Guatemala’s corruption thrust into international spotlight after government’s election meddling

Guatemala's Attorney General's Office raided the country's electoral authority headquarters on Thursday. It happened hours after it certified June 25 election results. The raid appeared connected to prosecutors' attempt to keep progressive candidate Bernardo Arévalo from competing in a runof…

GUATEMALA CITY — The Guatemalan government’s clumsy interference with its presidential election has turned a global spotlight on rampant corruption that previously had received only limited international attention.

President Alejandro Giammattei was deeply unpopular at home, but other than occasional reprobation from the United States and Europe, had managed to consolidate his control of the justice system, completely upending a longstanding anti-corruption campaign in the country with little consequence.

The June 25 presidential election may have changed all that. In the days leading up to the vote, it appeared there would be a runoff between a small number of right and extreme right candidates, including Giammattei allies.

Bernardo Arévalo, a progressive presidential candidate with the Seed Movement party, and running mate Karin Herrera greet their followers July 13 outside the office of Guatemala’s attorney general in Guatemala City after a judge suspended the legal status of the Seed Movement political party.

But with a large number of null votes, many cast in protest, and a campaign that resonated especially with young Guatemalans, progressive candidate Bernardo Arévalo placed second, ensuring his participation in an Aug. 20 runoff.

Suddenly, it seemed there was a real possibility of choice for Guatemalans who want to change the status quo. That stunned the powers that be, who quickly reacted.

“I think that fear clouded him, blinded him,” Katya Salazar, executive director of the Due Process Foundation, said of Giammattei. She added that Arévalo’s surprise support was “a demonstration of the dissatisfaction” in the Central American country.

“I think he (Giammattei) thought that it would be the same as always,” she said.

Late July 12, a federal prosecutor announced that Arévalo's party, the Seed Movement, had been suspended for allegedly violating election laws. Prosecutors followed up on Thursday morning by raiding the offices of the Supreme Electoral Tribunal just hours after it certified the election results that put Arévalo in the runoff.

Demonstrators protest July 13 in front of the office of Guatemala’s attorney general in Guatemala City after government interference in the nation’s presidential election.

Special anti-corruption prosecutor Rafael Curruchiche defended his investigation as serious, objective and impartial. He said the inquiry had taken a year to complete and it was a coincidence that he announced it on the same day the Supreme Electoral Tribunal certified the election results.

“That idea they have that this case arises from political issues is completely false,” Curruchiche said. “We don't get involved in political issues.”

The prosecutor said his office's raid of the Supreme Electoral Tribunal had produced valuable information, but he did not go into specifics. He did say that the tribunal's own documents showed it was aware that 12 signatures collected by the Seed Movement when it was being established in 2018 were those of dead people, yet still allowed them to be registered.

“They didn't take their responsibility like they should have,” he said.

Earlier Friday, the Attorney General's Office said in a statement that it was carrying out its duty to enforce the country’s laws and not trying to interfere with the second round of voting or keep any candidate from participating in the runoff. Curruchiche said his investigation would continue.

The government's actions have triggered a domestic and international uproar. In addition to statements of concern from the United States, European Union and Organization of American States, criticism came from other Latin American governments as well as Guatemala’s most powerful private business association.

Even Arévalo’s runoff opponent, conservative former first lady Sandra Torres, joined in, announcing that she would suspend her campaign activities because the competition was uneven while authorities pursued the Seed Movement.

Torres' UNE party has been a key force in allowing Giammattei to advance his legislative agenda, but it appeared she felt the attack on the Seed Movement party could undermine her own candidacy.

Demonstrators throw eggs at an image representing Guatemala's Attorney General Consuelo Porras during a July 13 protest outside her office building in Guatemala City.

“We want to demonstrate our solidarity with the voters of the Seed party and also with those who came out to vote,” she said. “As a candidate, I want to compete under equal conditions.”

Not long after that, the Constitutional Court, the country's highest tribunal, provided another blow to the Giammattei administration, granting the Seed Movement’s request for a preliminary injunction against its suspension. That quickly, if temporarily, lowered tensions.

