Even after the independent members of the constitutional court placed them under the full glare of publicity, the pro-government majority decided to reverse the twice-issued ruling of their predecessor and allow retired General Efraín Ríos Montt to register as a candidate for the presidency.
It was bound to arouse widespread indignation among opposition politicians, human rights organisations and representatives of some international bodies -but the ruling was based on a strict reading of the constitution.
Article 186 bars from running for the presidency or vice-presidency anyone involved in a government arising out of a breach of the constitution -such as a coup.
Ríos Montt fitted the bill. Called out of retirement by the generals who had staged a coup in March 1982, he served as President until August 1983, when he was removed by the same generals. The constitution imposing the ban, though, only came into effect three years later.
What Ríos Montt's lawyers have argued is that no law can be applied retroactively. On two previous occasions, the constitutional court preferred to overlook this; this time it did not.
As one prominent Guatemalan jurist (who heartily dislikes the latest ruling) told us, this loophole was the result of the manner in which Guatemala's peace agreements were negotiated -with great care not to cause more than the 'necessary' irritation to the still-powerful military.
This approach precluded using Guatemala's existing legislation to try and convict the previous military rulers (on a range of offences, including violation of the constitution). Had this been done, they would have been barred from seeking elective office, and not just the highest (there are nowadays at least 17 former military men seeking election to congressional and municipal posts).
Range of objections. Presidential candidate Alvaro Colom, running under the banner of the Unión Nacional de la Esperanza (UNE), says that the court's ruling is the result of 'juridical manipulation' -hence 'Ríos Montt's candidacy is illegal, and if it is not reversed, we will be facing a technical coup d'etat.' A former president of the constitutional court, Conchita Mazariegos, said, 'It is a blow against the rule of law and the institutions. I had though that what would prevail was good sense and respect for the constitution, but [...] that did not happen.'
Alvaro Castellanos, dean of the law school at the Jesuit-run Universidad Rafael Landívar, suggests that the electoral tribunal could yet 'refuse to register him [...] based on Article 156 of the constitution, which says that no official can accept illegal orders.'
The UN's special rapporteur on the independence of judges and lawyers, Dato Param Cumaraswamy, fumed, 'This latest decision flies in the face not only of previous decisions of the constitutional court but also of the specific recommendations I made after my mission to Guatemala in 1999.'
One of those recommendations of 1999 was that 'All personalities who were known to have committed human rights violations during the armed conflict should be removed from public office and from the military. In any event, those with such a record should not be elected, appointed or recruited for any public office in the future.'
Much ado about nothing? What seems to have escaped notice in all the hubbub about the court ruling is that Ríos Montt's chances of getting elected are looking very dim. A survey released as the court was deliberating showed that the frontrunner by far was the businessman Oscar Berger, of the Gran Alianza Nacional (GAN), with 39.4%. Ríos Montt came a poor third, with 3.8%.
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