El Salvador extends state of emergency to clamp down on violent gangs President Nayib Bukele claims he expelled their leaders to Mexico. A diversionary tactic, according to experts.
Tens of thousands arrested: police officers and suspected gang members in San Salvador (March 2022)
War has been raging between the government of El Salvador and the two criminal gangs MS-13 and MS-18 since March. After an informal standstill pact fell apart, the security forces hunt down suspected gang members. Over 41,000 people have been jailed in the Central American country in the past three months. President Nayib Bukele has now declared a kind of stage victory: the bosses of the MS-13 gang have fled to Mexico. He provided no evidence for this.
Popular war rhetoric
The state of emergency in El Salvador has meanwhile been extended again by 30 days – to a total of almost four months. When he requested the extension before Parliament, Justice and Security Minister Gustavo Villatoro said: “Many of the cowards are now giving orders from Mexico.” Seven of the 15 gang leaders have also been arrested. “Our work is only done when the last one is behind bars.” He didn't name names, instead he announced the construction of a new “high-security prison for terrorists.” In total, the number of gang members in El Salvador is estimated at around 70,000.
Affiliation as a tattoo: A police officer escorts a member of the MS-18 gang
The martial discourse is popular – more than 50 percent of Salvadorans support it, according to a survey by the Catholic University (UCA). “The president's image suffered from the Bitcoin crash, but was boosted by hard-line politics,” said Omar Serrano, vice-rector of the UCA. A year ago, El Salvador was the first country to introduce the cryptocurrency Bitcoin as an additional valid means of payment. The Bitcoin price had recently fallen sharply on the stock exchange.
Gangs need El Salvador as a base
Against this background, Hector Silva believes that the government's claim that the gang bosses are fleeing the country is mainly propaganda. “The rhetoric fits into Bukele's narrative of a crusade of the good guys against the bad guys,” the journalist, who specializes in security and organized crime, told DW. According to Tiziano Breda, Central America analyst at the International Crisis Group, there is information that gang members have fled abroad, but their presence in Mexico is “sporadic and marginal”. Breda explains: “Guatemala and Honduras have increased their security measures. Bukele may also want to persuade Mexico to take tougher action with his testimony.”
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The German-Salvadorian publicist Paolo Lüers can also see “no systematically planned removal movement” by the gang members. According to him, criminal activity from exile makes little sense, since territorial control is essential for the Salvadoran gangs' main source of income – namely extortion.
Government help for a criminal
The reality is far more complex than Bukele's portrayal, says journalist Hector Silva. Like his predecessors, the president made a pact with the gang bosses to lower the murder rate in El Salvador. As a result of this pact, the criminal Elmer Canales Rivera, aka “Crook”, who was sentenced to 60 years in prison, was released in 2021 and brought to Guatemala by a confidante of the head of state. “It's quite possible that Crook went to Mexico from there,” says Silva. However, it is questionable whether he will operate from Mexican soil. “Mexico is not a base of operations for the MS, it's more of a retreat,” says Tiziano Breda.
A broken pact becomes a time bomb
According to political observers, Bukele is trying to use such sensationalism to distract attention from a more in-depth analysis of his security policy. The pact with the gangs initially caused the murder rate in El Salvador to drop to its lowest level in decades – something that the head of state pinned on his lapel as a success. “But this pact fell through because the government promised the jailed gang bosses prison relief and money, but didn't keep these promises,” says Paolo Lüers.
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The bursting of the deal was followed by a bloody weekend at the end of March, during which band members murdered 87 people indiscriminately. “Such pacts are a time bomb,” warns Silva. “It gave the gangs political space and put them in a position to blackmail politicians.”
The government responded to the bloody weekend with an about-face to repression. “That puts the gangs under pressure and brings short-term results,” says Tiziano Breda of the Crisis Group. “But it's not a long-term strategy.” The publicist Paolo Lüers takes a similar view: “This is a declaration of bankruptcy for a policy that has been publicized as successful for two years.” The state of emergency put the gangs on the defensive. “But you can't extend it indefinitely. You can't have the entire police force and 70 percent of the armed forces hunting down gang members.” If the pressure eased, however, one would have to reckon with a return of the gangs. Lüers warns: “They have proven their adaptability over the past 20 years and will not simply disappear.”