Otto Pérez Molina – a former special forces soldier and the ex-leader of a military intelligence unit linked to allegations of human rights abuse – was elected president of Guatemala in 2011 on a vow to fight official misconduct and crime.
This week, the once-feared commander was ordered to stand trial for corruption, illicit association and bribery linked to a multimillion-dollar customs scam.
He went from president to indicted inmate in just five days.
The spectacular fall from grace was a remarkable victory for a UN-backed investigative commission established to dismantle criminal networks with ties to politicians and the security forces, and has prompted growing calls for similar independent crime-fighting bodies to be established in other Central American countries wrestling with endemic corruption.Evidence collected by the International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG) triggered weeks of unprecedented public proteststhat eventually forced Pérez Molina to step down last week. He was identified as a flight risk, and ordered to await trial in small cell at a military barracks.
The president’s dramatic downfall came less than a month after the detention of his vice-president over the same corruption allegations – and marked a landmark in Guatemala’s journey to democracy. At last the justice system seemed willing and capable of taking on the untouchables.
James Goldston, executive director of the Open Society Justice Initiative, said: “In investigating the president, vice-president and other senior officials for corruption, CICIG has punctured the veil of impunity which has reigned at the highest levels of government in Guatemala for decades.
“But this is still a work in progress,” added Goldston.
CICIG was established in 2007 to help tackle organised crime that first emerged during Guatemala’s brutal 36-year civil war when corrupt security officials with political ties became involved in drug trafficking and contraband.
A 1996 peace deal ended the conflict but not the criminality. Instead, new groups infiltrated politics, security forces and the criminal justice system, operating with almost total impunity.
Over the past eight years, CICIG has investigated around 200 complex cases to help bring charges against a dozen criminal networks and almost 200 current and former government officials – including two former presidents, several ministers, police chiefs and military officers. It has helped to weed out hundreds of corrupt police, prosecutors and judges.
Its breakthrough case was the bizarre 2009 death of prominent lawyer Rodrigo Rosenberg – who left a video message implicating then president Alvaro Colom in his demise. The clip triggered months of political turmoil, but after eight months of investigation CICIG concluded that Rosenberg had orchestrated his own death in order to bring down the government.
In another trailblazing case, the unit helped prosecute 19 people in connection with the extrajudicial killings of 10 prisoners in 2006. Its evidence helped a Swiss court convict former national police director Erwin Sperisen for his role in the massacre.
Before the massive customs scams that eventually brought down the president, CICIG was involved in two other large-scale corruption cases.
In September it helped dismantle a multimillion-dollar criminal network run by former army Captain Byron Lima – jailed for the 1998 political assassination of Archbishop Juan Gerardi, author of the Guatemalan truth commission report. The investigation revealed that Lima had become the de facto head of prisons under Pérez Molina and was even running a factory contracted to produce T-shirts for his political party.
Then in November, CICIG announced the capture of Haroldo Mendoza Matta, boss of a longstanding criminal dynasty linked to legislators, mayors and security services.
Around this time, many predicted that time was running out for CICIG, which must have its mandate extended every two years by congress.
But in April, the customs scandal was made public. It was a bold and politically smart move by the CICIG commissioner, Ivan Velasquez Gómez, who had built his reputation prosecuting paramilitary groups in his native Colombia.
Pérez Molina extended CICIG’s mandate a week later in what looked like an attempt to avert a political crisis – seemingly unaware of the incriminating evidence against him.
Critics argue CICIG was meant to be a short-term measure in order to build local capacity and independent judicial institutions. Eight years after it was established, most high-profile investigations still depend on CICIG, and serious problems persist at the highest level of the judiciary. The original judge in the customs case was removed amid allegations of bribery.
But activists across Central America have been buoyed by CICIG’s successes, and are now calling for similar initiatives to help tackle the appalling levels of corruption, crime and impunity afflicting El Salvador and Honduras.
CICIG, which costs $12-$15m a year and has 150 staff from 20 countries, is excellent value for money, according to Mike Allison, associate professor of political sciences at Scranton University and author of the Central American Politics Blog.
“I have confidence that the US and international community would provide the resources Honduras and El Salvador would need to establish similar commissions. If Guatemala can recoup some or all of the money stolen in the customs scandal and prevent its reoccurrence, it will have paid for several years of CICIG in a single investigation.”
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