President Nayib Bukele stressed that freedom of expression is guaranteed in El Salvador. “You will not be arrested, censored or have your property confiscated for exercising your right to freedom of expression,” he said.
Not only is El Salvador the safest country in the Western Hemisphere, but we also guarantee that you will not be arrested, censored, or have your assets seized for exercising your right to freedom of expression.
There is no real estate tax
— Nayi Bukele (@nayibbukele) August 25, 2024
The remarks come after the Salvadoran president exposed a fake news article published by the George Soros-funded digital newspaper El Faro about an “investigation” into an alleged corruption case in 2020, which showed a “false investigation.” “The evidence contained two serious errors that contradicted each other.
The newspaper showed as “evidence” an invoice dated 2000 and also bearing the logo of the government of Mauricio Funes, which began in 2009 and ended in 2014 (9 years after the date of the invoice and 6 years before the alleged corruption case).
The two serious errors in the bill are the date of the Francisco Flores government and the logo of the Mauricio Funes government. What made matters worse was that the newspaper’s readers themselves made them see the error, and instead of acknowledging it, or trying to provide an explanation, they manipulated the image they themselves uploaded so that today’s date would fit their “investigation”.
Bukele pointed out that manipulating the date on the bill, for whatever reason, involves an ideological lie, referring to the case of former Nueva Ideas deputy, Eric Garcia, who was stripped of his rank, arrested and remains in prison, for the same crime.
“If someone applies the same law to our public servants, they will shout from the rooftops that there is no ‘freedom of the press’ in El Salvador, and there will be no shortage of international and NGO condemnations,” he said.
“At the same time, they are promoting an image that there is no freedom of the press in El Salvador and that the government protects officials, when the opposite is clearly happening: officials are severely punished and so-called ‘journalists’ are allowed to commit crimes,” he said. “All kinds of crimes.”
https://x.com/nayibbukele/status/1826753047726526618?s=46&t=GrOMRJoZO-SFnKTeeHS6cA