Guatemalans yesterday headed to the polls to choose a new leader in a year that saw their president, vice president and central bank chief jailed to face charges for alleged involvement in graft schemes.
The Sept. 6 first-round presidential ballot narrowed a 14-candidate field down to Jimmy Morales, a comedian who has never held political office, and former first lady Sandra Torres.
Morales, who ran under the slogan “neither corrupt, nor a thief,” placed first last month with 23.9 percent support to the 19.6 percent garnered by runner-up Torres. A voter opinion poll released on Wednesday showed Morales with a two-to-one advantage over Torres.
Since former Guatemalan president Otto Perez Molina was forced resign his post on Sept. 2 to await trial for bribery and tax fraud, corruption has emerged as a top concern for voters in Central America’s biggest economy. In the run-up to the elections this year, demonstrations demanding that Perez Molina step down had attracted as many as 70,000 people in this country of 14.6 million.
“Corruption is the main topic on the agenda, and that’s going to continue,” said Paulo de Leon, director of research group Central American Business Intelligence. “Jimmy isn’t from the political establishment, and I think that’s why he’s been able to capture people’s discontent with the political class in the country.”
According to a ProDatos poll published on Wednesday in Prensa Libre, Morales has 67.9 percent support to 32.1 percent for Torres. The Oct. 9 to Oct. 14 survey of 1,201 people has a 2.8 percent margin of error.
Voting stations were scheduled to open at 9am and close at 8pm. About 7.5 million people are eligible to vote. The winner of the election is to take office on Jan. 14 next year.
Morales, 46, has proposed changing Guatemala’s 1 percent metal mining royalty that he has called “ridiculous” and “unjust” without specifying what he would do with it. Attempts to boost royalties in recent years have failed. Guatemala has struggled to boost tax revenue that is already one of the lowest in Latin America as a share of GDP and is projected to fall further.
Morales has also pledged to lower interest rates for small and medium-size business loans and promised to increase the budgets of the Guatemalan Comptroller General of Accounts and the Guatemalan Chief Public Prosecutor to crack down on corrupt officials.
“Guatemala said no to the old way of politics,” Morales said in an Oct. 5 debate. “Guatemala wants politics that are transparent and free of corruption.”
Torres, who has called Morales a “beginner” who would “improvise” as president, said she would target government spending by granting public-private concessions for jails and use 5 billion quetzals (US$649.8 million) in already-approved loans to finance government operations next year.
Guatemala’s US$59 billion economy, which exports coffee, textiles and gold, and serves as a gateway between Latin America and the US for migrants and drug trafficking, is expected to expand by 3.6 percent to 4.2 percent this year, according to the central bank.
Yesterday’s winner will inherit a proposed budget for next year of 72.4 billion quetzals that envisions a fiscal deficit of 1.9 percent of GDP. The plan calls for 11 billion quetzals in debt issuance next year, up from 4 billion quetzals this year.
Guatemalan Minister of Public Finance Dorval Carias said the government would consider selling global bonds to finance the spending gap.
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