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Guatemala currently may be moving toward a negotiated settlement of its civil war. A comprehensive peace accord ending Latin America's longest running war could be concluded within the year; that is, if elements in the country's military and the URNG guerrilla forces do not succeed in derailing its momentum. Or if the present political atmosphere is not thrown back into the dark days of the 1980s with the installation of former dictator General Efrain Ríos Montt as the country's next President. Having assumed the Presidency of Congress in mid-January, the staunchly evangelical Ríos Montt will almost certainly muster the congressional votes to overturn legislation that was designed explicitly to bar him from the country's highest elected office.
However events turn at the center of national politics, they will affect the conditions of rural Guatemala where Mayan Indians, the majority of the country's population, have suffered the brunt of the intense political violence of the past fifteen years and more. The Mayas will be the most affected by the impending peace, if it actually transpires. This article seeks to describe the current state of affairs in one Maya town, Santiago Atitlán, and to establish the town as an indicator of what to expect elsewhere in Guatemala. The view from Atitlán is at once hopeful but troubling.
Santiago Atitlán is the home of Tzutujil-speaking Mayas, who refer to themselves as Atitecos. Their town was the focus of severe violence during the 1980s. In 1981, the year before Ríos Montt last came to power, Atitlán was visited by guerrilla fighters of the Organización de Pueblos en Armas (ORPA), a Ladino-led organization that was recruiting Indians to fight against the Guatemalan army in a class-based revolution. ORPA appealed to many Atitecos who found themselves, like many other Mayas, in a situation of longterm oppression, deprivation, exploitation and injustice. However, directly following ORPA's entrance, the army arrived and began a campaign of terror that took at least 500 lives over the next nine years. ORPA's appeal faded rapidly after people realized how dangerous it could be to have any association with the insurgency.
Despite the erosion of ORPA's influence and its eventual abandonment of combat in the immediate area, the army not only stayed on but even escalated its intervention in the town's affairs. From their garrison within the town, the soldiers sometimes actually staged acts of "subversion" so that they could justify their own presence. The situation came to a head on 2 December 1990, when the soldiers turned their guns on a crowd of several thousand residents, killing thirteen and wounding dozens, in one of the most notorious incidents in recent Guatemalan history. The town immediately became the focus of considerable national and international discussion, especially when the people mobilized to force the army to vacate its garrison. Bowing to intense external pressures (from the US State Department)1 then-President Vinicio Cerezo issued a decree to order the army out, and the Atitecos declared a 25 square km. zone surrounding the town to be off limits to soldiers and guerrillas alike. The zone continues to be protected and is the only area in Guatemala that is virtually free of martial activity.2
Cerezo's decree triggered an emotional explosion in the community; a profound sense of comunitas combined the mourning for the army's victims with the lifting of a cloud of paralyzing fear and terror, reflecting the acknowledgment of a most unusual victory. The catharsis of the moment led quickly to a celebration of freedom and solidarity, a celebration remarkable under any circumstances, but especially in Guatemala. Black bows were hung above the doorway of virtually every house and store in town in memory of the thirteen Atitecos martyred days before. In front of the town hall a photography display commemorated the hundreds of Atiteco victims of the decade of violence. A "peace park," complete with a marble plaque of Cerezo's official decree, was constructed at the site of the former army garrison, the scene of the massacre.
It is difficult to gauge exactly how long this atmosphere persisted. On the first anniversary commemoration of the massacre, in 1991, long after the black bows had faded and become tattered, a distinct air of community solidarity remained. One reason for that durability of spirit was certainly the observance of "concentraciones," town meetings held in commemoration of the massacre, on the second day of every month. At those meetings, the town's mayor, Salvador Ramírez, a leader in expelling the soldiers, delighted in deriding the army. There was the time, Ramírez recounted, when the army had proposed to enter Atitlán to "help" the Atitecos contend with the cholera epidemic, and he had announced to the crowd that he would rather contract that disease than allow the soldiers back. The atmosphere of celebration had its limits, however. By 1991, it had become common for private conversations to turn toward a litany of other problems facing Atitlán. While people agreed that it was good that the political violence had ceased, they complained about the deteriorating economy and the seemingly endemic common crime. Evidently, solidarity alone can feed a community for only so long. By the second anniversary of the massacre, tears in the social fabric had become apparent. For instance, a faction of Atiteco Protestants started refusing to attend the concentraciones, saying that those meetings had become a "cult to the dead."
Political competition also began to reflect increasing social division. In the most recent mayoral election, Salvador Ramírez faced the head of the Development and Security Committee, Salvador Sisay. Indicative of the deteriorating state of affairs, Ramírez threatened that if he were to lose he would invite the army back into town. The massacre may have brought out the best in Ramírez, but partisan politics exposed his worst. A third candidate won.
Fourth World Bulletin • Fall 1994/Winter 1995
Copyright © 1996 by the Fourth World Center
Created by Aigis Communications, Ltd