José María Orellana
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José María Orellana Pinto (11 July 1872 – 26 September 1926) was a Guatemalan political and military leader. He was chief of staff of President
Manuel Estrada Cabrera Manuel José Estrada Cabrera (21 November 1857 – 24 September 1924) was the President of Guatemala from 1898 to 1920. A lawyer with no military background, he modernised the country's industry and transportation infrastructure, via granting c ...
and
President of Guatemala The president of Guatemala (), officially titled President of the Republic of Guatemala (), is the head of state and head of government of Guatemala, elected to a single four-year term. The position of President was created in 1839. Selectio ...
between 1921 and 1926, after overthrowing Conservative Unionist President Carlos Herrera. During his rule the Quetzal was established as the currency of Guatemala. Orellana Pinto died under suspicious circumstances in 1926 at the age of fifty-four. He was buried in the Guatemalan capital with state honors.


Early life

José María Orellana Pinto was born in El Jícaro; he was the son of Esteban Orellana and Leonora Pinto. Orellana had a military career becoming General of the Guatemalan Army. He was elected to the Guatemalan legislature on several occasions, as a member of the Liberal Party, and was also Chief of Staff of the President Estrada Cabrera; when serving as such, on 29 April 1907, he was riding alongside the president's coach when the latter suffered a bomb attack -which had been planned by the brothers Avila Echeverría and some of their relatives and friends-. Miraculously, both the president and Orellana were unharmed by the assassination attempt and almost immediately initiated the prosecution of the perpetrators.


Coup d'état against Carlos Herrera

On 5 December 1921, General Orellana - sponsored by the
United Fruit Company The United Fruit Company (later the United Brands Company) was an American multinational corporation that traded in tropical fruit (primarily bananas) grown on Latin American plantations and sold in the United States and Europe. The company was ...
- lead a coup d'état against president Carlos Herrera who had resisted approval of the concessions granted to the United Fruit Company and its subsidiaries by his predecessor,
Manuel Estrada Cabrera Manuel José Estrada Cabrera (21 November 1857 – 24 September 1924) was the President of Guatemala from 1898 to 1920. A lawyer with no military background, he modernised the country's industry and transportation infrastructure, via granting c ...
. Orellana had the help of several army officers, among them general Jorge Ubico.


Presidency

On 5 December 1921, Orellana was appointed as
Interim President An acting president is a person who temporarily fills the role of a country's president when the incumbent president is unavailable (such as by illness or visiting abroad) or when the post is vacant (such as for death, resignation or removal ...
, and eventually became Constitutional President after winning the elections the following year. During his term in office, he ratified concessions that the government of Estrada Cabrera had made to the
United Fruit Company The United Fruit Company (later the United Brands Company) was an American multinational corporation that traded in tropical fruit (primarily bananas) grown on Latin American plantations and sold in the United States and Europe. The company was ...
(UFCO) and that Herrera had refused to ratify. He also encouraged the creation of a tripartite republic formed by Guatemala,
Honduras Honduras, officially the Republic of Honduras, is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the west by Guatemala, to the southwest by El Salvador, to the southeast by Nicaragua, to the south by the Pacific Ocean at the Gulf of Fonseca, ...
and
El Salvador El Salvador, officially the Republic of El Salvador, is a country in Central America. It is bordered on the northeast by Honduras, on the northwest by Guatemala, and on the south by the Pacific Ocean. El Salvador's capital and largest city is S ...
, but this was unsuccessful. In 1923, in celebration of the birth centennial of liberal writer and ideologist Dr. Lorenzo Montúfar y Rivera, the government erected a monument to his memory in ''Avenida Reforma''.


