Guatemala City. It’s official: The candidate Bernardo Arévalo from the left-social-democratic party “Movimiento Semilla”, which emerged from the large anti-corruption protests, is sure to have the runoff with 11.8 percent reacheddespite being below two percent in polls.
In front is Sandra Torres from the Unity of National Hope (UNE) with almost 15 percent. The UNE is also a social-democratic party, but is generally not perceived as an opposition party, but counts as part of the ruling “Pact of the Corrupt”.
All candidates further to the right are not in the runoff. Manuel Conde from the current governing party Vamos came third with a good eight percent, Armando Castillo from the Viva party fourth with seven percent.
Edmund Mulet of the pro-business party and ultra-right candidate Zury Rios of the Unionista/Valor Cabal alliance came fifth and sixth respectively. Both had previously been traded as favorites for the runoff election in polls.
Unusual for left-wing election results in Guatemala, Arévalo scored particularly well in the big cities. He achieved a good 23 percent of the votes in the capital, 30 percent in the city of Antigua Guatemala near the capital, and even 32 percent in the second largest city, Quetzaltenango.
This was in contrast to the results in the northern rural departments of Huehuetenango, Quiche and Alta Verapaz, which are characterized by great poverty. Sandra Torrres was able to win this, while Semilla only achieved around five percent there.
In the current and previous election campaigns, the UNE and the parties further to the right were accused of buying votes through campaign gifts. Now even checks have appeared that only had to be cashed after the election and only if the right candidate wins, reported the German news.
The exclusions in the run-up – in addition to the left-wing candidate Thelma Cabrera for the Movement for the Liberation of Peoples (MLP) also three right-wing candidates were affected – a relatively high number of invalid (voto nulo) votes could be expected.
In fact, a good seven percent of voters cast blank ballots and over 17 percent invalid ballots, and turnout was relatively low at around 60 percent. In twelve out of 22 departments even the voto nulo won, in five the UNE, in three Semilla and in one the current governing party Vamos.
Both general elections the still-governing Vamos party will have the largest group with 40 deputies, followed by the UNE with 27. The Semilla will have 24 deputies in parliament, a significant gain from the current seven deputies. The VOS party, founded by UNE dissidents, will have four MPs, and the URNG/Winaq coalition will have one.
Despite a committed election campaign, the MLP only achieved 1.3 percent in the parliamentary elections and is no longer represented in parliament.
Both mayoral elections in the capital, the alliance “Foppa por la Cuidad” came third with 16.4 percent. After what looked like a neck-and-neck race, this is about five percentage points behind incumbent Ricardo Quiñónez from the ultra-right party alliance Uniosta-Valor, who won with a good 22 percent. However, the alliance was severely weakened by the exclusion and imprisonment of the well-known top candidate Fransisco Foppa (america 21 reported) and was no longer in the top spots in polls.
In Antigua, the Citizens Committee “Futuro” won. In Quetzaltenango, the Citizens’ Committee SBX (Sacandole Brillo a Xela) took second place behind the incumbent Juan Fernando López of the Humanista party to reach. The SBX puts campaign for good local public transport and ecological and social city policies.
In Solola, a citizens’ committee SUD (Sololateco Unidos para el Desarrollo) also won, with the former guerrilla organization URNG taking second place. Since the end of the civil war, the URNG and the above-mentioned committee had won all mayoral elections in the district town, which is dominated by the indigenous people and is close to the tourist magnet Lake Atitlan.
The “Movimiento Semilla” only took part in elections for the second time. In 2019, her presidential candidate, former Attorney General Thelma Aldana, was also disfellowshipped and forced to flee into exile in the United States.
The Semilla deputies carried out an offensive oppositional policy in the parliament. In the current election campaign, the party did not take part in the costly “battle of materials” and instead relied on content such as concrete proposals for reducing poverty and defending threatened and restricted democracy.