El Salvadoran Journalists Sound Alarm Over New Law That Criminalizes Reporting on Gang Activities
El Salvadoran journalists are raising the alarm over a new law that could imprison journalists for 10 to 15 years. The country’s congress has authorized harsh prison sentences for news media that reproduce or disseminate messages from gangs, playing into President Nayib Bukele’s long-standing war with press freedoms in the country. A flurry of gang killings in late March prompted Bukele to seek out and win emergency powers, which resulted in the arrests and detainment of some 6,000 people and the penning of the new legislation.
“We consider these reforms to be a clear attempt at censorship of media,” the Journalists Association of El Salvador (APES) said in a statement on WedElnesday. “Prohibiting journalism from reporting the reality in which thousands of people inhabiting these gang-controlled communities live… will create an illusion that is not faithful to the truth.”
Bukele has long been hostile toward the free press in El Salvador. Beginning with his inauguration in June 2019, Bukele has called independent journalists “mercenaries” and accused them of spreading “fake news.” Bukele investigated the news outlet El Faro for alleged “money laundering” after it reported that Bukele had negotiated with MS-13, the nation’s largest gang, to grant members prison privileges in exchange for a lowered homicide rate and support for Bukele’s party in elections.
“President Bukele’s repeated attacks and threats against journalists critical of his administration signal an extremely worrying shift towards authoritarianism,” said Emmanuel Colombié, the head of Reporters Without Borders’ (RSF) Latin America bureau. “The systematic denigration and attempts to create the image of a press that is the enemy of the people are not just dangerous and counter-productive. They also reinforce the entire society’s mistrust of journalists, whose reporting is nonetheless vital in a country badly affected by violence and corruption.”
El Salvador’s press freedom ranking stands at 82, a staggering eight places lower than it was in 2020 and close to 50 places lower than it was in 2013. Former President Salvador Sánchez Cerén reportedly afforded “more respect to journalists’ role on the part of the presidency,” according to journalist Fabricio Altamirano, editor and publisher of El Diario de Hoy. “There was no obsession with the official narrative from the government to be put forth as the truth of the land, as there is now.”
The state of emergency Bukele won in conjunction with the new press censorship law gives the government the power to hold a suspect for 15 days rather than the usual 72 hours, and was used to abuse imprisoned individuals by taking their mattresses, reducing their meals to two a day, and forcing them to remain in their cells. It is unknown if any journalists were among the people abducted after the state of emergency.
