramiro de León Carpio (Serrano’s successor) and the subsequent legislative elections won by the FRG. The abstention rate was almost one hundred per cent in the majority Maya areas, where the greatest consequences of the military repression had been felt. At this point the paradox begins to be less puzzling. In Guatemala City and in the eastern areas in general, the iron hand of Rios Montt was nowhere near n as heavy as in the western areas. On the contrary, the rise in delinquency and petty crime making the capital an unsafe city persuaded some sections of urban public opinion to call for a return to tougher police methods.
Although we said that Guatemala was rather atypical of Central American countries, significant processes of change are also underway. But to provide a fuller analysis we must take a step backwards and return to Serrano’s attempt to rule by decree.
On 25 May 1993 President Jorge Serrano suspended the constitutional guarantees and attempted to dissolve parliament. This gesture was – according to Serrano – necessary because of resistances from the political class under his management. The institutions, especially the Constitutional Court, and the international community responded immediately to the attempted coup and Serrano was forced into exile in Panama after four days. Vicepresident Espina Salguero’s attempt to take poweralso failed.After a twelve-day institutional crisis, following the advice from the Constitutional Court, Congress elected an acting president to complete Serrano’s term of office. The man chosen for the job was Ramiro de León Carpio, the attorney general for human rights, who remained in office until the election of Alvaro Arzú in January 1996.
De León Carpio had carried out his duties as attorney general for human rights, a delicate position in Guatemala, very energetically. He had been a thorn in the side of the government and the Administration and had taken important initiatives to limit the abuse of power by the army in keeping public order and pressganging new recruits.
De León Carpio was also one of the strongest opponents to Serrano’s attempted coup: this attitude, plus the relative political independence and credibility he had built up explain why he was appointed as president.
In carrying out his presidential duties De León Carpio introduced important reforms: a constitutional reform re-ordering legislative and judicial power undermined by very strong suspicions of corruption; a fiscal reform of fundamental importance in a country where tax evasion was not punishable by law and where tax pressure is scandalously low; and lastly the re-opening of talks with the guerrillas.
We will not go into the details of the institutional reforms introduced by the De León Carpio government. Significantly, it managed to pursue these reforms despite not being popular with the traditional majority parties in Congress. In fact it was the special ‘cathartic’ climate following the attempted coup that created the conditions for the dissolution of Congress, the proposed reforms and the subsequent institutional referendum.
This was almost the other side of the coin compared to Fujimori’s Peru, where his rule by decree was successful and the reforms were undertaken by the president after suspending the constitution.
The most evident result of De León Carpio’s reforms has been greater credibility for the institutions, which have been purged of many corrupt elements. We should like, however, to dwell on two interrelated aspects of the reforms which get to the root of the country’s problems: the tax reform and the peace negotiations.
Only twenty-five per cent of the Guatemala population benefits from the public health system; forty-nine per cent of the population is illiterate (seventy-two per cent in rural areas); and according to figures from the late 1980s, seventy-seven per cent of the population live in poverty and fifty-five per cent in extreme poverty. In this scenario of great need the tax pressure in Guatemala in 1994 was 6.8 per cent of the GDP, the lowest in Latin America and very much lower than even the other Central American countries. If we add that the crime of tax evasion is not even contemplated by law, we see why the Guatemalan state is in such dire straits when trying to meet even the most rudimentary needs of the population.
A reform to modernise the fiscal system was thus essential in tackling the structural reforms for the overall situation of underdevelopment in the country. Moreover, the forms of protest which led to the guerrilla movement were reactions to the situation of inequality and underdevelopment in the country. Hopes of reaching a settlement with the guerrillas are thus linked to the chances of creating an investment and social expenditure policy. This of course requires resources. The two aspects – pacification and fiscal reform – are thus closely interrelated.
De León Carpio’s fiscal reform includes the introduction of punishable tax crimes. It has raised tax rates by 2.2 per cent and has begun a process of strengthening and decentralising tax administration. Accompanying reforms to increase tax revenues, there have been a number of measures to augment social spending and decentralise health and educational facilities. These are first fundamental steps in the right direction.
The reformed involved tackling considerable resistance from the bosses of traditional power, but the process now seems irreversible. The bloc of the discontented (large landowners and those entrepreneurs reluctant to modernise) lent support to Rios Montt’s political party and strengthened Portillo’s hand as a presidential candidate. De León Carpio could not stand for the presidential election because of a clause in the constitution debarring the outgoing president from taking part in the elections.
The winner Alvaro Arzú, considered a liberal-minded conservative, obtained most of his votes in the urban areas. Although Arzú seems unlikely to provide continuity for de León Carpio’s policies, he was undoubtedly the lesser of the two evils, given the prospect of a populist president at the beck and call of Rios Montt and the ultra conservatives.
For the first time in forty years the left also took part in the elections and was represented by the Frente Democratic Nueva Guatemala. The URNG also showed their approval of the elections by establishing a thirteen-day truce to allow them to be held regularly. This all amounts to positive signs of a return to normality in Guatemala society and political life.
The strengthening of this normalisation process will be decisive for the future of Guatemala and will depend basically on two factors: a return to negotiations with the guerrillas and a reduction in the political power of the armed forces, traditionally very important in Guatemalan history. During the elections the so-called Xaman incident (the killing of eleven native Americans who had come back from Mexico) cast a disturbing light on the situation in rural areas and on the role of the armed forces.
De León Carpio was unable to conclude the accord with the URNG, due to be signed in 1995 after the creation of the United Nations mission to Guatemala. The most likely explanation for the break-down in the talks was the URNG’s desire to wait for the outcome of the elections. The electrical black-out on the electoral night of 12 November 1995 (legislative elections and first round in the presidential elections) may have been a warning from the guerrillas for its future interlocutors.
But, as we explained earlier, the resumption of negotiations is the only way forward. During a recent visit to Mexico at the end of February, President Arzú had informal talks with URNG representatives. This is the first time a Guatemala president has taken such a step. It may well signify a resumption of the dialogue interrupted over a year ago. Prior to the break-down of talks, the government and the URNG had signed four preliminary agreements whose aim was to prepare the ground for a definitive settlement: a global agreement on human rights, a resettlement agreement for the refugee population which had fled during the armed conflict, an agreement to set up a commission to investigate the historic violations of human rights and suffering of the Guatemalan people, and an agreement on the identity and rights of the native роpulations.
Emergency funds had been allocated to implement these agreements. Clearly, forty years of violence cannot easily be transformed into stable peace, as the Xaman incident goes to show. But there have been some glimmerings of a solution to Guatemala’s age-old problems in recent years. And this is why Guatemala still must only be considered a relative exception to the regional context.The negotiation process will only be transformed into real peace, however, if the reformist policies intended to reduce inequalities and exclusion are continued and strengthened. Moreover, these reforms must take place in the broad framework of the integration of the native populations into Guatemalan society.