Africa

William-Troost Ekong says he was asked to take Nigeria's decisive penalty against Ivory Coast by striker Victor Osimhen.

Cindy Mothogaathobogwe steers wildlife safari tourists on a Mokoro canoe through the Okavango Delta.

Wounded civilians at the Al Shifa Hospital in the Gaza Strip. Credit: WHO

By Naureen Hossain
UNITED NATIONS, Jan 19 2024 (IPS)

Gaza’s healthcare system is “on its knees” as ongoing hostilities force hospitals to operate beyond their capacity and displace their healthcare workers, according to a WHO expert.

On Wednesday, WHO Health Emergency Officer Sean Casey spoke with reporters in New York on the healthcare crisis in Gaza. Following a five-week visit to the region, Casey elaborated on the WHO team’s work during his visit and their findings on the hospitals that were still running amidst the outbreak of violence since October 7. During his visit, he visited six out of the 16 hospitals still operating in the Gaza Strip. He described them as either “minimally or partially functioning” with the limited medical supplies and personnel available to them. But without unfettered access to medical supplies or fuel to run generators in the facilities, the hospitals will not be able to stay open.

“Every time I went to a hospital, I saw again and again the simultaneous humanitarian catastrophe that’s unfolding—we see it every day in Gaza getting worse—and the collapse of the healthcare system,” he said.

The growing number of trauma patients impacted by the ongoing attacks is currently overwhelming the healthcare system. There are up to 60,000 injured people in the region that require urgent care. Yet, there is a backlog of patients in hospitals, which only increases with each passing day. This is causing hospitals in the field and in towns to essentially play catch-up with the previous days’ cases. Patients with specialized needs, such as mothers requiring maternal or natal care or patients undergoing dialysis treatments, have also been struggling to get the care they need.

Palestinian refugees flee the conflict. Credit: UNRWA/Ashraf Amra

There are not enough doctors or nurses in the hospitals to accommodate the ever-increasing number of patients. Nasser Medical Complex in Khan Younis is currently operating with only 30 percent of its staff, according to Casey. There are reportedly over 25,000 doctors and nurses in Gaza. However, a large number of them are no longer in their homes and are unable to travel to work. This includes specialists in other fields of treatment. Areas around hospitals have been evacuated, as it’s been observed that hospitals have been hit by gunfire and bombings, rendering them rubble.

Al-Shifa Hospital, one of the largest still open, has been operating beyond its 700-bed capacity. It now serves as a “trauma stabilization point,” according to Casey. Thousands of people, displaced by the loss of their homes, have taken refuge in the hospital, where there is nowhere else to go, filling up the operating rooms, corridors, and floors. For the patients, only five or six doctors and nurses are present.

“I saw patients in hospitals every day with severe burns, open fractures, waiting hours or days for care, and they would often ask me for food or water,” he said. “In addition to their injuries and illnesses, they’re crying out for the basic necessities of life.”

Constraints on security and access, as well as limitations on movement, have at times even prevented the safe passage of medical supplies and fuel. “The last week that I was in Gaza, we tried every single day for seven days to deliver fuel and supplies to the north, to Gaza City. And every day, those requests for coordinated movement were denied,” Casey said. Without a guarantee, fewer supply trucks are crossing the Rafah border. Meanwhile, needs are not being met adequately.

Rafah is currently hosting a million people, yet it does not have the health infrastructure to host so many internally displaced people. In order to address some of the care demands resulting from the hostilities, WHO is working to mobilize medical personnel and set up field hospitals.

The “rapid deterioration” of the healthcare system in Gaza is happening concurrently with the “dramatic humanitarian catastrophe” affecting the communities, Casey said. Due to the attacks, over 1 million civilians are now homeless and struggle with widespread food insecurity and a lack of access to potable water. For children, this will be particularly dangerous. UNICEF has warned that 10,000 children are at risk of dealing with child wasting, the most life-threatening form of malnutrition.

Casey remarked that a ceasefire would “provide immediate relief to the people of Gaza” and would allow for the UN and its partners to mobilize medicines, medical supplies, and other emergency resources.

