GUATEMALA CITY (AP) – Bernardo Arévalo was sworn in as Guatemala’s president yesterday minutes after midnight despite months of efforts to derail his inauguration, including foot-dragging and rising tensions right up until the transfer of power.
“It fills me with deep honour to assume this lofty responsibility, showing that our democracy has the necessary strength to resist and that through unity and trust we can change the political panorama in Guatemala,” Arévalo said in his first address as president.
Arévalo thanked Guatemala’s youth for not losing hope and the country’s Indigenous peoples for their support, acknowledging “historic debts that we must resolve”. He summarised his administration’s guiding principle as: “There cannot be democracy without social justice and social justice cannot prevail without democracy”.
Despite hundreds of Arévalo’s supporters pressuring lawmakers to follow the constitution, even clashing with riot police outside the congress building on Sunday, the inauguration process dragged for hours before he took the oath of office just past midnight.
A progressive academic-turned-politician and son of a Guatemalan president credited with implementing key social reforms in the mid-20th Century, Arévalo takes office with expectations of confronting Guatemala’s entrenched corruption. He has little support in congress and Porras’ term as the top law enforcement official extends to 2026, though Arévalo has said one of his first orders of business will be to request her resignation.
Supporters had been waiting hours for a festive inauguration celebration in Guatemala City’s emblematic Plaza de la Constitucion and were fed up with yet another delay, sweeping police roughly out of their way before gathering outside congress demanding legislators stop delaying and name the delegation that must attend the ceremony.
Congress, which was supposed to attend the inauguration as a special session of the legislature, engaged in bitter infighting over who to recognise as part of the congressional delegation, as members yelled at each other.
The leadership commission tasked with doing that was packed with old-guard opponents of Arévalo, and the delay was seen as a tactic to draw out the inauguration and weaken Arévalo.
Arévalo wrote in his social media accounts that “they are trying to damage democracy with illegalities, inconsequential details and abuses of power”.
Representatives from the United States government and Organisation of American States called on the congress to respect Guatemala’s constitution.
Minutes before midnight, the special session of congress was convened.
