On August 21, Guatemala’s Public Prosecutor’s Office again lashed out at President of the Republic, Bernardo Arévalo, for allegedly promoting corruption and impunity. The Public Prosecutor’s Office claims that Arévalo is involved in an alleged case of corruption in the Department of Communications, and is requesting the Supreme Court to authorize the process and allow Congress to approve the removal of the immunity that the president has. If this legal process is successful, the Public Prosecutor’s Office could request Arévalo’s preventive imprisonment, which seems to be, since the beginning of Arévalo’s mandate, the main target of the whole scheme concocted the Attorney General’s Office.
The latest accusation
According to the Public Ministry led by Consuelo Porras (a fervent opponent of Arévalo), the cases of corruption occurred due to alleged illegal payments to certain construction companies, which would imply that the Executive allegedly committed abuse of authority, usurpation of powers, and actions in violation of the Constitution.
The accusation is based on an audio in which President Arévalo informs that he is dismissing the then Secretary of Communication, Jazmín de la Vega, for not complying with an order to pay certain companies. The Public Prosecutor’s Office alleges that this conversation confirms the supposed responsibility of the President in a corruption structure. “According to the facts, which were made known to the Special Prosecutor’s Office Against Impunity, [it can be said] that the main person responsible for fostering corruption in Guatemala is President César Bernardo Arévalo de León. The main person responsible for fomenting impunity is the President…Arévalo,” said Curruchiche, the prosecutor in charge of the investigation.
However, Arévalo denied that this was a conversation to pay illegal accounts, but that, on the contrary, he talked with the former Secretary of Communication about the lists prepared to pay the companies once the works were completed, as required by Guatemalan law. Thus, the government assures that the accusation is another politically motivated attempt to remove the most progressive president Guatemala has had in the last 40 years.
The third attempt by Curruchice and Porras to “destroy” Arévalo
This is the third time that the Public Prosecutor’s Office has made a frontal attack on President Arévalo. And it is no coincidence that all these actions have been carried out by Rafael Curruchiche, head of Guatemala’s Special Prosecutor’s Office Against Impunity (FECI), who seems to want to remove Arévalo at any cost.
Curruchiche is included on the Engel List, also known as the Section 353 Corrupt and Undemocratic Actors Report, a registry that the US government considers to include corrupt and undemocratic individuals. According to the State Department, Curruchiche is accused of “obstructing investigations into acts of corruption by disrupting high-profile corruption cases against government officials and filing spurious complaints against FECI prosecutors, private attorneys, and members of the International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG).” Attorney General Consuelo Porras is also on the list.
In 2019, the CICIG, created by the United Nations, had its operations terminated overnight by former president Jimmy Morales. The decision was met with widespread protests.
Many experts say Curruchiche has strong ties to Guatemalan conservatism since he was appointed head of FECI by Attorney General Consuelo Porras, who was herself appointed by then right-wing President Alejandro Giammattei.
This is according to the defense of José Rubén Zamora, a well-known journalist and former editor of El Periódico, who published a series of reports revealing corruption and bribery of former president Giammattei. Following the publication of the reports, the FECI accused Zamora of money laundering to finance his media outlet and requested 40 years in prison against him. Today the journalist is being held and sentenced to six years in jail, despite insisting in his innocence and demanding freedom. Amnesty International and Fundación Gabo recently signed a petition to demand his freedom and denounce the persecution of journalists in Guatemala.
“José Rubén Zamora is being persecuted for exercising his right to freedom of expression in the context of his journalistic work of investigating and denouncing corruption. Unfortunately, José Rubén Zamora is one more victim of the politically motivated persecution strategy carried out by the Public Prosecutor’s Office and the Judicial System. He must not spend one more day in jail, his suffering must stop immediately,” said Ana Picquer, Director of Amnesty International Americas.
As for the President of the Republic, in 2023 Curruchiche accused Arévalo of having illegally adhered 5,000 people to his political party Semilla, in response to which the prosecutor ordered the search of Semilla’s headquarters and the Supreme Electoral Tribunal…twice. Given this, FECI tried to suspend Semilla’s legal status, which it did precisely when Arévalo triumphed in the presidential elections. The President-elect then affirmed that it was an attempted coup d’état to prevent him from taking office in January 2024.
Read: President-elect of Guatemala, Bernardo Arévalo, warns that “coup d’état” is underway
Arévalo managed to take office as President of the Republic and decided to counterattack: he proposed a legal reform that would allow the removal of Attorney General Porras from office and thus make her accountable for the alleged anti-democratic actions of corruption. Hence, there is an open struggle between the Executive and the Attorney General’s Office to see “who falls first”.
For the time being, it appears that Arévalo is not alone in his suspicions that the Public Prosecutor’s Office intends to intimidate and persecute him. The Organization of American States denounced “the continued judicialization of the process and the practice of the Public Prosecutor’s Office to intimidate the electoral authorities” concerning President Bernardo Arévalo.
