President Bukele issues false speech about “zero homicides” in El Salvador

The “zero homicides” speech that the president of El Salvador, Nayib Bukele, has reiterated at the end of September 2022 is false. Specialists and other data show that, although crime reports have gone down, the authorities have omitted figures of some murders that occur of people already incarcerated, possible criminals or those derived from social violence.

The phrase “zero homicides” resonates in El Salvador and even in other countries. The government of President Nayib Bukele has highlighted that according to data from the Ministry of Justice and Public Security by the end of September 2022, there had been 200 days “without homicides” in his country.

“Zero homicides. Within 16 months, Salvadorans will have the power to decide if they want to return to the past, continue on the path, or try another path. Meanwhile, we continue in the War against the gangs”, highlighted President Nayib Bukele in his Twitter account. Twittera publication that has more than 8 thousand likes and more than a thousand retweets.

“The 204 days without murders so far in the administration of President Nayib Bukele are a true reflection that his government’s security strategy is adequate…”, it is added on the other hand in a official statement From El Salvador.

His speech has even been replicated by other political leaders in other Latin American countries, such as Zury Ríos, a political figure who has sought the presidency of Guatemala. “… Our neighboring country, El Salvador, has spent approximately 150 days in which no one has been murdered,” he said on July 20, 2022 in a Facebook spot.

Social violence is not considered in the discourse

One of the reasons why the authority speaks of “zero homicides”, according to analysts, is because the Government of El Salvador has segregated the types of violence to manage the perception of security.

Juan Carlos Torres, director of the master’s degree in Public Policies, Prevention of Violence and Culture of Peace of the Don Bosco University, told VOA that, although the levels of criminal violence have decreased and homicides have dropped, this has not been the case with social violence.

“There are somehow homicides that have to do with social violence, partner violence, intolerance, those sentimental crimes, there have been homicides in the country, especially for common crime, but those are not recorded in what the Government presents as data to combat crime.

“What they did is they segregated, one thing is social violence and one thing is gang violence or criminal violence, that is why we have zero homicides (derived from criminal violence), whether you like it or not, the gangs are minimized right now Some of them are hidden because there are supposed to be some 80,000 gang members and there are barely 53,000 (locked up), so somehow there is still that dynamic, that danger, that risk, but it is not going to be controlled by public security, because We citizens continue to be violent and we are going to continue reproducing violence, so whether you like it or not, that cycle will not be broken if the other type of violence that is more complex, social, is not addressed,” he explained.

With the arrests that have taken place under the Exception Regime, he commented, it has not been said how many of the more than 50,000 people detained are really part of the gangs and have committed a crime.

“Remember that the president has been a publicist, so he knows how to manage people’s perception of some phenomenon,” he said, questioning the reason why the Government of El Salvador sought to highlight his “zero homicides” speech.

Figures do not include the murders of possible innocents in prisons or those linked to gangs

Lucrecia Landaverde, a lawyer criminal lawyer and journalist from El Salvador, assured in an interview for VOA that, with the exception regime The following have been omitted from the official records: homicides of incarcerated people whose responsibility for criminal acts could not be proven, as well as the murders of gang members at the hands of the authorities.

“It is not true that there are no homicides, it is not the same that there are no homicides than that the homicides are not being recorded, because the homicides continue to happen, what happens is that there is no longer clear information about them,” he said.

“The government has deployed a propaganda apparatus, one to make the best publicity in favor of the government, but also to hide the true information and hide everything that harms its image, this is the issue of homicides, gangs …” he added.

Landaverde, with more than 20 years of experience as a lawyer, stated that she has the report of some people detained for possible gang-related acts who left the prison dead and who are not included in the homicide figures.

“…those dead who were murdered inside the penal centers, without even having the right to a defense, do not appear in the homicides, when these deaths occur the government always publishes zero homicides,” he added.

Landaverde’s approach coincides with an investigation by The lighthouse in which it was documented how people detained under the emergency regime left prison lifeless, with traces of torture, but the authorities attributed their death to “pulmonary edema.”

Count of murders does not contemplate possible criminals

The official reports provided by the National Civil Police (PNC) El Salvador also openly omit the murders of alleged gang members.

An example of this was the report of September 30 in El Salvadorwhere the PNC reported that there were “0 homicides” but excepted the deaths of four people allegedly linked to gang groups.

According to him Bogotá Protocol on the quality of homicide data in Latin America and the Caribbean In the homicide report, “deaths due to aggression committed by public agents in the exercise of their professional duty, even when legal, as well as deaths that occurred in the exercise of legitimate defense by any person, are considered.”

The means dedicated to verification infodemic It also considered false that in August 2022 in El Salvador there were 21 days without homicides.

“We have a contrast to the version of the government with evidence, but also a gigantic contrast that tells us that the government is not only lying about that, but that it is lying about everything regarding the homicides because they are hiding them, it is not the same as there are no homicides than that the homicides are not registered, they are two very different things and precisely they are not registered because the human person has been deprived of all the value of being human”, said the criminal lawyer, Lucrecia Landaverde.

Although a request for an interview about the homicide statistics was made to the Information Officer, Gabriela Gámez Aguirre, of the government of El Salvador through the mail [email protected] no official response was received.

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