wfn.org | Guatemala's New President Promises to Solve Bishop's Murder

[PCUSA NEWS <pcusa.news@ecunet.org>]

18-January-2000 
00023 
 
    Guatemala's New President Promises to Solve Bishop's Murder 
 
    Power struggle expected with former dictator Rios Montt 
 
    by Paul Jeffrey 
    Ecumenical News International 
 
GUATEMALA CITY - The first Guatemalan president in nearly 40 years to take 
office during peace time has promised to bring to justice those responsible 
for the death of Roman Catholic Bishop Juan Gerardi, a human rights 
champion who was brutally murdered in 1998. 
 
    Alfonso Portillo, a former leftist who ran as the candidate of a 
right-wing party, made the promise during his inaugural speech on Jan.14. 
He said he had ordered government prosecutors to look wherever they wanted, 
including inside the government, for those responsible for the murder. 
Portillo also announced that he was proclaiming the date of Bishop 
Gerardi's death - April 26 - as a National Day of Dignity for the Victims 
of the Violence, in memory of the 200,000 people killed or "disappeared" 
during the 36-year civil war which ended in 1996. 
 
    The new president also surprised many observers by naming two close 
associates of Bishop Gerardi to top government positions.  Edgar Gutierrez 
will become the president's Secretary for Strategic Analysis.  Gutierrez 
was director of the Catholic Church's Historical Memory Project, which took 
evidence from thousands of war victims and in 1998 released a report, 
"Guatemala: Never Again!" which blamed the military for more than 80 per 
cent of the violence. 
 
    Bishop Gerardi, the main author of the report, was killed just two days 
after it was released.  Despite evidence linking the military to his 
murder, no one has been brought to trial for his death. 
 
    Ronalth Ochaeta, who directed the Archdiocesan Human Rights Office set 
up by Bishop Gerardi, was named by Portillo to head the Presidential Human 
Rights Commission. 
 
    Another surprise appointment by Portillo was Otilia Lux de Coti who 
will be Minister of Culture and Sports.  An indigenous educator, Lux was 
one of three members of a United Nations-sponsored truth commission which 
released a report last February accusing the Guatemalan military of 
genocide against indigenous communities. 
 
    Many observers believe that Portillo's election is likely to cause a 
new power struggle in right-wing circles here.  Portillo's party, the 
Guatemalan Republican Front (FRG), was founded by Efrain Rios Montt, a 
retired general who was sworn in last week as president of the Guatemalan 
Congress.  Rios Montt controls the FRG, and wanted to run for national 
president himself, but as a former coup leader he was unable to do so 
because of stipulations in the Guatemalan constitution. 
 
    Rios Montt seized power in 1982, and ruled Guatemala for 17 months 
before being overthrown by another group of army officers.  Both the 1998 
Catholic report and the 1999 U.N. commission report said his term in office 
had been marked by repeated massacres in indigenous villages as well as 
widespread violations of human rights throughout the country. 
 
    Apparently eager to demonstrate that he is not a puppet of Rios Montt, 
Portillo said at his inauguration that the recommendations of both the 
Catholic and the U.N. reports "will be converted into commitments of the 
government and the state." 
 
    "That's a fascinating and unprecedented commitment, which, if it really 
happens, would mean that high-level military officers will be put in gaol 
(prison)," declared Dennis Smith, a Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) mission 
worker here. 
 
    Portillo, a 48-year-old former academic who expresses admiration for 
the late revolutionary leader Che Guevara, won 68 per cent of the vote in a 
run-off election on Dec. 26. During his inaugural speech, he also announced 
he had sent legislation to the FRG-controlled Congress to dismantle the 
elite presidential guard which was behind many of the disappearances and 
killings of the war.  He will also push for reforms to allow him to appoint 
a civilian as minister of defense. 
 
    Sources close to the president said that Portillo and Rios Montt fought 
hard over who would be in the new cabinet and on his staff.  Portillo 
reportedly said that when he first revealed his list of nominees to the 
general, Rios Montt responded: "That's a cabinet full of good old 
Marxists." 
 
    Analysts here will be watching closely in coming weeks to see which of 
the two comes out on top of what promises to be a power struggle over the 
direction of the nation. 
 
    Gutierrez is one of those expected to be in the middle of the struggle. 
As Secretary of Strategic Analysis, Gutierrez said he would "provide the 
president with the information and analysis he will need to make decisions 
and set future polices of the government." 
 
    In an interview with ENI, Gutierrez said that accepting the new job had 
not been an easy decision.  "I talked about it with people in the church, 
in civil society and the international community, and came to the 
conclusion that although there are a lot of risks, I was being offered a 
space to make change," Gutierrez said.  "It wouldn't be responsible just to 
criticize the government from the outside.  Now was a chance to work inside 
the government to make change." 
 
    According to Maria Garcia, editor of the Guatemalan Catholic magazine 
"Voces del Tiempo," Gutierrez "is one of the best minds in the church." 
She said that while she doubted Gutierrez would be able to work freely 
under Portillo, "we're willing to give him the benefit of the doubt for 
now.  If Portillo doesn't comply with what he has promised, then Edgar can 
quit." 

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