Jimmy Morales: Scandal-Ridden Guatemalan Presidential Election victor

Jimmy Morales is a 46-year-old former comedian and, as of Sunday evening, Guatemala’s president-elect.

Morales, who is essentially the Donald Trump of Guatemala, won the election on an anti-corruption message – and by campaigning to significantly reduce Guatemalan migration to the United States.

A former TV comedian with no experience in government is poised to win Guatemala’s presidential election on Sunday after a corruption scandal toppled the country’s last leader and fueled voter outrage with the political establishment.

But despite not knowing where he stands on numerous issues, Guatemalans cheered on Morales as he ran against the backdrop of a major corruption scandal in the Guatemalan government; the president and vice president both recently resigned and are under investigation related to a customs fraud ring.

On the campaign trail, Morales described himself in interviews as a “Christian Nationalist”, though he downplayed the associations that term has with Hitler’s Third Reich, and arguing that religion and patriotism are the only things that bind Guatemala’s geographically and ethnically diverse population.

The conservative Morales started the race with just 0.5 percent support back in April.

Jimmy Morales, the National Front of Convergence party presidential candidate, gives a victory sign as he speaks to supporters during a campaign rally in Guatemala City, Thursday, October 22, 2015.

“The new president will face a somber panorama because the state is in a death spiral”, said Manfredo Marroquin, head of the local chapter of Transparency worldwide. Morales’s campaign slogan was “ni corrupto, ni ladron” – not corrupt, not a crook.

Morales calls for government officials probed for any ties to corrupt dealings, should America do the same?

Do you think that Morales can reverse the tide of corruption in his country?

Though the protests have quieted since Perez Molina’s resignation, many Guatemalans remain fed up with corruption and politics as usual, and Morales will face pressure to deliver quickly on widespread demands for reform.

Morales will have to govern with just 11 seats in the 158-seat Congress.

TSE’s president, Marlon Pineda, said at a press conference that 100 percent of the votes had been tabulated and expressed confidence in the electoral system.

Corruption in Guatemala also is rooted in the long period of impunity under military rule, so in voting for the anti-corruption candidate linked to figures from that period, Guatemalans may be in for a disappointment.

Kelsey Alford-Jones of the Guatemala Human Rights Commission/USA told ThinkProgress earlier this year, “The economic elite aided the Guatemalan military in their operations on a number of occasions”. Morales says he offers no magic solutions, but he has “nothing but a big heart swollen with love for this country”, the Times reports.