Guatemala's presidential hopefuls channel heavy-handed tactics of El Salvador's leader
Candidates to be Guatemala’s next president are pushing a neighbor’s controversial success into the race
Sonia Prez D.
20 hours ago
Candidates to be Guatemala’s next president are taking a cue from the leader of neighboring El Salvador and promising their voters they will build mega-prisons and hammer criminal gangs into submission.
The formula of Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele has become well-known to citizens across Latin America, and the tough-talking, Bitcoin-loving leader enjoys approval ratings the envy of any world leader — even a year after suspending key rights to wage war against his country’s gangs.
“It would be good to adopt his program” in Guatemala, said 48-year-old Lucrecia Salazar, a government worker who lives in a neighborhood in the capital known as a hotspot for gangs and crime. “We have the resources. What we lack is the will.”
Now, many top candidates for president in Guatemala are vying to demonstrate such a will, saying ahead of June 25 balloting that, if elected, they would emulate Bukele’s heavy-handed tactics.
More:
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/nayib-bukele-ap-guatemala-el-salvador-latin-america-b2351697.html