More than a hundred days have passed since the beginning of the current humanitarian crisis in Gaza. The death toll has exceeded 24,000, and more than 60,000 have been injured.

Major leaders in the UN and its agencies, including Secretary-General António Guterres, have called for a humanitarian ceasefire to come into effect immediately to allow unimpeded aid to go through and to “tamp down the flames of wider war” that is threatening the region. “I am deeply troubled by the clear violation of international humanitarian law that we are witnessing,” he said to reporters on Monday.

The heads of WHO, UNICEF, and the World Food Programme (WFP) released a joint statement urging for the delivery of emergency humanitarian aid to mitigate the risk of famine and deadly disease outbreaks. UNRWA Commissioner-General Philip Lazzarini, in his statement to mark the 100 days, remarked that the current conflict in Gaza was a “man-made disaster compounded by dehumanizing language and the use of food, water, and fuel as instruments of war.”

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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The scheme, one of President Ruto's key policies, seeks to provide affordable healthcare to all Kenyans.

The government aims to block the sale of personal items to preserve the anti-apartheid hero's legacy.

Workers take a break after unloading fish from the Sor Somboon 19 fishing vessel. Initial screenings conducted by Greenpeace revealed that the crew of this Thai trawler met internationally accepted definitions of forced labour. Credit: Greenpeace

By Ed Holt
BRATISLAVA, Jan 19 2024 (IPS)

“The thing is that when you come from an African country, they know that you’re basically trapped,” says Noel Adabblah.

“You have the wrong documents; you can’t go home because you’ve already borrowed money there to get here, and you won’t risk losing what work you have, no matter how bad, because of that. They know all the tricks.” 

The 36-year-old is speaking from Dublin, where he has managed to make a new life for himself after becoming a victim of what recent reports have shown to be widespread and growing forced labour in fishing fleets across the globe.

Adabblah, from Tema in Ghana, and three friends signed up with a recruitment agency back home to work as fishers on boats in the UK. They paid the equivalent of 1,200 EUR to be placed in jobs and were given letters of invitation and guarantees by their new employers, who said they would be met in Belfast, Northern Ireland, and who agreed to take care of all their documents and visas. Their employment contracts stated the men would be paid 1,000 GBP per month and employed for 12 months, with an option to reduce or extend that by three months upon mutual consent.

But when they arrived in January 2018, they were taken to Dublin and later split up. In the following months, they were taken to do various jobs at different ports in Ireland, sometimes late at night with no idea where they were going.

“We thought we were going there to sail and fish, but when we got there, we saw the boats were not ready; they were in poor condition, and we couldn’t fish, so the owner of the boats got us to do other jobs instead,” Adabblah tells IPS.

A Cambodian fisher from the fishing vessel Sor Somboon 19 recovers from beriberi at Ranong Hospital. The crew met internationally accepted definitions of victims of forced labour. Credit: Greenpeace

“But after a few months, we said this is not what we came here to do. We had an argument over pay—he said he had no boats to fish with and wanted to lay us off, told us to go home. But we said no, that we had a 12-month contract we had signed for. He said he wouldn’t pay us, but could try to get us another job with someone else, but we said we couldn’t do that because the visas we had only applied to working for him. He told us if we didn’t like it, we could go home.”

It is at this point that many victims of forced labour often simply accept their fate and either go home or do whatever their employer wants. But Adabblah and his friends were determined to see the terms of their contract met, and they contacted the International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF).

However, their problems deepened as they discovered they did not have the right documents for their work.

“We had no idea of the difference between Ireland and the UK. We thought the papers were OK. But when we went to the ITF, we realized they weren’t,” explains Adabblah.

At that point, the Irish police were obliged to open an investigation into the case.

Adabblah, who stayed in Ireland and has since managed to find work in the construction industry, says he heard nothing about the case until last year. “I heard that the police had said there was not enough evidence to pursue a conviction,” he says. Forced labour does not exist as an offense on the Irish statute books, so such cases are investigated under human trafficking legislation.

Regardless of the lack of a conviction in his case, he is clear that what he and his friends experienced was forced labour.

“They treated us badly. We worked 20-hour shifts some days. Once, when I was ill and couldn’t go on the boat, they said that if I couldn’t do the job, I could go home. They say stuff like that to threaten you,” he says.

