Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy

 A newly elected President with a social-democratic profile would fight as well against physical insecurity – assisted by the newly established International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG) - as insecurity in terms of access to food, employment, health care and education. Women and children would profit most from both. The political context was rather positive. Changes in the electoral and political party regulations had helped in enhancing multiparty dialogue and establishing inter-party cooperation, the role of indigenous politicians at the local level had increased, and a number of parties had started working on ideology development.

In the course of the year it turned out that the security situation continued to be the main problem of Guatemala (5.834 homicides in 2008 according to data of the police, 6.338 according to the Ombudsman).

Socio-economic security issues

This situation is not unique for Guatemala. All Central American countries face problems with security as a result of the expansion of organized crime and weak state structures to deal with this. The situation in Guatemala is however more serious due to the infiltration of organized crime in state structures. Although CICIG was making a positive contribution in revealing the criminal networks that exist and supporting the prosecutor with evidence to put main suspects to trial, the turning point was not achieved in 2008. As far as socio-economic security is concerned, the government continued to put a lot of effort in reducing poverty and improving services in education and health care. Results were tangible. Political analysts, commenting on one year of Colom Government, valued the effects of the Social Cohesion programme of the Government and its policy to fight poverty, although they criticized the continuous high levels of criminality and impunity.

The social programme received fierce criticism by the media and by more conservative sectors of the country that think this is the start of a kind of populist Venezuelan model in Guatemala (“New Left”). Notwithstanding the above, the government managed to maintain a reasonable level of governability throughout 2008 and the effects of the financial crisis have until now been relatively small.

Social partnership

The Congress approved the budget presented by the government and approved a special solidarity tax. However, in order to maintain the same level of governability, it is important that the conservative sector and the government come to some kind of understanding; otherwise the current tensions can deteriorate. Here is one of the points were the NIMD programme came in directly. For several years the programme had been making efforts to overcome antagonistic attitudes and to work on long-term national economic and social policies, related to the establishment of a Social Economic Council (SEC) in Guatemala. After quite some preparatory work with the different sectors involved (entrepreneurs, unions, cooperatives), a SEC founders group was established in 2008.

The positive effect of this process and event on the negative attitudes of some stakeholders in Guatemalan society cannot be underestimated. The approval of the new Organic Law of Congress in November 2008, facilitated by the NIMD programme, was a breakthrough in the improvement and the professionalisation of Congress.

The immediate effect was the separation of political and administrative functions of Congress. In the long run it will contribute to better internal and external political accountability of Congress, thereby reinforcing the positive transformation of the political system.


Decentralization

The same can be said about the decentralization programme of NIMD Guatemala. The decentralization programme, characterized by Shared Municipal, Departmental and National agendas, brought politics to civil society.

An important contribution to better knowledge and understanding of civil society organizations and political parties of each other’s roles in consolidating democracy at different levels of the government structure. Having said all this, one has to acknowledge Guatemalan democracy was going through a rough patch. The crime levels were high, and the lack of coordination between the police and the judicial system contributed to high levels of impunity. This severely affected democracy. People were afraid to go out and the confidence of the people in the state to guarantee protection and security was low. A huge challenge in 2009!