GUATEMALA CITY, Guatemala: Guatemala’s attorney general, whom new President Bernardo Arevalo accuses of participating in a plot to overturn his election, refused a meeting with the head of state on Wednesday, saying she refused to resign.
Consuelo Porras, along with Chief Prosecutor Rafael Curruchich and Judge Fredy Orellana, spearheaded the judicial effort to stop reformist Arevalo from taking office.
All three are listed as corrupt and undemocratic by the US government, and Arevalo said one of his first actions as president would be to ask Porras to resign.
Arevalo, 65, a former lawmaker, diplomat and sociologist, caused a stir when he came from obscurity to win an election last August, inflaming voters tired of bribes in one of Latin America’s poorest countries.
His anti-corruption crusade has put him in the crosshairs of prosecutors accused of bribery and closely linked to the country’s entrenched political and economic ruling class.
They tried to overturn the election results and strip Arevalo, who enjoys strong support from the international community, of immunity from prosecution.
His Semilla (Seed) party has also had its registration suspended following allegations of fraud, which are widely believed to be fabricated.
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Arevalo repeatedly condemned the “coup in slow motion”.
He took office on January 15 in a ceremony that was delayed for nine hours by bickering in Congress in what was seen as part of a last-ditch effort to halt his rise.
Porras insisted in a video posted on social media Wednesday that she fully intends to “fulfill the constitutional mandate for four years … and I will not resign as a result.”
Arevalo sent a letter to Porras three days after his inauguration, inviting her to a meeting where he was widely expected to ask her to resign.
Porras, 70, was appointed in 2018 by then-President Jimmy Morales and to a second four-year term by his successor, Alejandro Giammattei, in 2022.
Porras insisted in the video that the prosecutor’s office is an “autonomous and independent institution” and does not answer to the government.
