El Salvador’s congress on Thursday approved constitutional reforms to scrap presidential term limits.
The 60-seat congress, which comprises 54 members of president Nayib Bukele’s New Ideas party, voted to allow indefinite presidential reelection, to extend presidential terms to six years, and to eliminate second-round run-off votes.
The constitutional reforms, which were voted upon under an expedited procedure, were approved 57 to 3, putting Bukele in a position to govern the country indefinitely.
Reactions to the reforms
The news has sparked condemnation among Bukele’s opponents, with Marcela Villatoro of the opposition Republican National Alliance (Arena) saying that democracy has “died” in El Salvador. She accused members of the New Ideas party of “[taking] off their masks” and “[delivering] the final blow to democracy.”
Meanwhile, Claudia Ortiz of the opposition party Vamos (Let’s Go) said that the reforms were indicative “an abuse of power and a caricature of democracy.”
Human rights group Amnesty International has said that the reforms “put human rights at risk.” César Marín, the organization’s deputy regional director for the Americas, believes that the decision to amend the constitution “without proper debate or public consultation” represents an attempt “to concentrate power in the executive branch,” and “increases the risk of human rights violations and the implement of further reforms in the future without regard to the voices or rights of the population.”
Amnesty has called on Bukele’s government to ensure that such constitutional reforms “are subject to adequate periods of debate and public scrutiny.”
Bukele’s crackdown on crime
Bukele won the election in a landslide victory last year, allowing him to govern for a second term, despite the country’s constitution prohibiting from doing so.
However, a recent poll put Bukele’s approval rating at 85%, with over 88% of Salvadorans saying that his greatest accomplishment has been improved security in the country.
El Salvador was long known as the “murder capital of the world,” with a homicide rate of 106 per 100,000 inhabitants in 2015. In March 2022, one weekend saw the deaths of 87 people, prompting the government to declare a state of exception, which remains in place.
Since then, the country’s homicide rates have dropped to a record low. However, the government has been criticized for overseeing arbitrary detentions and for poor prison conditions.
Since the declaration of a state of exception, an estimated 81,000 people have been arrested, including over 3,000 children, according to HRW. Amnesty says that “torture” and “extreme overcrowding” are present in El Salvador’s prisons, with over 300 deaths in custody recorded.
A particular subject of criticism has been the country’s “megaprison” CECOT, which has capacity for 40,000 detainees. Concerns have been raised about prisoners being held incommunicado, unfair trials, and the issuance of life sentences for all prisoners.
Comparisons to Venezuela and Nicaragua
Juanita Gobertus, the director of the Americas Division of Human Rights Watch (HRW) has expressed concern that El Salvador is “following the same path as Venezuela,” adding: “It begins with a leader who uses their popularity to concentrate power, and it ends in a dictatorship.”
Presidential terms in Venezuela were scrapped in 2009, after 54% of Venezuelans voted to abolish term limits for elected officials. At the time, Hugo Chávez was president.
After Chávez’s death in 2013, Nicolás Maduro was elected president: a role he continues to hold today.
Under Maduro, the United Nations has reported “crimes against humanity,” including “persecution on political grounds.” Opposition leaders have been barred from running for president, with many opponents to the Maduro regime fleeing the country.
7.7 million Venezuelans are estimated to have left the country since 2014, the “largest exodus in Latin America’s recent history,” according to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR).
Bukele has also previously been compared to Daniel Ortega, who governs Nicaragua alongside his wife Rosario Murillo. Ortega served as president from 1985 to 1990, and took office again in 2007, where he remains.
In 2014, Nicaragua’s adopted a constitutional reform scrapping presidential terms, in a move which led to significant criticism by opposition leaders.
Ortega and Murillo have been accused of weaponizing “forced exile” and “citizenship revocation” as ways “to target critics.” They have also been condemned for “arbitrarily” closing non-governmental organizations and universities and for “systematic methods of censorship and persecution against critics and opponents.”
Featured image credit:
Image: Nayib Bukele
Photographer: Carlos Moronta/Presidencia República Dominicana
Source: https://www.flickr.com/photos/presidenciard/47980632231
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/2.0/deed.en
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