‘We are under a dictatorship.’ Six years into his rule, El Salvador’s Nayib Bukele tightens his grip

Nayib Bukele, the self-declared “world’s coolest dictator,” will mark six years as El Salvador’s president on Sunday, a period defined by contentious reforms, which critics say have brought peace to the streets at an incredibly high price.

Nayib Bukele, the self-declared “world’s coolest dictator,” will mark six years as El Salvador’s president on Sunday, a period defined by contentious reforms, which critics say have brought peace to the streets at an incredibly high price. His iron-fisted crackdown on crime in the country, that was once the most violent nation in the western hemisphere, led to the arrest and detention of around 87,000 people, often with little due process. The government has defended the move, pointing to significant reductions in gang violence nationwide, but opponents say it has come at the cost of mass incarceration and the erosion of civil liberties. The dragnet expanded as time wore on to include civil society groups and journalists investigating official collusion with the country’s gangs, critics say. On May 19, Ruth López, an anti-corruption lawyer for the human rights group Cristosal, who is also a prominent critic of Bukele, was detained by Salvadoran authorities for allegedly stealing “funds from state coffers.” However, López still has not been charged with a crime despite remaining in detention. Soon after Lopez was arrested, Bukele’s government passed a law taxing foreign donations to NGOs like Cristosal at 30%, which rights groups have described as an existential threat.