A complicated challenge

Increasing violence has lead to a remilitarisation of Guatemala, says Rogelia de Carmen Soto Chacon, new MS programme officer

Rogelia de Carmen Soto Chacon: “The Peace Agreement is not on the agenda any longer.” Foto: Eva Rasmussen

Guatemala is a complicated challenge for MS’s focus on democracy, says Rogelia de Carmen Soto Chacon, new MS programme officer in this Central American country.
“Guatemalans are scared. Lately there have been an average of 16 murders a day, in our capital Guatemala City alone”, Rogelia explain. She considers that the increase in violence has lead to a remilitarisation of the country.
Several interested parties
“I think there are two major reasons for the increasing violence. Influential groups are trying to make this country ungovernable so as to strengthen the power of the military - and the truth is that they have succeeded. Today the army is patrolling the streets with just one police officer at their side. Furthermore, the deteriorating security situation has become big business, which almost exclusively benefits former members of the army.  Private security guard companies just keep on growing – and as far as I know only one of those is not owned and staffed by former members of the Guatemalan army. At the same time, the sale of arms and ammunition is on the rise, and that too is an industry owned by retired military persons”, comments Rogelia.
Rogelia has worked with national and international development organizations since 1992 and thinks the most important democratic step forward in Guatemala during those 14 years was the signing of the Peace Agreement in 1996. “After 36 years of civil war the Peace Agreement opened the door to a certain popular participation in political processes. However ten years later we must acknowledge that this has not had the desired results, and today the Peace Agreement is not even on the agenda – neither that of the government or of civil society.”
“We have not been good enough to make the government keep to the Agreement.  Guatemalan civil society tends to focus on “the issue of the day”. So today it is CAFTA, the trade agreement with the United States, tomorrow the Puebla-Panama Plan (a giant infrastructure project intended to integrate Mesoamerica). And it is not only the national organizations that follow the fashion; the international ones do so too. We concentrate intensely on one topic, then drop it and go on to the next without analysing how the one influences the other, how for instance CAFTA and the upcoming trade agreement between Central America and the European Union relate, or how the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund structural adjustment programmes tie in to the trade agreements.”
“As international NGOs we must analyse these interrelations, and we must be able to explain them in such a way that people who normally do not go in for those topics can  understand” says Rogelia. “In Guatemala there have been demonstrations against CAFTA, and the news media has on several occasions asked participating peasants what they are protesting against. The answer too often has been: For the right to land. This in turn has been used to show that the demonstrators don’t even know what they are demonstrating against. This is actually a serious problem for civil society, because it undermines our criticism of the trade agreement.”