Global Courant
In the distribution of seats for the Tenth Legislature, blocks with more representation were strengthened and benches that used to be the majority must now strengthen more alliances.
According to the projection of Prensa Libre regarding the formation of the next Congress, the party with the most representation would be Vamos for a Different Guatemala (Vamos), with almost 40 spaces occupied.
The two parties that go to the second round, Unión por la Esperanza Nacional (UNE) and Movimiento Semilla, managed to reach a similar number of seats with 28 and 23 respectively, and Cabal would be the fourth block with 18 deputies.
The UNE’s loss of strength may be due to the number of parties that participated, inferred José Manuel Martínez of Alianza por las Reformas.
“I think there is a fragmentation regarding the number of political parties and the method of minority representation,” he explained.
In addition to the spaces that the UNE loses, they were won by benches such as Semilla and Cabal.
For Alejandro Valverth, from the Legislative Observatory, it is logical that both parties have large benches, since the UNE has bases throughout the territory and Semilla because it occupied the voting niche of the Winaq parties or the extinct Encuentro por Guatemala, in addition to being more organic.
Alliances
While the UNE will face a weakening in the number of seats, Semilla grew in its representation.
In the ninth legislature, the UNE began the period with 51 deputies that later, due to internal conflicts, faced some dissidents. Now the group would lose 45 percent of its representation.
Contrary to that of Semilla, which grew by more than 300 percent in the seats they will occupy. However, both face the challenge of achieving political negotiations in order to legislate.
Regardless of the candidate who is elected in the second round, the benches must seek alliances both with Vamos and Cabal as well as with the parties that will be represented by only one deputy.
“Both blocks are super hinges and that to some extent consensus can be reached regarding an agenda that makes the development of the country viable,” said Martínez.
According to Valverth’s perspective, UNE has maintained recurring alliances for years thanks to Sandra Torres. In her words, Semilla “is going to have to make some political concessions, either with Vamos or UNE, which are larger benches” for the initiatives to advance.
He warned that the group must be faithful to its voters and achieve a balance between the negotiations it must seek and the interests of its readership.
Situation in which the UNE has the advantage, which has legislated in recent periods based on alliances and even buying deputies, according to the expert.
Although for María del Carmen Aceña, a researcher at the Center for National Economic Research (Cien), and a member of Congreso Eficiente, she believes that Semilla would have possibilities of negotiations with the VOS, URNG-Winaq and perhaps even Elefante benches.
The new president will influence
For the governance of the next president, Congress will be crucial. The analysts stated that if Bernardo Arévalo is elected as president, the role could be affected if the UNE achieved more alliances.
In this sense, Aceña referred “to govern it would be better for Torres because he would have fewer challenges in congress.”
In the same way, Valverth added: “we are going to see how much this alliance can strengthen that it can result in another steamroller, but if Torres were the president it is much easier than if it were Bernardo Arévalo.”
And Martínez indicated that “in quantitative terms it is possible to say that, in a hypothetical case, in which the UNE wins, it has shown that it can reach consensus through corruption.”
Valverth also commented that the course of the legislature can be defined if Vamos, Humanista, Valor, Todos, Creo and Viva continue with the alliance together with the UNE and stressed that such agreements are usually subject to the economic power of the Executive branch.
we go with majority
For the next legislature, Vamos would have 39 deputies, recovering a number of seats after having only 17 for this period.
In general terms, Martínez declared that the Vamos party, in addition to seeking the presidency, was interested in having more power in the legislature.
“The intention of the ruling party was that, to win the presidency, but also to use the example that the UNE has set, to have a good share of power even losing presidential elections,” he stressed.
Although in his opinion, the Congress was still made up mostly of the traditional parties that have already led in power, “although there was a surprising electoral result, the new Congress still has a composition that is quite inclined towards the parties that have rewarded corruption.” ”.
On the other hand, Aceña described as positive that fewer benches will integrate the Congress. So far, there would be 17 different blocks. When in 2019 19 entered and the period ended with 22.
