July 22, 2023, 20:39 PM
July 22, 2023, 20:39 PM
The Supreme Electoral Tribunal of Guatemala (TSE) asked the country’s highest court to grant guarantees for the execution of the presidential ballot on August 20, while the Prosecutor’s Office raided the party of one of the two candidates, Bernardo Arévalo.
An appeal filed by the TSE before the Constitutional Court (CC) requests that it order the Prosecutor’s Office, the Police, the Army, the Supreme Court and other State institutions to guarantee the presidential runoff, in which Arévalo and Sandra Torres must face each otherboth Social Democrats, which would put an end to 12 years of right-wing governments in the country.
The search of the Arévalo party, Semilla, was requested by the prosecutor Rafael Curruchiche and ordered by Judge Fredy Orellana. The measure adds to a series of legal maneuvers that have increased uncertainty about the outcome of the elections.
The TSE argued that there is “the threat” that these maneuvers “violate the Democratic State of Lawby not guaranteeing the exercise of the functions of the Supreme Electoral Tribunal, of the Temporary Electoral Bodies and of the citizenry in general, for the development of an electoral process until its conclusion in an environment of freedom”.
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) expressed this Friday its “concern about interference in the electoral process in Guatemala, in a context of lack of independence of the Public Ministry and its attorney general” Consuelo Porras.
The Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OAS), Luis Almagro, condemned the intervention of the party headquarters and called to “immediately stop these attacks for political purposes and respect the electoral process as well as the democratic system.”
The government of President Alejandro Giammattei said in a statement that The TSE’s amparo action is “surprising and regrettable” because it considers that the Executive “has provided all the guarantees of protection and access to vote during the electoral process.”
In the midst of the judicial labyrinth that the presidential election has becomethe Special Prosecutor’s Office Against Impunity (FECI) raided the headquarters of Semilla “to obtain evidence to strengthen the investigation” for alleged irregularities in its creation in 2017, according to the agency.
Arevalo, who was at a campaign rally in the southern department of Retalhuleu, denounced the raid as “part of the political persecution of the corrupt minority that knows it is losing power day by day.”
After the first presidential round on June 25, various judicial appeals from right-wing parties that lost and a controversial disqualification of Semilla (annulled a day later) have clouded the ballot campaign.