Giammattei, who was barred by law from seeking reelection, kept out of sight.

His response had little effect on a population that witnessed how the president had dramatically transformed a nation that until four years ago had hosted an aggressive and productive anti-corruption effort supported by the United Nations. After Giammattei’s predecessor forced out the U.N. mission that supported the fight against graft, the current president systematically forced out prosecutors and judges who were continuing that effort, replacing them with loyalists. Even those who had grown critical of the zealous anti-corruption effort concede the country is much worse off now.

Hundreds protested in front of the Attorney General's Office on Thursday.

“We are fed up with the corruption in Guatemala,” said Adolfo Grande, a 25-year-old repair technician. “We want them to let us choose and not to impose who they want.”

“The corrupt who have tried to steal these elections from the people today find themselves marginalized,” he said. “Today we are starting the first day of the campaign.”

Public-sector corruption is often felt before it is seen. It is carried out in private agreements and manifests publicly at polling stations, jails, hospitals, banks, and government buildings—places not all people have direct or consistent familiarity with.

While there are certainly exceptions to this position—perhaps the most egregious, recent example being the wide-reaching attempted malfeasance surrounding the 2020 U.S. presidential election—most public-sector corruption is systemic and, as such, is equal parts obsequious and insidious.

Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index quantifies how corruption varies in frequency and type from country to country worldwide. It uses 13 public data sets exploring bribery, nepotism, state capture, embezzlement, prosecution of corrupt leaders, legal protections for journalists and whistleblowers, enforcement of integrity mechanisms, and other factors. Stacker leveraged that index to identify the countries most corrupt in their public-sector systems and operations. The full methodology, which ranks countries on a score between 1 and 100, is available on Transparency International's website.

COVID-19 exacerbated existing corruption in many areas. The pandemic widened the windows for increasing abuses of power by law enforcement in many regions, especially in Latin America and certain parts of Africa. Countries that are already home to significant disparities in quality of life between high- and low-income communities often see higher rates of public sector corruption, as vulnerable, marginalized communities serve as scapegoats, bearing the disproportionate brunt of financial and institutional inequalities without the means to hold officials accountable. Especially in developing countries, this often means ethnic minorities, LGBTQ+ communities, and low-income populations effectively become targets.

On the other end of the spectrum, the index found that the least corrupt countries—among them New Zealand, Finland, Denmark, Sweden, and Singapore—tend to rank highly in practicing transparency within elections, financial institutions, and government affairs.

Some countries are beginning to take a turn for the better. Nations such as Armenia, Angola, and Uzbekistan, among other Middle Eastern and central African countries, have seen significant jumps in their respective CPI rankings since 2017. Other nations, such as Afghanistan, Brazil, and Somalia, have begun implementing systems of checks and balances meant to block corruption from becoming institutionalized in public infrastructure. Although such developments would seem to be in direct conflict with the regime controlling some of these countries—such as Afghanistan, which continues to sit rather low on the CPI—signs of progress can be seen in these countries' financial systems and government contracting processes, according to a 2020 World Bank report.

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The United States has a relatively low level of public-sector corruption on a global scale. Nevertheless, as exemplified by Finland, which, along with Denmark, is the least corrupt country in the world, "corruption-free countries do not exist."

Chicago, Miami, Baltimore, and Los Angeles see some of the highest rates of corruption nationwide. Unsurprisingly, Washington D.C.—with its disproportionate density of government agencies—eclipses all other areas of the nation in corruption incidents. The contestation of the results of the 2020 presidential election was an all-time low for corruption in the country, with at least 253 politicians supporting baseless claims undermining a free and fair election.

In December 2021, the Biden administration introduced the U.S. Strategy on Countering Corruption, the first of its kind in the country. The plan focuses on countering illicit transnational financial activity through international cooperation. Along with Switzerland, the U.S. is one of only two countries worldwide that are "active enforcers" taking quantifiable steps to investigate and charge officials with corrupt activities.

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