Caribbean & Central America - February 2018 (ISSN 1741-4458)

The encouraging news that acute malnutrition fell by 9.1% last year to 12,138 cases, coupled with two anniversaries (the 21^st anniversary of the Guatemalan peace agreement in December and the second anniversary of the inauguration of Jimmy Morales as president in January) has led to various reviews of the current condition of the country’s indigenous communities. While there may be some signs of progress, the overall picture remains problematic.

Guatemala has one of the largest indigenous populations of any country in the Americas, and also suffers the greatest incidence of poverty and inequality: the two things are not unconnected. Activists claim that up to 60% of the country’s population of 17.25m people are indigenous. The highest income group tends to be the creoles (criollos - whites of European descent) who according to the 2010 census account for just under one-fifth of the population (18.5%). A total of 41% of the population is Ladino (mixed European and Amerindian ancestry), while 39% are full Amerindian.

Among the Amerindians, the main ethnic groups are the Mayas, and include the K’iche’ (11% of the total population), Q’eqchi, Kaqchikel, and Mam peoples. About 93% of the population speaks Spanish, but there are also 21 Mayan and two non-Mayan Amerindian languages spoken in the country. Meanwhile, official figures show that six out of ten Guatemalans (59.3%) live below the poverty line, while just over two out of ten (23.4%) suffer from acute poverty. About half the country’s children aged less than five years suffer from chronic malnutrition. The indigenous communities suffer disproportionately from poverty and malnutrition.

Keen to show that some progress is being made, the government highlighted the reduction in acute malnutrition. Germán González, head of the secretariat of food and nutritional security (Sesan), said that cases of acute malnutrition had fallen to a five-year low in 2017. In his state of the nation speech delivered on 14 January, the second anniversary of his inauguration, President Morales also highlighted the delivery of 26m lbs of food supplies to the poor, and the provisions of a new law which requires spending on school meals to more than double to Q3 (US$0.41) per pupil this year and to rise further to Q4 (US$0.54) in 2019. This could make a significant contribution, but there are doubts over the real strength of the government’s commitment to making lasting changes. Political wrangling over the budget in congress means the money for the extra school meals is not yet fully guaranteed. In January González announced he was resigning after six years as head of Sesan. He gave no reason for leaving but described himself as an “honest” person, leading to speculation that he may have been caught up in the political in-fighting over alleged corruption that has dogged the Morales government.

A civil-society lobby group, Observatorio Indígena de Guatemala (OIG), made clear it sees regression, rather than progress in the condition of the indigenous communities over the last two years. In a statement issued in January it recognised only some improvement in the battle against crime, since the homicide rate – still one of the highest in the world – has been falling. Otherwise, it said, it was deeply preoccupied over “the inefficiency, lack of knowledge, lack of clarity, lack of political will, and obscurity of vision” of President Morales. It described corruption as a “malign tumour” in society and accused the government and ruling party of doing little to combat it effectively. It said indigenous communities continued to be disadvantaged by shortages of medicine and poor education. School enrolment was falling in predominantly indigenous areas such as Huehuetenango, Totonicapán, Sololá, Quetzaltenango and Quiché: this, it suggested, was part of a “racist” approach by the government in office.

Politically, organisations such as the peasant development committee (Comité de Desarrollo Campesino – Codeca) seek to mobilise indigenous and rural workers in a radical campaign against the government. Codeca demonstrated in Guatemala City during the president’s state of the nation address. Its main demand is that Morales and all 158 members of congress should resign because, in its view, they are implicated in endemic corruption. It also accuses the president of ultimate responsibility for the death of 41 young girls in a fire at a hostel for poor children in March 2017 (investigations into that tragedy are ongoing).

A key aspect of the problem is that many of the peace agreements and undertakings that ended Guatemala’s long civil war in 1960-1996, which left a death toll of roughly 250,000 people, have never been fully implemented. Many indigenous communities supported the left-wing rebel groups, and many were targeted by the army’s ruthless counter-insurgency campaign. Marking 21 years since the peace agreements were signed on 29 December 1996, the key monitoring body, Consejo Nacional para el Cumplimiento de los Acuerdos de Paz (CNAP), noted a number of shortcomings. The budget for reparations has been cut back, and conflicts over land ownership continue (a total of 8,080 conflicts involving 3.47m people were registered in 1997-2016). Although Guatemala is a signatory to Convention 169 of the International Labour Organisation (ILO), which requires indigenous communities to be consulted before major extractive or hydroelectric projects are started, CNAP says the views of local communities have been ignored in a majority of cases.

• Agreements insufficient

A former guerrilla leader of the Unidad Revolucionaria Nacional Guatemalteca (URNG) rebel group told EFE, the Spanish news agency, that the agreements had been insufficient to overcome what she described as poverty, inequality, racism and discrimination. While still defending the potential for development and social inclusion created by the peace agreement, she argued that the Morales administration had chosen to “support structures of corruption and impunity”.