Spotlight: The road infra proposals of Guatemala's leading presidential candidates

Guatemala is on the home straight of a bumpy general election race to be held on June 25, with several candidates being disqualified from running because of electoral administrative issues.

Those barred were three popular candidates who were viewed as threatening Guatemala's political status quo and their exclusion is widely seen as politically motivated – Thelma Cabrera on the left, and Roberto Arzú and Carlos Pineda on the right. 

Without those candidates, the polls are headed by Sandra Torres of the center-left UNE party, Edmond Mulet representing the center-right Cabal party and right-winger Zury Ríos of the Valor-Unionista coalition, according to a survey published by Prensa Libre in late May. 

One of the issues mentioned frequently during the campaigns is the state of road infrastructure in the country, which some candidates say could be addressed by creating infrastructure councils or national infrastructure agreements, as well as improving tax management to ensure more funding. 

Torres (pictured) says she will push a plan to build a dry corridor project linking San José port on the south coast and Barrios port on the northeast coast. According to UNE’s website, Torres would also promote the construction of a “border-to-border” highway, crossing the country and connecting it with El Salvador, Honduras and Mexico.  

The candidate has said that municipalities oversee transportation services, but has offered to carry out projects like a metropolitan beltway for Guatemala City to reduce traffic congestion in the metropolitan area, according to Canal Antigua.

Meanwhile, Mulet suggests implementing an emergency plan to improve public transportation. His general plan, entitled 'For a modern Guatemala', is aimed at reducing the “catastrophic traffic congestion” in Guatemala City by carrying out works on 300km of highways.

However, this plan would also be reproduced in other parts of the country thanks to the creation of a national company for transport and urban mobility called ENTM, which would invest in urban infrastructure in other cities. 

Mulet also proposes a US$877mn investment over four years to improve highways and roads across the nation, adding 364km of four-lane highways and reducing the current road deficit by 5%. 

He has also mentioned the construction of a highway linking El Rancho with Barrios port and a road to connect the borders with Mexico and El Salvador, which he claimed has not yet been built due to corruption. 

Mulet also expressed support for changing the contract award models to prevent corruption. 

“The contract award models will be entirely changed so that companies become responsible and capable. All lawmakers have their construction companies, but they lack substance and serve no purpose,” he was quoted as saying by Prensa Libre. 

Ríos, meanwhile, has expressed her desire to make it legal to build infrastructure in lieu of paying income tax. 

“They [would pay] by building a school, refurbishing a hospital, building a highway, expanding a road to four lanes, they would build in the way they see fit, but transparently,” she said in an interview with Publinews. 

“Public works financed with taxes are a concept to combat corruption and provide transparency, which opens the door to working with different cooperation models, not only contracts, but concessions, PPPs and investment,” she was reported as saying by Prensa Libre. 

Ríos has also said she would find a legal route to revive road infrastructure projects that are suspended due to issues like corruption, as in the case of construction contracts signed with Odebrecht.

She has also expressed her support for the AeroMetro cable car project in Guatemala City – which she claims has not been approved by congress due to political differences with the mayor of the capital. 

Photo credit: AFP