1982 - José Efraín Ríos Montt
On 23 March 1982 young officers ousted Lucas García and his elected successor and installed General José Efraín Ríos Montt, who had been denied electoral victory in 1974, in the National Palace. On 08 August 1983 Minister of National Defense Brigadier General Oscar Humberto Mejía Victores and the Army High Command of the Military Commanders Council removed Brigadier General José Efraín Ríos Montt from the presidency in a swift coup d'etat in which some seven people were killed and a few injured. A proclamation by the military chiefs stated that Mejía Victores would retain his position as defense minister and would rule the nation as chief of state, not as president. Thus ended the nearly 17-month regime of Ríos Montt, who on assuming power in the aftermath of a coup on March 23, 1982, had informed his fellow citizens that “ God had decided that I would become president of this nation.
The military proclamation also set forth as the justifications for the coup — which was described as a military action, not a coup — the existence of “ a small group seeking to perpetuate itself in power indefinitely,” the presence of “ a religious, fanatic, and aggressive group ignoring the essential principle of separation of church and state, and the need “ to eradicate administrative corruption at all levels. ” The proclamation made clear, however, that the Army High Command was primarily concerned with its own institutional well-being: “ We are aware, above all. that the unity of the army must be preserved and strengthened, maintaining the principle of hierarchy and subordination, in order to frustrate the attempts of some elements who have tried to divide and confuse the armed institution.
It was unlikely that the coup — and the reasons put forward in explanation - came as a surprise to Ríos Montt. Throughout his period in office there were continuous reports of coups attempted or in preparation. From early 1983 onward there were increasing rumors of unrest within the military hierarchy because of Ríos Montt's reliance on a small group of young officers and on his co-parishioners in the Church of the Word (Iglesia del Verbo) a fundamentalist, evangelical Protestant sect to which Ríos Montt had converted and of which he was an elder. The young officers included junior and mid-level officers who under the leadership of Captain Carlos Rodolfo Muñoz Pilona had executed the March 1982 coup and had invited Ríos Montt to head the military junta. These officers had supported Ríos Montt when he dismissed the other two members of the junta, Brigadier General Horacio Egberto Maldonado Schaad and Colonel Francisco Luis Gordillo Martínez, and assumed the presidency.
Ríos Montt retained many of these officers in key positions, most notably in the General Staff of the Presidency, and the power and influence of this group became increasingly irksome to the army hierarchy. In addition, in June 1983 individuals who had been involved in the March 1982 coup, such as Gordillo and Leonel Sisniega Otero, reemerged politically with calls for Ríos Montt to resign. and several observers concluded that these individuals either had or would soon secure support within the officer corps. This possibility added to the concern of those military commanders who wished to preserve the military's unity and cohesion.
By May, Ríos Montt was being subjected to sustained criticism by three powerful interest groups: the Roman Catholic hierarchy, businessmen and industrialists, and large landowners. In a document entitled “ Confirmed in Our Faith,” dated May 22, the Conference of Catholic Bishops accused Ríos Montt's government of responsibility for “ a growing militarization ” of the country and charged that there were still frequent “ cases of missing persons” and that “massacres are still being carried out” by the military in some parts of the country. The hierarchy also criticized the obligatory participation of Indians in civil defense patrols and the existence and functions of the special courts. And in a thrust aimed directly at Ríos Montt, the Catholic spokesmen asserted that the aggressive escalation ” of proselytization by Protestant fundamentalist sects posed a danger to society.
Business and industrial groups were incensed by a tax reform proposal that included a 10-percent value-added tax (VAT; Impuesto al Valor Agregado — IVA ). Government officials let it be known that international lenders, meaning particularly the International Monetary Fund (IMF), would refuse to lend further funds unless Guatemala increased its tax revenues, among the lowest per capita in Latin America. Many of the large landowners supported the VAT proposal because agricultural exports were exempted, but they were vociferously opposed to government proposals of modest land reform measures.
It was in an already tense political situation that Brigadier General José Guillermo Echeverria Vielman — in length of service the senior army officer on active duty — sent a public letter to Ríos Montt. Echeverria urged that the tax reform be postponed until an elected legislature could debate and vote on the measure, stated that the military should retire from its dominant role in the government, and lamented the “ loss ” of Belize. He directed his sharpest criticism against the evangelical sectarianism “ being practiced at the highest levels of government... producing an unnecessary offense to the Catholic population, which sooner or later will make known its repudiation.” The general paid to have his letter read on a popular news broadcast on June 5, and the letter appeared in numerous newspapers the next day.
On June 8 Echeverria was dismissed from active service for having violated military regulations, but by that time numerous groups, including the Roman Catholic hierarchy, had publicly endorsed the general's position. The far right political parties, particularly the National Liberation Movement (Movimiento de Liberación Nacional — MLN ), increased their criticism of government policies and their demands for early elections. The call by the MLN for early elections undoubtedly reflected its judgment that because they were well organized and the moderates and conservatives were not, the MLN would win in an early election.
Events reached a climax of sorts in June. Ríos Montt met with several leaders of political parties on June 24 and 25 and on Army Day, June 30, with many or all of the military commanders. In the midst of this, on June 28 Gordillo delivered a vehement attack on Ríos Montt on a popular television program. This was followed later in the evening by a broadcast of an interview with Sisniega, who set forth a detailed denunciation of government policies but took care to distance himself from Gordillo and the leaders of the MLN.
In response to these pressures, Ríos Montt agreed to fix the date for constituent assembly elections, dissolved the young officers advisory council (the General Staff of the Presidency). and imposed a “ state of alarm. " an emergency martial law measure that reimposed most of the restrictions on civil liberties that had been lifted on March 22, 1983. In a related measure, some 50 military officers were transferred from civilian jobs back to military postings. On June 30 Ríos Montt formally inaugurated the Supreme Electoral Tribunal, which was assigned the task of preparing for and conducting the elections. The five members of the tribunal enjoyed considerable public prestige ; its president, Arturo Herbruger Asturias, had served as a minister in the government of President Juan José Arévalo and had been appointed president of the Supreme Court by President Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán.
Despite these pressing problems. Ríos Montt publicly remained unperturbed. On August 1 he announced that the constituent assembly elections would be held July 1. 1984, and that the assembly would convene on September 15, 1984. He also asserted that the “ roots of Central America's frailty lie in its grave social problems, its ideological disputes, and its age-old dependence.” He opined that “ the power policy, the so-called hard-line policy... leaves no room for arbitration" and that " the East-West confrontation must be removed " from Central America. “ We want to be neither East nor West, but simply Middle America. " On August 5, three days before the coup, he dismissed queries by foreign reporters about coup attempts as “ pelas en la sopa' (hairs in the soup). Three of the six young officers who were the target of officer corps objections had not been removed from their posts, and Sergio Alvaro Contreras Valladeres and Francisco Bianchi Castillo, elders of the Church of the Word, continued to report daily to their offices in the National Palace.
Although elements of the presidential guard engaged in a spirited though brief defense, the coup went smoothly. According to various observers. the chief of the national defense general staff, Brigadier General Héctor Mario López Fuentes, orchestrated the attack and the presence later in the day of the military commanders who signed the proclamation that deposed Ríos Montt and installed Mejía Victores.
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