Burmese fishers in temporary shelter in Ambon Port, Indonesia. Hundreds of trafficked workers are waiting to be sent back home, with many facing an uncertain future. The forced labour and trafficking survivors interviewed by Greenpeace Southeast Asia detailed beatings and food deprivation for anyone who tried to escape. The tuna fishermen on their vessels were forced to work 20–22 hours a day for little to no pay, often deprived of basic necessities like showers. Credit: Greenpeace

 

A commercial shrimp trawler is pursued by three Sea Lions near San Felipe.
Shrimp trawlers, often entering into marine reserves illegally, pose a great threat to the marine environment at the northern end of the Gulf of California, due to the variety of marine wildlife, including Sea Lions, that get caught in their bottom-trawling nets. Credit: Greenpeace

Adabblah’s experience is far from unique among workers in the world’s fishing fleets. A recent report by the Financial Transparency Coalition, an international grouping of NGOs, said that more than 128,000 fishers were trapped in forced labour aboard fishing vessels in 2021. Its authors say there is a “human rights crisis” of forced labour aboard commercial fishing vessels, leading to horrific abuses and even deaths.

They point out that many of these victims of forced labour are from the global South, something that the people behind these crimes use to their advantage, experts say.

Michael O’Brien of the ITF’s Fisheries Section told IPS: “Those employing vulnerable migrants in forced labour scenarios rely upon the vulnerability of the victim, the potential lack of legal status of the victim in the country where they are working, and the victim’s reliance on an income that is unavailable to them in their country of origin.”

Mariama Thiam, an investigative journalist in Senegal who did research for the Financial Transparency Coalition report, said fishers often do not know what they are signing up for.

“Usually there is a standard contract that the fisher signs, and often they sign it without understanding it fully,” she told IPS.  “Most Senegalese fishermen have a low level of education. The contract is checked by the national fishing agency, which sees it, says it looks okay, approves it, and the fishers then go, but the fishers don’t understand what’s in it.”

Then, once they have started work, the men are so desperate to keep their jobs that they will put up with whatever conditions they have to.

“All the fishers I have spoken to say they have had no choice but to do the work because they cannot afford to lose their jobs—their families rely on them. Some of them were beaten or did not have any days off; captains systematically confiscate all their passports when they go on board—the captains say that if the fishermen have their passports, some will go on shore when they are in Europe and stay on there, migrating illegally,” she said.

“In the minds of Senegalese fishermen, their priority is salary. They can tolerate human rights abuses and forced labour if they get their salary,” Thiam added.

Adabblah agrees, adding though that this allows the criminals behind the forced labour to continue their abuses.

“The thing is that a lot of people are afraid to speak up because of where they are from, and they end up being too scared to say anything even if they are really badly treated. There are lots of people who are in the same situation as I was or experiencing much worse, but if no one speaks up, how can [criminals] be identified?” he says.

Experts on the issue say the owners of vessels where forced labour is alleged to have occurred hide behind complex corporate structures and that many governments take a lax approach to uncovering ultimate beneficial ownership information when vessels are registered or fishing licenses are applied for.

This means those behind the abuses are rarely identified, let alone punished.

“In Senegal, what happens is that the government doesn’t want to share information on owner control of boats. No one can get information on it, not journalists, not activists, sometimes not even people in other parts of government itself,” said Thiam.

Other problems include a lack of legislation to even deal with the problem. For instance, Thiam highlighted that fishers in Senegal work under a collective convention dating back to 1976 that does not mention forced labour.

O’Brien added: “In the Irish context, there has never been a prosecution for human trafficking for labour exploitation in fisheries or any other sector.

“There is a school of thought among progressive lawyers that we need a separate offense on the statute books of ‘labour exploitation’ to obtain convictions. In the case of fishers, some remedies can be obtained via the labour and maritime authorities, but these are lower-level offenses that do not have a dissuasive effect on the vessel owners.”

Victims also face difficulties seeking redress in their home countries.

Complaints to recruiting agencies in fishers’ home countries often come to nothing and can end up having serious consequences.

