Alejandro Giammattei has won victory in Guatemala's presidential runoff, the electoral commission says. He has pledged to fight crime with the death penalty and limit reproductive freedoms and equality for LGBTQ+ people.
Image: picture-alliance/AP Photo/O. de Ros
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With results from 95% of polling stations in Guatemala's presidential runoff counted, the Supreme Electoral Council has announced that 63-year-old Alejandro Giammattei has won almost 60% of votes, compared with about 26% for former first lady Sandra Torres.
"The aim is fulfilled," Giammattei said late Sunday. "It will be an immense honor to be president."
Eight million people were eligible to vote in the runoff for the June 16 election. However, a turnout of 40% suggests disillusionment.
Giammattei, who had lost three previous presidential bids, received negative press ahead of the vote. Investigative site Nomada branded Giammattei "impulsive ... despotic, tyrannical ... capricious, vindictive" — and worse. This time, Giammattei ran for Vamos, a party that preaches liberal economics and works to limit access to reproductive services and opposes LGBTQ+ equality.
Change to come?
Torres had previously run a textile and apparel company. She proposed an anti-corruption program, but her Unity for Hope party has come under fire because some of its mayoral candidates have found themselves accused of receiving contributions from drug traffickers for their campaigns.
Central American immigrants turn to Mexico
Most migrants to the United States from the so-called "Northern Triangle" of Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador are staying in Mexico for now — because of Donald Trump's new immigration policies.
Image: Reuters/C. Jasso
No longer first choice
In a migrant shelter in the southern Mexican city of Tenosique, near the Guatemalan border, a refugee from Honduras says he originally planned to move to the United States with his family. Trump's election has changed everything. "I wanted to go to the United States with my family, but we've seen that the new government there has made things harder."
Image: Reuters/C. Jasso
Lingering in Mexico
Concepcion Bautista from Guatemala cradles her newborn son in the same migrant shelter. She says she plans to head for the United States, but will linger in Mexico to see how US President Donald Trump's immigration policies play out. Her goal is to reunite with her family up north...
Image: Reuters/C. Jasso
A mere transit country?
…but for the time being, she believes applying for asylum in Mexico is a smarter move. Mexican asylum data and testimony from migrants in Tenosique suggest that although fewer Central Americans are trying to enter the US, plenty are still fleeing their poor, violent home countries, with many deciding to stay longer in Mexico, which has traditionally been a transit country.
Image: Reuters/C. Jasso
Tough immigration policies
The Trump administration has pointed out a sharp decline in immigrant detentions in the first few months of this year as a vindication for the president's tough immigration policies. The measures are already having another effect. In California, where farmers usually rely on workers from Mexico to bring in the harvest, many Mexicans are staying away, preferring to find work in their own country.
Image: Reuters/C. Jasso
Asylum applications on the rise
Migrants from Central America play football in the migrant shelter in Tenosique. The number of people applying for asylum in Mexico has soared by more than 150 percent since Trump was elected president. These days, Mexican immigrants would rather set up in Canada than the United States.
Image: Reuters/C. Jasso
Human smugglers up the price
One man from Guatemala says the prices charged by people smugglers have risen sharply since Trump took office, now hovering around $10,000 (9,100 euros), up from about $6,000 a few years ago. Migrants sit below a mural in Mexico with the words: "Our demand is minimal: justice."
Image: Reuters/C. Jasso
A new home
With Mexico's immigration authorities controlling migration more assiduously, Central Americans were forced to take more isolated, dangerous routes where the chances of being mugged were higher. "We've gone north several times, but every time it's got harder," says one man, who was deported from the United States in December. "Now, it's better if we travel alone, along new routes."
Image: Reuters/C. Jasso
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Guatemala has been transited by people seeking to migrate to the United States via Central America. The candidates avoided committing to a migration deal that President Jimmy Morales — barred by Guatemalan law from seeking a second term — had negotiated with the Trump administration. In a poll by Prodatos for the Prensa Libre newspaper, 82% of respondents opposed the deal.
Guatemala has a poverty rate of 60%, and the homicide rate remains high. At least 1% of Guatemala's population of about 16 million people has left the country this year.
Remittances from US-based Guatemalans reached a record $9.3 billion (€8.3 billion) last year. According to the World Bank, remittances account for 12% of the country's gross domestic product.
Analysts do not expect Giammattei to reverse the decision by Morales to expel the UN-backed International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala, which helped to launch a massive anti-corruption drive and bring down President Otto Perez Molina in 2015. The commission had also started investigating the campaign financing of Morales, who has accused the body of getting involved in politics and announced that he would not renew its mandate when it expires in September.
