A retired general promising to fight rampant crime had an early lead in Guatemala’s national election, as voters appeared ready to choose a former military man for the presidency for the first time since democracy was restored in 1986.
Otto Perez Molina of the Patriot Party, known for his symbol of an “iron first,” had 32 percent support, followed by businessmen Manuel Baldizon with 22 percent and Eduardo Suger with 14 percent, according to preliminary results early yesterday. Seven other candidates shared the remaining votes.
However, with less than 20 percent of the voting stations counted, election magistrate Ulises Gomez said it was too early to confirm a trend.
In pre-election polls, Perez had the support of up to 48 percent of voters, Baldizon 18 percent and Suger 10 percent. Any candidate needs more than 50 percent of the vote to avoid a runoff on Nov. 6.
“We are going to double our efforts, now that we are in the second round,” Perez said after learning he would be at least in the runoff.
Perez would be the first former military leader elected president in Guatemala after the end of the military dictatorships of the 1970s and 1980s.
A UN-sponsored truth commission found that 200,000 people were killed in Guatemala’s 36-year civil war, 93 percent of them by state forces and paramilitary groups. Still, many credit Perez with playing a key role in the march toward democracy, including negotiating the 1996 peace accords that ended the conflict.
Campaigning focused on fighting the street gangs and Mexican drug cartels operating in the lawless border region that have given Guatemala one of the highest murder rates in the western hemisphere. Almost all of the candidates lean to the right after the center-left party of outgoing Guatemalan President Alvaro Colom failed to field a candidate.
Among the field of 10 candidates, the only leftist running is Nobel Peace Prize laureate and Mayan activist Rigoberta Menchu, who is polling with just over 2 percent.
Eduardo Rodriguez Contenti, a 68-year-old veterinarian, said he wanted a president who could control the “violence, corruption, impunity and lack of employment” in Guatemala.
Rodriguez works in Guatemala’s northern region of Peten, where 27 people were decapitated in an assault in March that authorities attribute to the Zetas drug gang, a Mexico-based organization that has expanded across the border.
“My business has fallen by 60 percent, especially after what happened in March,” Rodriguez said.
There were sporadic reports of election violence, but nothing like in 2007 when Perez narrowly lost to Colom. That campaign was marred by a wave of violence that left more than 50 candidates, party activists and family members dead.
Police spokesman Donald Gonzalez said on Sunday that unknown assailants opened fire on the headquarters of Perez’s Patriot Party in San Miguel Chaparron, about 160km east of Guatemala City. A security guard at the headquarters died, as well as the bodyguard of the mayoral candidate for the rival National Unity for Hope.
Police are investigating the details of what happened.
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