I haven't been following the corruption scandal that closely but I wonder if Senator Leahy's threats are starting to pay off. The investigation in wrongdoing during the Saca administration, the recent arrests of members of the Texis cartel, and the possible investigation into former President Francisco Flores might have bought El Salvador some good will.
It was no secret to most Salvadorans while construction was under way on the Diego de Holguín that large sums of money were disappearing into politicians’ and businessmen’s pockets given the constant and numerous irregularities in the project: inexplicable changes in the highway’s route; sudden, lengthy pauses in construction; illegal tree-cutting; and multiple lawsuits. However, it was not until 2010 that the parameters of this elaborate corruption scheme began to be outlined in a suit submitted to the attorney general’s office by the new Minister of Public Works, Gerson Martínez. Martínez, a founder of the leftist Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN) party, came to office under President Mauricio Funes’ administration in 2009, becoming the first non- right wing government in El Salvador’s history. .
In large part, Funes’ electoral victory can be attributed to earnest campaign promises to increase governmental transparency and on his tough-on-corruption stance. Martínez took this message to heart and ran with it upon entering office, initiating the most well documented corruption investigation in recent Salvadoran history involving some of the country’s biggest players. To date,18 people, among them former ministers, vice-ministers, government functionaries, and high-profile businessmen, have been charged in a move that illuminates just whose interests the various political parties running for office in the February 2014 elections have at heart.
Go
read the whole thing. I can honestly say that many of us were expecting more investigations / arrests like these over the last four plus years.
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