“The thing about the agency I dealt with at home and other agencies like it is that if you complain to them, they will just say that you are talking too much and you should come home and solve the situation there, and then when you get home, they just blacklist you and you won’t get any fishing work ever again; they will just recruit someone else,” says Adabblah.

Although Adabblah did not see the justice he had hoped for, he is aware his story has ended better than many other victims of forced labour. He, along with his three friends, have made new lives in Ireland, and he is hoping to soon begin the process of becoming a naturalised Irish citizen.

He urges anyone who finds themselves in the same situation to not stay quiet, and instead contact an organization like the ITF or something similar.

Doing so may not always bring victims a satisfactory resolution to their problems, but each publicized case may end up having a long-term positive effect on stopping others from being abused, said O’Brien.

“The ITF has significant resources but not enough to match the scale of the problem. The cases we take up like Noel’s are the tip of the iceberg. However, we use these cases, with the consent of the victims, to highlight the problem with governments and, in turn, campaign for changes in the law,” he said.

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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A farmer tending to her vegetable field in Bangladesh. Women make up 58% of Bangladesh’s agricultural workforce. Credit: BRAC

By Asif Saleh
DHAKA, Bangladesh, Jan 19 2024 (IPS)

Half the world eats rice. In Bangladesh, everyone eats it. The small, densely-populated nation is the third-highest rice-producing country in the world.

For a nation of 170 million people which has suffered through some of the world’s worst famines, this ranking holds special significance. While Bangladesh is mostly self-sufficient in food now, its farmers face a new threat ¬– the climate crisis.

The impact of a changing climate on food security is a catastrophe shared by many countries in the Global South, from the Philippines, where biodiversity based rice farming is facing extinction, to Peru, where drought has devastated food systems.

Smallholder farmers produce one-third of the world’s food. In Bangladesh, agriculture makes up every second livelihood. The country has a population predicted to swell to 200 million people by 2050, and salinity intrusion is affecting an area larger than Lebanon.

A farmer in Bangladesh returning from the field with his harvest. Credit: BRAC

In 2022 alone, flooding destroyed crops that would have been enough to feed 10 million people for a month. The impacts of Cyclone Sidr, which struck Bangladesh’s coast 16 years ago, are still felt today, with salt residue rendering thousands of hectares of land non-arable for much of every year.

Bangladesh is small – its land size is just a little more than the US state of Mississippi – but surprisingly diverse in terms of topography and ecosystems, and the climate crisis is a cruel reminder of that diversity.

North-eastern Bangladesh floods regularly, central regions suffer longer dry spells, coastal areas are under attack by rising salinity, and farming communities along Bangladesh’s 600-plus rivers are constantly threatened by erosion.

A whole-of-society approach

Climate impacts are attacking smallholder farmers on every front. To support them on every front, we can’t tinker around the edges; we need holistic solutions at scale.

Bangladesh is an example that these approaches work – it has used holistic, large-scale approaches to take poverty rates from 80% to 18.7%, increase life expectancy by one and a half times and triple rice production – all in the last 50 years.

Farmers in Bangladesh weeding their rice fields a month after planting seedlings. Bangladesh produced 38.3 million tonnes of rice in 2023. Credit: BRAC

The starting point for such an approach must be the most fundamental – seeds, which Bangladesh has invested in for decades. One of the key reasons the country was able to become self-sufficient in food was because of widespread uptake of high yield varieties.

It turns out, however, that high yield crops are particularly vulnerable to climate impacts. There is also a lack of diversity – while hundreds of climate-resilient varieties are available in Bangladesh, 70% of the country’s Boro rice fields are cultivated with just two varieties.

The work needed going forward is not only in the development of climate resilient seeds, but also in working with farmers to encourage them to use them, as well as to try different crops altogether.

Rice, for example, the mainstay of the Bangladeshi diet, which covers 80% of cultivable land in the country, needs 3,000-5,000 litres of water to produce 1kg. Maize requires 30% less, and millets require 70% less. Methane from rice also contributes around 1.5% of total global greenhouse gas emissions. With many smallholder farmers living harvest to harvest though, getting them to change varieties is not easy.

