Global Courant 2023-04-19 07:26:44
Sandra Torres and Zury Ríos, presidential candidates of the National Unity of Hope (UNE) and Valor-Unionista parties, respectively, have exchanged remarks after the armed incident that occurred on April 15 in the municipality of Tucurú, Alta Verapaz.
The contenders in the current electoral process have stepped forward to distort and exacerbate the spirits with mutual accusations regarding their passage through the government administration. But how do you compare what they say with the historical documentation?
The debate focused on the restitution of the death penalty, the main campaign offer of Ríos, daughter of the head of state in the 1980s, Efraín Ríos Montt, who was also president of Congress during the government of the Guatemalan Republican Front (FRG). ).
Torres has disqualified the proposal to apply the capital punishment of Ríos Sosa, because she considers that it is unfeasible due to the legal vacuum that was generated in 2000 when her father was president of Congress and she was a deputy.
“Surely he approved that decree. We have to verify that, but he most certainly approved it. Look at the great contradiction, ”he pointed out.
Death Penalty in Guatemala: The Facts
According to the Prensa Libre newspaper library, in 2001, during the administration of President Alfonso Portillo, Congress, with the FRG’s official majority, including the candidate and her father, repealed the Pardons Law.
Decree 159 of the National Legislative Assembly regulated the procedure for granting pardon, but it was repealed by Decree 32-2000 of Congress.
Until June 1, 2000, the knowledge of the Grace Appeal and the granting of the respective Pardon corresponded to the President, as ordered by Decree 159.
Ríos Sosa responded to Torres: “I want to inform you that I voted against Initiative Law 159, your advisers surely knew it, but you, as always, either did not listen to them, or fired them, because they do not think like you, and Not because I say so, the former Finance Minister (of the UNE), (Juan Alberto) Fuentes Knight said so”.
A year later, President Portillo promoted a project to abolish the death penalty, but it was rejected. The last execution was in 2000, by means of lethal injection.
That time the death penalty was applied to the prisoners Luis Amílcar Cetino Pérez and Tomás Cerrate Hernández for the kidnapping and murder of Isabel Bonifasi de Botrán. This court action was broadcast live on television.
On February 10, 1998, the lethal injection was applied for the first time to comply with a death sentence that was later the reason for the Inter-American Court of Human Rights to sentence the State of Guatemala.
It was Manuel Martínez Coronado who paid with his life for having assassinated Juan Arias Bautista, Rosa Miguel, Emilia Arias and the girls Francisca, Jovita, Arnoldo and Aníbal, with the last names Arias Miguel, on May 16, 1995 in the village of El Palmar, municipality of Quezaltepeque, Chiquimula.
Four years earlier, during the government of Álvaro Arzú, founder of the Unionista party, which now makes an alliance with Valor de Zury Ríos, firing squad was applied for the last time as the death penalty. It was broadcast on television, too.
Ríos and Torres talk about the death penalty
In response to Torres’s remarks, the Valor-Unionista presidential candidate referred to the fact that she (the UNE candidate) proposes (now) to hold a popular consultation to take a position on the death penalty, (but) our party (Valor) proposed that initiative more than five years ago.
According to Prensa Libre, on March 29, deputies from FCN-Nación, Valor and Unionista proposed holding a referendum to apply the death penalty. This possibility arose after the Constitutional Court (CC) resolved an appeal and eliminated the death penalty for the crime of murder from the Penal Code.
He argued: “We have already consulted the people of Guatemala, the people want the death penalty to be applied and in fact, the constitution contemplates it, we should not be afraid of making firm decisions, especially when it comes to protecting the safety of our families, no one is above the law.”
Ríos Sosa assured that the deputies of the UNE, related to Torres, make a majority with the official Vamos party on issues that interest them. He asked his challenger to demonstrate his political will and instruct them to vote for the death penalty.
During the UNE government, President Colom vetoed the law that had empowered him to grant or deny pardons to those sentenced to death.
On February 12, 2008, when Torres was Colom’s wife, and therefore first lady, the Guatemalan legislature restored to the president the power to pardon the life or confirm the death sentence of the convicted prisoners, which had been suspended in the 2000, during the FRG government.
Colom made the decision because he considered the law unconstitutional.
“Mrs. Sandra Torres today spoke about security, she says that the country will change in 100 days, she was already president, de facto president, and in 1,460 days, in what she could have done so much, she did nothing,” Ríos said.
