Decent article. Sheds some light on the new Gautemalan president. I bet some people were intrigued by his victory:
On August 20, Bernardo Arévalo was elected president of Guatemala, defeating conservative Sandra Torres. An anti-graft crusader, Arévalo has promised to root out corruption and create a large public jobs program by improving services like water sanitation.
Political analyst Edgar Ortiz Romero called Arévalo “the most progressive candidate to get this far since 1985” when democracy was restored to Guatemala after three decades of military rule following a 1954 CIA-orchestrated coup.
[…]
Though influenced by his father, Bernardo Arévalo is less of a threat to the U.S. because there does not exist a strong left-wing movement pushing him to undertake major economic reforms that would undercut U.S. business interests in Guatemala, including by amending a corporate friendly tax system.
Fighting a rear-guard battle against the extreme right, Bernardo Arévalo’s platform is center-left, focused on fighting corruption and initiating modest social improvements and public works projects.
Arévalo at the same time has not denounced U.S. imperialism in terms similar to his father, and has criticized alleged human rights abuses in socialist Venezuela and the supposed authoritarianism of Daniel Ortega’s left-wing government in Nicaragua.
- comrade-bear3·1 year ago