Non-government organizations can help address this issue, because they work closely with communities and are trusted by them. BRAC works with a network of 7,000 smallholder farmers to produce seeds which are distributed to a community of 1.3 million farmers – and networks and communities like this exist across the Global South.

Access to finance is vital

To experiment with seeds though, farmers need access to finance. Most Bangladeshi subsistence farmers earn less than $2 per day, making it a constant struggle to eke out a living, let alone to invest in their livelihood.

Farmers in Bangladesh spray pesticides on their field to protect the corn crops from pests. Credit: BRAC

Farmers typically don’t need a lot of money – but they often need it all at once, at the start of the season. Customized microfinance loans for farmers are key in this. BRAC provides finance to approximately 10 million people, many of whom are farmers – and increasingly in the form of one-off loans to be repaid at harvest time. The default rate is less than 2%.

Crop insurance is also crucial, to support farmers to absorb increasing climate shocks. More than half the world’s countries have government agriculture insurance programmes, and most of those subsidize premiums.

Only four countries in Africa, however, have them. At BRAC, we recently piloted crop insurance, partnered with agri-advisories and localized weather predictions via SMS with 80,000 farmers. Even without subsidizing, more than half the farmers opted to continue the insurance after the pilot.

Importance of up-to-date knowledge for farmers

Farmers also need information at their fingertips, in a way they can understand. Government agricultural extension services provide this, and non-state actors can ensure it gets to particularly vulnerable communities.

One initiative being piloted in Bangladesh is adaptation clinics – one-stop service centres in climate hotspots run by agricultural graduates and farmers in those communities, offering other farmers access to a range of resources, from weather forecasts and market information to training, technology and produce storage facilities.

They also need to know they can sell their new produce. Sunflowers are a good example. Sunflower oil is used extensively in cooking in Bangladesh, and the country relies on imports to meet 90% of its demand for edible oil.

Sunflowers are also a naturally salt-tolerant crop. Even though the government put effort into promoting sunflowers for years, the crop was never taken up because of a lack of buyers.

Now with industrial oil producers showing interest and that market gap being addressed, there is a bloom of sunflower farming on the coast – and farmers are fetching up to five times as much as they would make from the crops they would previously have grown.

Challenges facing farmers only intensifying

Seeds, finance, information, and market linkage are just the start. With climate impacts anticipated to wipe out 30% of food production by 2050, the challenges farmers are facing are only going to intensify.

They need support which is equally comprehensive, that combines the technical strengths of state and private actors, with the confidence and localized direction on the ground from non-state actors to transition away from generations of tradition.

With a global population that is only getting hungrier ¬– 43 countries currently have alarming or serious levels of hunger – the stakes have never been higher.

This article was originally published in World Economic Forum Agenda blog which can be accessed through this link.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Excerpt:

Asif Saleh, Executive Director, BRAC

Betty Mtehemu, Deputy Chairperson of Fabric Clothes Sector, and Chairperson of the Women’s Union in Dar es Salaam’s Mchikichini Market.

By Franck Kuwonu
UNITED NATIONS, Jan 19 2024 (IPS)

As African economies look to the new year, countries across the continent are poised to make moderate economic gains but must navigate the maze of domestic and international challenges.

According to the UN World Economic Situation and Prospects (WESP) 2024, the continent’s economic growth is expected to quicken slightly, with average GDP possibly inching up to 3.5 per cent.

Yet, debt sustainability concerns, fiscal pressures, and climate change present uncertainties. The projected 3.5 per cent growth is a slight increase from the 3.3 per cent in 2023.

Major regional economies, such as that of Egypt, are anticipated to slow to 3.4 per cent from 4.2 in the previous year, mainly due to foreign exchange scarcities that may weaken import capacity and domestic demand.

In South Africa, the persistent energy crisis has limited the growth to just 0.5 per cent in 2023, and no significant change is expected in 2024.

In Nigeria, the country’s growth prospect points to a moderate increase, largely due to government reforms in the oil sector. The growth is forecast to be at 3.1 per cent.

 
Debt burden

High levels of debt are one of the main challenges African economies face going forward, the report noted. For instance, Zambia is navigating a debt-to-GDP ratio that soared past 70 per cent in recent years.

