[NEWS] Guatemala votes for new president, runoff likely to decide outcome – Loganspace AI

GUATEMALA CITY (Reuters) – Guatemalans on Sunday voted for a brand contemporary president, who will face the daunting arena of curbing drug gang violence that has ravaged the nation and helped spur illegal immigration to the US, stoking tensions with President Donald Trump.

Polling stations closed at 6 p.m. (0000 GMT). None of the 19 candidates is expected to grab an outright majority, meaning the head two finishers will likely face off in a 2d round on Aug. 11.

Passe first girl Sandra Torres, of the heart-left UNE salvage together, has led the flee to succeed President Jimmy Morales, a conservative used tv host whose time interval has been blighted by accusations of corruption made by U.N.-backed investigators.

Torres, who needs to send troops into the streets to fight drug gangs, and use welfare packages to kind out poverty, has the red meat up of about 20 percent of the voters, idea polls showed.

“We must in any respect times form out our issues right here, and segment of the cause of the migration is the shortage of jobs, the gap in wages between the US and right here,” Torres talked about as she voted in Guatemala Metropolis. “We must in any respect times work with the alternate neighborhood to revive the financial system and create jobs.”

Her closest opponents, trailing by just a few proportion capabilities, are conservatives Alejandro Giammattei, who’s running in his fourth marketing campaign, and Edmond Mulet, a used U.N. reliable whose candidacy has won traction in recent weeks.

Arriving to vote whereas driving a white car carrying his wife and son, Mulet talked about he had flee an austere marketing campaign and became once hopeful of making the runoff.

Rampant violence and in trend discontent over corruption and impunity within the nation of 17 million contain introduced about more and more Guatemalans to fly for the US.

The surge of exits has undermined Trump’s pledge to curb illegal immigration, and the U.S. president has answered by threatening to within the reduction of U.S. again to Central The USA.

That prospect has introduced about fear in Guatemala, the place the legacy of the bloody 1960-1996 civil war still casts a prolonged shadow over the nation’s constructing.

Preliminary results are as a result of begin coming in around 7 p.m. (0100 GMT).

COALITION PROSPECTS

With polls showing it’s extremely no longer going any candidate will snatch bigger than 50% of the vote, victory will likely count upon candidates’ skill to price a coalition for the 2d round.

Consultancy Eurasia Team talked about on Friday that Torres would fight to grab a runoff, given her excessive negative ratings and the skill of her likely opponent to unify conservative voters and stable red meat up from the nation’s extremely efficient elites.

Morales, who’s barred by law from seeking re-election, took office in 2016 vowing to root out corruption after his predecessor became once introduced down by a probe led by the U.N.-backed World Fee in opposition to Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG).

As an more than just a few, Morales himself turned a map of a CICIG probe into allegations of marketing campaign finance wrongdoing and became once arena to impeachment lawsuits in 2017.

He survived the are trying to oust him, after which engaged in a bitter dispute with the CICIG sooner than lastly terminating its mandate, efficient from September.

None of the head contenders has unequivocally backed the CICIG, with Torres asserting she would contain in mind keeping a referendum on whether it might probably still live in Guatemala.

Fernando Escalante, 41, an industrial originate adviser, talked about the following president must continue the fight in opposition to corruption.

“I fear your total development we’ve made could be lost, however maybe it’s time for us Guatemalans to tackle the duty,” he talked about.

Questions of legitimacy contain dogged the 2019 contest since two of the front-runners had been compelled out, including Thelma Aldana, a used criminal professional routine who tried to impeach Morales with the CICIG. The authorities accused Aldana of corruption, main to her exclusion final month.

Allegations of shady dealings contain permeated the election, which has been fought out amid intensifying efforts by Trump to flip Mexico and Guatemala into buffer zones to retain migrants from getting into the US illegally.

Presidential hopeful Mario Estrada and congressional candidate Julio Jose Rosales had been arrested for the interval of the marketing campaign and charged with having hyperlinks to Mexico’s Sinaloa drug cartel.