At the end of this month, President Carlos Castillo Armas will make a state visit to Washington and reap some of the honor due him as the doughty little warrior who kicked a pro-Communist government out of Guatemala. Since that mid-1954 burst of glory, he has managed to survive in the face of drought, plots and a sputtering of accusations (TIME, Aug. 22). But last week, as he made plans to depart, his prestige was dipping. Main reasons: resentment over ham-handed measures by his police, and a hard-to-ignore smell of corruption.
Both problems stemmed from a food-speculation scandal, in which an old friend of the President cornered markets in corn and beans with government help (TIME, Aug. 22). The government has reacted chiefly by stepping up police "security" measures, most of them aimed at curbing criticism.
The cops dusted off a law that dates to the dictatorship of Jorge Ubico (1931-44), and makes "speaking ill of the President" punishable by prison terms of six months to three years. One of the first arrested turned out to be a pro-government editor whose words were misunderstood by informers; he was beaten, then hastily freed. Small boys up before dawn were searched (and found to be newspaper deliverers).
Midnight-riding cops shot and killed two men, described in communiqués as "Communist elements." The press, which has generally approved of Castillo Armas, was dismayed. El Impartial feared the re-establishment of the "abominable climate of fear and distrust" of Ubico's times.
None of the abundant policemen have set to work on the corn and beans deal; instead, a new food scandal broke. Guatemala's established importers of flour charged that Minister of Economy Jorge Arenales had set up a quota system that virtually handed an import monopoly to a group of businessmen represented by his own former law partner. Arenales tried to defend his move as an encouragement for growing and milling wheat locally. But the press was unconvinced. Columnist José Alfredo Palmieri sighed: "Corn, beans, and now flour—the best profits are always made on hunger . . . Food speculation hands the Communists all the arguments."