Yet, the country is not alone: “18 countries in Africa recorded a debt-to-GDP ratio of over 70 per cent in 2023, with many of them facing debt distress,” the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA) said in a release accompanying the report.

Ghana’s financial health is also under scrutiny, with a staggering fifth of its tax revenue devoted to servicing debt. These instances are not anomalies but rather stark representations of the debt dilemma many African nations confront.

Fiscal health and inflation

Fiscal stability remains elusive, the report highlighted, with many countries wrestling to increase their tax revenue, a vital lifeline for economic sustainability.

Energy subsidy reforms in nations like Nigeria and Angola reflect attempts to recalibrate fiscal policies amidst pressing economic realities. At the same time, inflationary pressures are widespread, with countries like Nigeria and Egypt experiencing severe surges in food prices.

In response, Central banks across the continent have tightened monetary policies, trying to stabilize currencies and curb inflation. Yet, the effectiveness of these measures in the face of global economic turbulence remains a critical question.

 
Climate change

Climate change continues to be an unpredictable catalyst, significantly impacting agriculture-dependent economies. The Horn of Africa, repeatedly battered by droughts exacerbated by human-induced climate change, faces ongoing threats to food security and economic stability.

Southern Africa’s vulnerability was laid bare by Cyclone Freddy in March 2023, with losses mounting into hundreds of millions. These incidents underscore the urgent need for climate resilience strategies.

Trade

The global slowdown in trade has also slowed down economic growth in Africa. This is due to less demand from the main countries that buy Africa’s exports and the prices for raw materials and goods sold by the continent have stopped increasing.

Although overall intra-African trade remains relatively low continent-wide, hovering below 15 per cent, this general trend masks regional variations.

Notably, East and Southern Africa stand out with their relatively higher levels of intra-regional trade, where intra-African exports correspond to almost 30% of these subregions’ overall exports. These regions contrast with other parts of the continent, where trade is more externally oriented.

The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) emerged as a central initiative intended to address these intra-African trade issues. Its goal is to enhance economic integration and increase trade flows within the continent by creating a single market for goods and services.

Yet, despite its potential, the actual impact of AfCFTA has been limited so far, the report said.

The 2024 UN World Economic Situation and Prospects (WESP) is produced by UN DESA in partnership with the five UN Regional Commissions, UNCTAD, UN-OHRLLS and UNWTO. It features the global economic outlook for 2024 and 2025, and regional growth forecasts for developed and developing economies, as well as economies in transition.

The full report is available at: https://desapublications.un.org/

Source: Africa Renewal, United Nations

IPS UN Bureau

 

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Credit: Emmanuel Andres/AFP via Getty Images

By Inés M. Pousadela
MONTEVIDEO, Uruguay, Jan 18 2024 (IPS)

Guatemala’s new president, Bernardo Arévalo, was expected to be sworn in on 14 January at 2pm –the 14th at 14:00, as people repeated in anticipation for months. It was a momentous event – but it wasn’t guaranteed to happen.

One year earlier, Arévalo – co-founder of the progressive Movimiento Semilla (Seed Movement), a political party born out of widespread 2015 anti-corruption protests – was largely unknown, freshly selected as his party’s presidential candidate. He wasn’t on the radar of opinion polls. A long chain of unlikely events later, he’s become the first Guatemalan president in living memory who doesn’t belong to the self-serving elites who Guatemalans call ‘the corrupt pact’, which he has credibly promised to dismantle.

The fear this caused among corrupt elite that has long ruled Guatemala was reflected in a series of attempts to try to stop Arévalo’s inauguration. The huge and sustained citizen mobilisation that came in response can largely be credited with keeping alive the spark of democracy in Guatemala.

Last-minute delays

All the Guatemalan Congress needed to do on the morning of 14 January was certify its newly elected members so the body could swear in the new president. But this routine administrative procedure was dragged on for many hours. The Indigenous movement, at the forefront of the months-long protests that had successfully kept at bay successive attempts to reverse the election results, called on Indigenous communities throughout Guatemala to remain on the alert.

In the late afternoon the Secretary General of the Organization of American States, Luis Almagro, surrounded by members of numerous foreign delegations, read a declaration calling on Congress to hand over power, ‘as required by the Constitution’, to the president-elect. This signalled that the world was watching.

