New corruption scandals in El Salvador and Costa Rica
latinamericadailybriefing.substack.com
Yesterday, El Faro reported that El Salvador’s Attorney General’s Office “buried evidence of corruption in COVID-19 food contracts worth $22.7 million.” The investigation, which began in May 2020, looked into irregularities in the contracts won by the company Negocios y Servicios Bursátiles (NSB), owned by businessman Munir Miguel Bendeck. Prosecutors were investigating Bendeck and several government officials for alleged favoritism and overcharging on contracts that benefitted NSB. However, when President Nayib Bukele’s Nuevas Ideas party illegally removed and replaced the Attorney General with a party loyalist in May 2021, “the new attorney general then dissolved the team of prosecutors in charge of the case and closed the investigation.” Corruption investigations in El Salvador, including Operation Cathedral, have exposed vast and complex corruption networks in the Bukele administration which allegedly reach the president’s brothers, chief of cabinet, advisors, and the Nuevas Ideas party head, among others.
New corruption scandals in El Salvador and Costa Rica
New corruption scandals in El Salvador and…
New corruption scandals in El Salvador and Costa Rica
Yesterday, El Faro reported that El Salvador’s Attorney General’s Office “buried evidence of corruption in COVID-19 food contracts worth $22.7 million.” The investigation, which began in May 2020, looked into irregularities in the contracts won by the company Negocios y Servicios Bursátiles (NSB), owned by businessman Munir Miguel Bendeck. Prosecutors were investigating Bendeck and several government officials for alleged favoritism and overcharging on contracts that benefitted NSB. However, when President Nayib Bukele’s Nuevas Ideas party illegally removed and replaced the Attorney General with a party loyalist in May 2021, “the new attorney general then dissolved the team of prosecutors in charge of the case and closed the investigation.” Corruption investigations in El Salvador, including Operation Cathedral, have exposed vast and complex corruption networks in the Bukele administration which allegedly reach the president’s brothers, chief of cabinet, advisors, and the Nuevas Ideas party head, among others.