Protestors demand accountability for missing vaccines
Since June, the people of Guatemala have been given no answers about how the Guatemalan government has handled money from two situations: the deal for Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccines and a money filled carpet sent to President Alejandro Giammattei. The lack of transparency from the government has left millions of dollars unaccounted for, slowed COVID-19 public health efforts, and strengthened Russian mining interests in Guatemalan ports.
In late June, Guatemalan Health Minister Amelia Flores announced that the government had asked Russia for a refund for the Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccines that the Guatemalan government had already paid for. The Guatemalan government paid $80 million dollars in April for the original contract of 16 million doses. However, by the end of June, the country had only received 150,000 doses.
Following an uproar about the missing vaccines, President Giammattei announced in late July that the contract had been negotiated down to 8 million Sputnik V vaccine doses. With only 309,339 Guatemalans being vaccinated by this point, President Giammattei stated that the remaining vaccines would be delivered by the end of the year.
To date, a little over 8.4 million COVID-19 vaccines doses have been administered, from varied sources. Considering that roughly only 17% of Guatemala’s population is fully vaccinated, the government owes it to the Guatemalan people to secure the missing vaccines from Russia.
Around the time the Giammattei government was navigating backlash from missing COVID-19 vaccines, he became engulfed in a bribery scheme. A witness came forward in June to anticorruption prosecutor Juan Francisco Sandoval about his involvement in delivering a rolled up carpet filled with cash on April 29 to the president’s home. The witness heard someone at the house state that this money solidified “an open door with the port.”
Days after this interaction, the Minister of Energy and Mines gave a mining license to Mayaníquel, a Russian company. This license seems to solidify the idea that the President accepted a bribe to allow the Russian mining company to operate in the Guatemalan port city of Santo Tomás de Castilla.
President Gimmattei continues to receive support from the Biden administration despite multiple scandals (picture source: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/03/world/americas/guatemala-president-bribe-giammattei.html)
Right after exposing this corrupt interaction between the Guatemalan president and the Russian company, Sandoval was fired. The attorney general of Guatemala, María Consuelo Porras, proceeded to replace Sandoval with a prosecutor currently under investigation. Fearing for his life, Sandoval fled to the United States at which point an arrest warrant was put out in Guatemala due his “breach of duties and obstruction of a criminal case.”
In light of the attorney general office’s mistreatment of Sandoval, the Biden administration has stated it would stop working with the Guatemala attorney general. The Biden administration, however, continues to collaborate with President Giammattei.
The Biden administration’s continued partnership with the Guatemalan president is hypocritical when considered in the context of them terminating their relationship with the attorney general due to their refusal to engage with Sandoval’s findings on corrupt behavior by the Guatemalan president himself.
Giammattei’s acceptance of the bribe comes at a time when many Guatemalan citizens have not been vaccinated against COVID-19 nor have access to the COVID-19 vaccine. Rather than investing money into securing other vaccine options or programs that would help the Guatemalan population, Giammattei allegedly accepted the money and in turn continued the historical trend of foreign actors exploiting Guatemalan natural resources.