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Rigoberta for President

17:59 H | Topics: Guatemala - Politics - Women

While the U.S. is caught up in the Obama vs. Hillary for president game, many Guatemalans are celebrating the announcement that Nobel Peace Prize laureate and indigenous activist Rigoberta Menchu will run for president of their country:

Rigoberta Menchú said Wednesday that she will run for president of Guatemala, backed by a center-left coalition, in an attempt to become the second indigenous leader of a Latin American nation.

Menchú, the 1992 Nobel Peace Prize laureate and defender of the Mayan victims of the brutal civil war that tore through Guatemala between 1960 and 1996, will participat in the September 9th elections together with the Juntos por Guatemala coalition and Winaq, a newly formed indigenous political party.

That piece of news is flawed, as the party is actually called Encuentro por Guatemala (EG). The Washington Post reports that the coalition between Winaq and EG was seen as necesssary since Menchu announced earlier this year that she was planning to run on an indigenous ticket, but Winaq did not have time to register as a political party before the September elections.

Menchu says that she and activist Nineth Montenegro, EG's leader, will enter into a "pacto de damas" ("a pact between ladies") to formalize their affiliation.

Via / 20 Minutos, El Pais and The Washington Post

Related

• Guatemala Elections: Runoff, Menchu defeated (Monday, Sep 10 2007)
• Nobel prize winner Menchu run out of Mexico hotel (Wednesday, Aug 15 2007)