The rise of Nayib Bukele

In an alley in Valle del Sol, a half-naked soldier is hanging a shirt on a clothesline. A small barracks sits in the slum, among acacia trees and mango trees. Patrols with machine guns regularly pass through.

“I’m friendly with the soldiers,” says local citizen journalist Victor Barahona (56), as his son brings us small bowls of vegetables with lime and fish flakes. “That doesn’t mean I’m no longer afraid of them.”

Three years ago, on a June morning in 2022, there was a loud knock at Barahona’s door. The army was going door to door in El Salvador’s poorest neighborhoods, hunting for gang members. Valle del Sol was known as a hotbed of violence. Murders happened here every week. At first, Barahona wasn’t worried about the soldiers. He had guided two presidents and UN ambassadors through the area to denounce the violence. “I was the last person you would suspect,” he says. “But they didn’t believe me.”

READ ON (paywall, Dutch): https://www.standaard.be/buitenland/in-el-salvador-trumps-favoriete-dictatuur-als-je-niet-voor-president-bukele-bent-dan-ben-je-voor-de-gangsters/89102758.html