As tensions mounted, Semilla reached an agreement for one of its representatives to be elected as president of Congress. This allowed the certification process to resume, and Arévalo was finally sworn in shortly after midnight. Night-long celebrations followed.

A coup attempt in stages

Arévalo’s election was unexpected. He only made it into the 20 August runoff because several other contenders not to the elite’s liking had been disqualified ahead of the first round. His candidacy wasn’t blocked because he scored so poorly in the polls. People’s expectations were extremely low, and first place went to invalid votes.

But once Arévalo entered the runoff, his rise was unstoppable. Death threats soon poured in, and an assassination plot involving state and non-state forces came to light days before the runoff.

As soon as the first-round results were announced, nine parties submitted complaints about supposed ‘irregularities’ that had gone undetected by all international observers. Their supporters converged outside the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) calling for a rerun.

The Constitutional Court instead ordered a recount and instructed the TSE to suspend official certification until complaints were resolved. Following the recount, the TSE eventually endorsed the results two weeks later.

But meanwhile, Attorney General Consuelo Porras Argueta, an official under US sanctions for corruption, launched an investigation into Semilla for alleged irregularities in its registration process and had its offices raided. She also ordered two raids on TSE offices, and when the TSE officially announced Arévalo as one of the runoff contenders, she ordered Semilla’s suspension. The Constitutional Court however blocked this order and the runoff ran its course. Arévalo took 58 per cent of the vote, compared to 37.2 per cent for the pro-establishment candidate.

Efforts to stop Arévalo’s inauguration began immediately, with yet another attempt by the Public Prosecutor to have Semilla suspended. The Constitutional Court continued to receive and reject legal challenges until the day of the inauguration.

For 100 days, two different visions of Guatemala wrestled with each other: people eager for change protested nonstop while corrupt forces linked to organised crime strove to preserve their privileges at any cost.

Democracy on life support

Guatemala has long been classified as a ‘hybrid regime‘ with a mix of democratic and authoritarian traits. Under outgoing president Alejandro Giammattei, civic freedoms steadily deteriorated. State institutions grew even weaker, ransacked by predatory elites and coopted by organised crime.

One of the last acts of Giammattei’s predecessor and ally, Jimmy Morales, was to end the work of the International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG). Charged with supporting and strengthening state institutions to investigate and prosecute serious crimes, CICIG helped file over 120 cases in the Guatemalan justice system and its joint investigations with the Attorney General’s Office led to over 400 convictions.

Under Giammattei, the Attorney General’s Office dismantled all anti-corruption efforts and criminalised those in the legal profession who’d worked alongside CICIG. Impunity flourished. Transparency International’s 2022 Corruption Perceptions Index found evidence of strong influence by organised crime over politics and politicians, with some crime bosses seeking and securing office.

It’s no wonder that Guatemalans’ trust in state institutions hit rock bottom. According to the latest Latinobarómetro report, in 2021 satisfaction with the performance of democracy stood at a meagre 25 per cent.

Challenges ahead

Arévalo came to the presidency on a credible anti-corruption platform. But dismantling dense webs of complicity, rooting out entrenched corruption and rebuilding state institutions are no easy tasks.

Among the many challenges is a highly fragmented Congress in which 16 parties are represented, with Semilla on only 23 out of 160 seats. A large majority of Congress remains on the payroll of the interests Arévalo has promised to take on, along with most of the justice system. The 14 January events made clear that the ‘corrupt pact’ will do anything it can to stop Arévalo.

Arévalo’s to-do list is long, ranging from reducing political spending and improving social services to reversing laws that criminalise protest and establishing an effective protection mechanism for human rights defenders. At the top is forcing the resignation of Attorney General Consuelo Porras, the highest official presiding over a judicial network set up to ensure the impunity of the ‘corrupt pact’.

Arévalo can’t remove the Attorney General unilaterally, and so will have to negotiate her departure. This will be a key early test of the hope invested in him to keep democracy alive. Many more are sure to come.

Inés M. Pousadela is CIVICUS Senior Research Specialist, co-director and writer for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report.

 

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