Economy

Gum raw material extraction in the northern department of Petén was sold to Percy W. Shufeldt, who carried out the operation without paying taxes; unlike his predecessor—Carlos Herrera—Orellana gave favorable contracts such as the Shufeldt one to foreign companies. Another examples was the Electric Company, which had been expropriated from German shareholders after
World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
, and was sold to the American Bond and Share Company on 4 May 1922. Orellana promoted the construction of hundreds of kilometers of railways and was pressured by the International Railways of Central AmericaIRCA was a United Fruit Company subsidiary. to enforce the Méndez-Williamson railroad contract, signed in 1908 by then president
Manuel Estrada Cabrera Manuel José Estrada Cabrera (21 November 1857 – 24 September 1924) was the President of Guatemala from 1898 to 1920. A lawyer with no military background, he modernised the country's industry and transportation infrastructure, via granting c ...
. When Estrada Cabrera was ousted, IRCA had intended to enact this agreement but the acting president Carlos Herrera refused to implement the contract;The contract was not favorable for Guatemala and Herrera was concerned to make arrangements to enact it. The project was intended to build a railroad between Zacapa and Anguiatú—on the Guatemalan-Salvadorean border. after Herrera was overthrown, Orellana ratified the contract on 10 March 1922. The Guatemalan Congress issued the following laws during his term in office: * Ratified the Central American Union Covenant held in San Jose,
Costa Rica Costa Rica, officially the Republic of Costa Rica, is a country in Central America. It borders Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the northeast, Panama to the southeast, and the Pacific Ocean to the southwest, as well as Maritime bo ...
. * Approved the contract for light, heat and electric power services, held in
Guatemala City Guatemala City (, also known colloquially by the nickname Guate), is the Capital city, national capital and largest city of the Guatemala, Republic of Guatemala. It is also the Municipalities of Guatemala, municipal capital of the Guatemala Depa ...
between government representatives and the Central America Power Company. * Hydrocarbons law * Ratified executive Decree 798, by which Archbishop Luis Javier Muñoz y Capurón remained in exile. * Approved the contract between the government and Emilio Capoulliez, proxy for Washington Serruys, for the installation of an electric tram. * Approved the contract between the Ministry of Development and the All America Cables Incorporated company to build a public telegram office in Guatemala City * Approved the contract with AEG from Berlin, Germany, to continue and complete the Los Altos Railway and the Santa María power plant. * Approved
oil exploration Hydrocarbon exploration (or oil and gas exploration) is the search by petroleum geologists and geophysicists for hydrocarbon deposits, particularly petroleum and natural gas, in the Earth's crust using petroleum geology. Exploration methods V ...
contracts with US companies. * Work Act * Endorsed and encourage a national soap industry development.


The United Fruit Company

# Dockworkers strike: In mid-1924, Puerto Barrios workers -key to banana transport- demanded an 8-hour day and increased wages. When UFCO refused to accept, workers went on strike, with the support from all workers in the farms of the ''frutera''. UFCO asked the Guatemalan government for help, and Orellana quickly sent troops to restore order in Puerto Barrios; the collision was brutal and resulted in numerous workers injured or dead. The strike lasted 27 days, but repression tactics finished it: 22 leaders were jailed and then expelled from the country. # Railroad strike : In late 1924, the employees of International Railways of Central America (IRCA) demanded the reduction of working hours, higher wages and respect to their labor union. ''Railway Society''. Again, the ''frutera'' flatly refused to accept these demands and ordered Orellana's government to violently repress the strike of five thousand workers.


Cultural references

* Rafael Arevalo Martinez talks about Orellana in numerous occasions in his biography of Estrada Cabrera ''¡Ecce Pericles!''. * Orellana is also mentioned, though not by name, in the Guatemalan novels '' El Señor Presidente'', ''Viernes de Dolores'' and ''Viento Fuerte'' of Nobel Laureate Miguel Angel Asturias. In Viernes de Dolores, Asturias calls Orellana by his nickname: Rapadurero.Rapadurero=Dark sugar man. * Given that during his rule the Quetzal was instituted as the
Guatemala Guatemala, officially the Republic of Guatemala, is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico, to the northeast by Belize, to the east by Honduras, and to the southeast by El Salvador. It is hydrologically b ...
n currency, his image appears on the one quetzal bills, which are colloquially called "chemas".Chema=Colloquial name for people called José María in Guatemala. * His cousin, general Manuel María Contreras Orellana later would lead a coup against interim president Baudilio Palma in December 1930.


Death

On 25 May 1926, ''El Imparcial'' -a private newspaper- had published a news flash: ''Martial law enacted'' which referred to executive decree 916, in which President Orellana had suspended the individual guarantees contained in the Constitution; the main reason for such decision was that "insidious and unpatriotic activities of certain elements" tended "to disrupt the peace and development of the country", which, at once, made it impossible to solve the national economic problem. Although ''El Imparcial'' was not circulating regularly in the previous days -due to a government boycott-, after 26 May it ceased publication indefinitely. Thereafter, only the official news outlets, such as '' Diario de Centro América'' and ''El Guatemalteco'', could circulate, carrying irrelevant information. The story took a sudden turn on Sunday 26 September when, at 0:15 pm, Orellana died during a vacation trip to
Antigua Guatemala Antigua Guatemala (), commonly known as Antigua or La Antigua, is a city in the Guatemalan Highlands, central highlands of Guatemala. The city was the capital of the Captaincy General of Guatemala from 1543 through 1773, with much of its Baroque- ...
; he was in a room at Hotel Manchén. "A violent angina attack ended the life of our illustrious president," explained ''Diario de Centro America'' in a special edition that day. These strange circumstances led to the suspicion that he was poisoned. General Lázaro Chacón assumed as interim President and immediately lifted Martial Law and allowed private newspaper to be published again.


References


Bibliography

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Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Orellana Pinto, Jose Maria 1872 births 1926 deaths People from El Progreso Department Guatemalan people of Spanish descent Liberal Party (Guatemala) politicians 20th-century presidents of Guatemala Leaders who took power by coup Manuel Estrada Cabrera Guatemalan generals 20th-century Guatemalan people