'General Genocide' uses terror to rig vote in Guatemala

HE RULED Guatemala with an iron fist, presiding over unprecedented bloodshed and earning the title ‘General Genocide’ for his part in a civil war which claimed 200,000 lives.

Now, Efrain Rios Montt is poised to return to power again after succeeding in overturning a constitutional ban on former dictators running for president. His opponents claim he has unleashed hundreds of hooded supporters who have brought terror to the streets of Guatemala City.

Earlier this month, when the constitutional court ruled against Rios Montt’s candidacy, his supporters rioted in the streets of Guatemala City, leaving one journalist dead from a heart attack as he tried to flee the rampaging mob.

The rioting was not spontaneous. Rios Montt supporters were bussed in from the countryside and protesters were seen with radios, apparently coordinating action through rich neighbourhoods of the capital. Lunchboxes were even issued to protestors by Rios Montt’s political party.

The United States ambassador, John Hamilton, said the demonstrations were a mockery of the right of protest and freedom of assembly. "It is difficult to believe these protests were not centrally planned and organised," he said.

In the wake of the riots the Constitutional Court voted four to three in favour of allowing the former dictator to stand for this November’s presidential elections. One magistrate, Rodolfo Rorhmoser, had complained before the vote of receiving death threats. He was one of the three that voted against Rios Montt.

A former president of the Constitutional Court, Conchita Mazariegos, condemned the court’s ruling, calling it "unconstitutional and illegal."

US Congressman Cass Ballenger said the uprisings could well intimidate voters against opposing the general, in a country that only came out of a bloody 36-year civil war in 1996. "Fear is a way to influence an election," he said.

Human rights groups have long warned that Rios Montt, now 77, will stop at nothing to win the presidency, having been thwarted twice before in 1990 and 1995, when his candidacy was blocked on the grounds of a 1985 law which prohibited former dictators from seeking the presidency.

Rios Montt’s 16-month rule after a coup in 1982 saw one of the most vicious periods of fighting in the civil war as government forces moved into the rebel highlands, where the native Mayans live, massacring suspected guerrillas and torching villages. The war left 200,000 dead, many of the bodies still lie undisturbed in mass graves across this Central American nation.

Some say that Rios Montt already runs the country in everything but name. In 1999, he ran instead for Congress and won, becoming president of the legislature whilst his Republican National Front party won the presidency with their candidate Alfonso Portillo, who has since presided over a marked rise in corruption, cronyism and organised crime.