El SalvadorĮl Salvador presents a slightly different challenge. On top of this, femicides continue to plague all three countries, Guatemala most prominently. The vice president unsuccessfully called on the president to resign, but the crisis halted the momentum of the “Pact of the Corrupt” group in congress. Protesters broke into the historic national palace, starting a fire and prompting the congress to backtrack on the budget changes. Thousands of people streamed into the streets outraged that, in the aftermath of the damaging two hurricanes, the national congress increased its own members’ expense accounts while cutting budgets for COVID-19 patients, nutrition programs, human rights offices, and the judiciary.
Popular dissatisfaction erupted this past November. The backlash against the successful international body illustrated the entrenched power of elites and the challenges to fostering accountability. Backers of that commission became afraid to speak out against corruption, and judges known for courageous decisions received death threats. A corrupt political class has re-exerted itself after shutting down a U.N.-backed anti-impunity commission that had in 12 years indicted over 400 politicians, businesspeople, and ex-military officers implicated in illicit networks. Here too, poverty and inequality afflict the population, especially indigenous communities. The country, which suffered a 2% economic decline in 2020, is experiencing political turmoil under President Alejandro Giammattei, a conservative just completing his first year in office. In Guatemala, the presence of violent gangs and drug trafficking organizations persists, as does impunity, as courts continue to release people indicted in high-profile corruption cases. prison after serving a three-year term for money laundering. Hernández, who has been named in New York’s federal court as a co-conspirator of the notorious drug trafficker “El Chapo.” And one opposition party seems bent on nominating a presidential candidate for the November elections who was released in 2020 from a U.S. The epitome of malfeasance is sitting President Juan O. After an Organization of American States (OAS) anti-corruption mission was terminated last year when the government wanted to gut its investigative authorities, the courts have dismissed many of the charges in key cases. The entire political system is infused with corruption, as is the judicial system, and politicians keep voting to give themselves new immunities.
Honduras is also emblematic of the problem of providing large amounts of aid. In the same week that Joe Biden was inaugurated, Guatemalan and Mexican authorities used force to stop a caravan of an estimated 7,500 people, mainly Hondurans, from advancing north through their countries. With a poverty rate of 48% and a middle class of only 11% in 2015 (much lower than the 35% regional average), it is no surprise that Honduras became the largest source of migrants to the U.S. Despite having experienced some growth in the past few years, its deep inequality, poverty, and corruption long predate the 2020 hurricanes. Already the poorest country of mainland Latin America, Hurricanes Eta and Iota displaced over 100,000 people, many of whose houses were destroyed, and wrought significant agricultural destruction. One key problem is that none of the three governments represent an optimal partner for advancing U.S. Although all three governments of the Northern Triangle - Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador - borrowed heavily to extend massive support packages, especially to the poorest sectors, it may take years to recover from virus’ economic consequences. In December, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) projected that Central America’s economies will have shrunk 6% in 2020, with a short-lived drop in remittances last spring and ongoing declines in tourism. Economic problems, ongoing violence, worsening corruption, and challenges to democracy have been aggravated by the devastating impact of the coronavirus. Those root causes have only worsened in the past few years, thanks largely to nefarious nonstate actors and corrupt and exclusionary states.