With all due respect, President Trump, Americans don´t owe anything to President Morales because of Jerusalem. Let it be, let´s move on to H.R. 1625 sec 7045, “U.S. Strategy Engagement for Central America”. The path is there, all we need is the political will. Let´s focus on topics that both the U.S. and Guatemala need to solve such as illegal drugs and migration.
As you know, narcotraffickers and organized crime are running their political campaign for Congress and City Halls in Guatemala in 2019. As Guatemalan citizens, we cannot fight them back because they have power, guns and money. They can buy justice. A bullet has no name and will never be punished. Not a single Guatemalan is able to fight back against narcotraffickers unless they’re have a death wish.
Elections in our country are in 2019 and prevention programs to tackle this issue should already be in place—but they’re not. Illicit financing from narcotraffickers or organized crime is something that the Electoral College of Guatemala (Tribunal Supremo Electoral de Guatemala) cannot oversee due to the lack of political will. This will impact City Halls and Congress of Guatemala by helping narcotraffickers increase the volume of drugs being sent to U.S. Unfortunately we cannot do much.
On the other hand, we have the issue of migration and caravans traveling to the U.S. southern border. Although I agree on #BuildTheWall, it is really important for United States border security to help us #BuildTheRuleOfLaw in Guatemala like we were doing with CICIG. Now that CICIG is out of Guatemala, with the help of Senator Rand Paul and Senator Mike Lee, who is going to help us? Is Senator Paul going to step in or is he just going to wash his hands off after damaging Guatemala?
Narcotrafficking, Organized Crime, White Collar crime, Corruption and Impunity generate migration. If the U.S. is serious about reducing immigration, we have to tackle the root causes that generate the flow: illegal drugs, corruption and impunity.
The Guatemalan government is unable and unwilling to reduce migration because as long as the U.S. provides education, health, and security for migrants in the U.S. Guatemalan politicians don´t care to keep pushing migrants as long as they send money to help their family members in Guatemalan. At least one Bank uses the money remittance to launder money from corruption and narcotrafficking. They use off-the-book accounting with the protection of the Bank Regulator of Guatemala. Guatemalan politicians are just laughing in America’s face, telling you that they are doing something about it, when they have zero committment to do so.
If the United States is serious about immigration, we have to lay on the table a common ground that we need to solve: “illegal drugs” and “migration”.
