[Cispes-update] U.S. Ambassador and ARENA promote role of private sector in ensuring public safely

[CISPES]

U.S. Ambassador and ARENA promote role of private sector in ensuring public
safely

CISPES Update

March 20, 2008

*vaya
<http://www.cispes.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=blogcategory&id=35&
Itemid=28&lang=es>  aquí para CISPES informes en español*

 

Also in this update:

-         Food security damaged by CAFTA <> 

-         ARENA chooses presidential candidate <> 

 

Recent comments by Charles Glazer, U.S. Ambassador to El Salvador, regarding
the state of public safety in the country have exposed the ARENA party’s
security policies as “a failure,” according to FMLN party legislative deputy
Benito Lara. Lara is a member of he Legislative Assembly’s Security
Commission. In recent weeks, Glazer has publicly stated that high levels of
insecurity and crime in El Salvador are scaring away foreign investment, and
that private security companies could play a larger role in cracking down on
crime.

 

The governing ARENA party supported Glazer’s call for the private sector to
provide public security. Without referring to his party’s history of failed
public security policies, ARENA deputy Ernesto Angulo affirmed the
importance of collaboration between private companies and the National
Civilian Police, stating “we all know there are many private security
officers that have contracts with businesses, but there is no system for
them to collaborate with the police.” 

 

For FMLN deputy Walter Duran, these declarations are worrisome. According to
Duran, many members of ARENA “are owners of these private agencies, [who
are] asking that they be legally allowed to carry out police duties, which
is very dangerous for the rule of law and respect for human rights.” 

 

Alongside the FMLN, various social organizations have denounced the proposal
to involve private companies in public security. The real problem, they
insist, is that the criminal justice system is inefficient and arbitrary.
Community leader Mario Chávez said his biggest preoccupation is that El
Salvador’s attorney general “responds to the interests of the Executive and
specifically the ARENA party.” Chávez’s son, Omar Chávez, disappeared three
years ago and the family has yet to receive a response from judicial
authorities about the case. Social organizations and the FMLN party continue
to demand that this case, along with others such as January 2008
assassination of Mayor Wilber Funes and Zulma Rivera in the town of Alegría,
be investigated.

 

The current controversy began several weeks ago when U.S. Ambassador Glazer
spoke at a meeting of the American Chamber of Commerce of El Salvador. “As
the businessman and investor that I am, I want to emphasize that the crisis
of public security in El Salvador is also an economic crisis, as it puts a
brake on foreign investment,” Glazer stated. The Ambassador also recognized
the failures of El Salvador’s criminal justice system, citing six
consecutive years of U.S. State Department Human Rights Reports, which found
that judicial inefficiency and corruption were impeding the country’s
development. Though he pointed out that some judges were honest and
efficient, Glazer categorized the judicial system as “arbitrary,
unpredictable and very slow.”

 

Salvadoran president Antonio Saca gave a limited response to Ambassador
Glazer’s tough criticisms, stating that there have been advances in the
reduction of homicides and extortions. Meanwhile, Francisco Rovira, newly
appointed director of the National Civilian Police, downplayed the
importance of Glazer’s remarks, saying he is “aware of the level of the
problem that exists, but the word ‘crisis’ is very extreme.” Rovira’s
comments did not include steps for improving the security situation.

 


Food security damaged by CAFTA


 

March 2008 marked the second anniversary of the implementation of the
Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), and to mark the occasion
social organizations have been carrying out various activities to highlight
the negative effects of the accord, specifically in the agricultural sector.


 

Rafael Alegría, representative of Via Campesina of Central America,
declared, “it is not possible to talk about exporting when the country is
importing basic grains to meet the demand of the citizens.” Alegría went on
to explain that El Salvador is not prepared to meet the demands of free
trade with a market as powerful as that of the United States.

 

Representatives of various agricultural sectors have argued that, under
CAFTA, they are losing their productive sovereignty, and that El Salvador is
being flooded by basic grains – including corn and rice - imported from the
United States. These imports are sold at prices lower than those that
Salvadoran producers are able to offer, thus driving those producers out of
business. 

 

Additionally, El Salvador’s trade deficit has increased since the inception
of CAFTA. In promoting the accord to the Salvadoran people, President Saca
claimed that CAFTA would enable the country to export more of its products.
However, official statistics demonstrate that the trade deficit increased by
18.5% in CAFTA’s second year.

 

According to Mateo Rendón, leader of the National Agricultural Board, “in
the countryside we are in big trouble. They said we were going to export our
products, and this basically hasn’t happened.” Rendón added that, on the
contrary, production of basic grains has diminished. “At this point they are
importing 40,000 tons of white corn and 70,000 tons of rice per year.” In
the process of wiping out local production, these imports are allowing the
creation of a grain monopoly for a small group of wealthy financiers and
importers in El Salvador. Citing alarming statistics that confirm the
displacement of local producers, Rendón stated that “20 years ago close to
600,000 manzanas [858,000 hectares] of corn were cultivated; today we don’t
even reach 300,000 [429,000 hectares].

 

The increasing food insecurity that the population finds itself in, along
with the loss of productive sovereignty, demonstrates that the promises made
by the ARENA government about CAFTA were false. The only agriculture-related
sector that has benefited from CAFTA seems to be a small group of
agro-industries such as Diana, a brand of snack foods owned by Hugo Barrera,
the former Minister of the Environment who resigned when he was accused of a
number of high-profile violations of El Salvador’s Environmental Law.

 

The organizations taking part in the activities marking CAFTA’s second
anniversary point out that the four promises made by the government in
relation to the accord have all proven false. There has not been an increase
in employment, nor more foreign investment. Similarly, consumer prices have
not fallen, nor have exports increased.

 


ARENA chooses presidential candidate


 

After a long, drawn-out, confrontational process, the right-wing ARENA party
finally chose its presidential candidate last week.  The winner was Rodrigo
Avila, former head of the National Civilian Police (PNC), who left the
institutional in turmoil when he stepped down to vie for the ARENA candidacy
in February.   Avila has been blamed for the worsening conduct of the PNC in
recent years, and given his police background he is seen by many as the “law
and order” candidate.  Current vice-president Ana Vilma de Escobar
immediately challenged the process and accused a relative of President Tony
Saca, among others, of working to manipulate the internal process in Avila’s
favor.  One of the first major polls to be published following the
announcement shows FMLN candidate Mauricio Funes with a 44% to 23% advantage
over Avila (see
<http://www.angus-reid.com/polls/view/30196/journalist_leads_presidential_ra
ce_in_el_salvador>  from CID-Gallup polling data here.)

 

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