[Cispes-update] Urgent: Two FMLN Activists Assassinated by Heavily Armed Group Posing as Police

[CISPES National Office]

Urgent Update: Two FMLN Activists Assassinated by Heavily Armed Group
Dressed as Police

High tensions on eve of El Salvador’s municipal and legislative elections

CISPES <http://www.cispes.org/>  Update - January 12, 2009

 



Also in this update:

*	Terror campaign leads to domestic <>  deployment of Salvadoran Armed
Forces
*	Government ignores healthcare <>  workers’ demands

 

A father and son, both activists of the leftist FMLN party in El Salvador,
were shot and killed in their home on January 9 in the small town of Las
Minitas, El Salvador.  26 year-old Maximino Rodríguez and 63 year-old Delfo
de Jesús Rodríguez – an ex-combatant of the former FMLN guerrillas – were
attacked by a group of six or seven heavily armed men who were reported to
be dressed up to look like special unit police officers.  The style of the
assassinations, in which the masked men arrived in a vehicle and unloaded
their weapons indiscriminately into the Rodríguez house, recall the death
squad killing of the 1980s.  

 

The FMLN immediately denounced the assassinations as part of an escalation
of political violence, and called on the government to carry out a full
investigation.  Already the National Civilian Police and the Attorney
General have implied that the killings were carried out by gang members, an
assertion that friends and party leaders of the FMLN see as ridiculous.  At
least two suspects have been detained by the police, but no charges have yet
been filed.  The FMLN declared that continued impunity for the perpetrators
of such political violence is a severe setback for the 1992 Peace Accords.
Please respond to the CISPES
<http://www.cispes.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=502&Itemid=
27>  alert from last week about political violence and the right wing dirty
campaign.

 

The FMLN also warned against further campaign violence as the country moves
toward the first round of voting.  The Salvadoran municipal and legislative
elections will take place on January 18; the mayoral campaigns throughout El
Salvador officially end on January 12, and tensions have been high for
months. 

 

One such highly contentious race is for mayor of San Salvador, in which
Violeta Menjivar, current mayor and candidate for the FMLN, has a 14 point
lead over Norman Quijano, the candidate for the Nationalist Republican
Alliance (ARENA) party.  This race has already seen several incidences of
electoral violence.  In November, campaign workers for ARENA candidate
Quijano attacked and injured a group of FMLN members campaigning
door-to-door, actions denounced by Salvadoran human rights organizations and
El Salvador’s Human Rights Ombudsman Oscar Luna. Quijano’s campaigners also
attacked vendors and shoppers at the Montserrat Market who refused their
campaign flyers, turning over a market stall and breaking a vendor’s cooking
supplies. In response to the attacks, Quijano infamously stated that his
campaigners are usually armed and should be “considered dangerous.”  

 


Terror campaign leads to domestic deployment of Salvadoran Armed Forces


 

In an attempt to continue instilling fear in the public during this
electoral period, the Ministry of Security announced on December 15 that
supposed armed groups are undergoing military training in the Salvadoran
countryside, an announcement that was disseminated by the Salvadoran media.
The key piece of evidence serving as proof of the existence of such groups
is a photograph of community members reenacting a military formation with
plastic prop guns taken during a social-cultural public event in El Paisnal,
an event that commemorates the civil-war death of Comandante Dimas
Rodriguez. The presence of members of the FMLN at the community event
resulted in the Ministry of Security and President Tony Saca of the ARENA
party establishing false connections between the FMLN and these armed groups
before the United States’ FBI, Interpol, the Organization of American States
(OAS), and the United Nations (UN).

 

The Minister’s announcement has more serious impacts than just fear:
Salvadoran military troops were deployed throughout the region surrounding
El Paisnal to monitor these supposed armed groups.  As a response,
organizations in El Papaturro, Canton, La Bermuda, Suchitoto, and the
department of Cuscatlan to mobilize against and denounce the presence of
soldiers in their communities. According to Jose Antonio Rivera, a
representative of the El Parpaturro community, the presence of soldiers is
viewed as a “very delicate” provocation and blatant violation of the
guidelines in the 1992 Peace Accords that ended the Salvadoran Civil War,
guidelines that prohibit armed forces from policing the country.  “We want
the authorities to stop implicating our communities in this, they have
nothing to do with these false accusations,” said Rivera.

 

The FMLN denounced the accusations as a “terror campaign” and a last ditch
effort to defame their party whose presidential candidate Mauricio Funes has
a 16 point lead over the ARENA candidate Rodrigo Avila, according to the
most recent polls.  “We don’t want this to be utilized in the current
electoral climate because it is a great violation of the political rights of
citizens, and is intending to provoke fear and terror so they will choose
[ARENA] candidates,” said Miguel Montenegro, director of the Human Rights
Commission.

 

At a public event, the Vice-presidential candidate for the leftist party
responded to the fear campaign launched against the FMLN Salvador Sanchez
Cerén by stating: “despite the dirty campaign, people continue to trust in
the FMLN to govern.” 

 


Government ignores healthcare workers’ demands


 

On January 7, health care workers powerfully marched from Benjamin Bloom
Children’s Hospital to Rosales Hospital in San Salvador to demand that the
government improve working conditions, increase payments, and provide basic
equipment to the hospitals.

 

This is the healthcare workers’ third action in three months.  In November,
a two day public healthcare worker’s strike shut down outpatient services at
Rosales and Benjamin Bloom Children’s Hospitals in San Salvador. While the
government agreed to negotiate with the Healthcare Workers’ Trade Union of
El Salvador (SIGEESAL), they have yet to respond to SIGEESAL’s demands for a
greater budget to purchase medicine, food for patients, and pay the $300
year-end bonus (the demand was since lowered to $200) owed to workers. 

 

Frustrated by the government’s negligence, the union organized its second
action for better working conditions, shutting down outpatient visits at the
hospitals again on Wednesday, December 16.  In addition to blocking the
hospitals, SIGEESAL has organized the closing of major streets and peaceful
demonstrations at the Ministry of Treasury. 

 

However, according to Mario Arevalo, secretary general of SIGEESAL, “Our
demands still have not been resolved.” “If we compare the benefits given to
the Ministry of Justice, who receive an $800 [year-end] bonus, we should
also have a bonus because we attend to 80% of the population,” he continued.


 

In addition to lack of pay, a nurse from the Rosales hospital pointed out
the hospital’s lack of funding for resources and medicine needed to treat
their patients. “We don’t have materials to work with; as result patients’
relatives have to buy the medicine that is very expensive, it can be up to
$50 dollars.” 

 

SIGEESAL has led the struggle for more government investment in public
healthcare, as the present network of public hospitals endures a medicine
and food shortage, as well as low wages for workers. SIGEESAL has also
helped fight government efforts to privatize public healthcare, which would
lead to greatly reduced services and higher costs.

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