San Salvador, El Salvador – Expulsion, for the sellers of rue du Center -Ville here, was not a surprise. It was a sentence they were waiting for.
Maritza Trejo heard rumors for the first time three years ago. As a backup, she managed to rent a place she used as a warehouse for her goods. But it was still shocking when, at the end of February, she and other sellers received an opinion that they had to leave the city center within 72 hours. The opinion came from the mayor’s office, part of a multi -phase initiative to revitalize the region. The sellers were informed that they would be moved, but that did not happen.
Trejo has sold old costumes and jewelry, keychain and magnets in the city center for 25 years. But his bestsellers? Everything with the face of President Nayib Bukele on it.
Trejo knows this extortion and this death in the past formerly reigned over San Salvador. Bukele, who was mayor from 2015 to 2018, promised to end all of this. When he presented himself to the presidency in 2019, Trejo’s decision was easy.
“Who would I vote for?” she asked.
Since the election of Bukele – and the re -election in 2024 – the city center has transformed. Offly restaurants have opened and China has donated $ 54 million for futuristic reconstruction of the National Library.
The sellers say that Bukele has cleaned the streets. They are grateful that they no longer fear for their lives. But now they fear for their livelihoods.
In its new location, Trejo is struggling to attract customers.
“We sell every day, but before the expulsion of a bad day, we would sell $ 300 American,” she said. “Since we moved, the best day, we sold US $ 199 and a bad day, $ 11 US.”
Until now, at least 2,500 sellers have been expelled in six of the 200 blocks that make up the city center. The remaining sellers know that their opinions will come any day.
“By making these decisions, there has been no discussion with the sellers, who have been there for decades,” said political scientist Carlos Monterroza.
Trejo’s eyes well as she remembers how Mario Durán, the mayor of San Salvador, campaigned on a promise he would support companies like hers. His grandparents worked as sellers.
A few weeks after being forced from the city center, Trejo says that the mayor’s words feel like betrayal.
The heart of Salvador
Light meets the shadow in downtown San Salvador. Residents and tourists visit historic sites such as metropolitan cathedral and the national palace, and sip beer in vegetable bars. In addition to souvenir sellers, souvenir sellers are those who sell products, clothes, natural drugs and much more. The Salvadorans of other districts came to the city center to store their own companies.
“When I think of the center, I do not refer to physical space; I refer to what the center represents: the heart of El Salvador, ”explains Belén Goca, who Promoses companies in the city center in Tiktok. Sellers know that if they publish it, customers will come.
For decades, the city center was one of the most violent regions in the country. The gangs fought for control and walking on the wrong street could mean death. But in March 2022, after gang members killed 87 people, down passers -by in the streets across the country, Bukele declared the state of emergency, which seriously slowed down civil freedoms in the name of security. It is still in force.
Since the start of the emergency state, the government has reported that it has been held more than 85,000 people. According to Human Rights Watch109,000 people are held in a penitentiary system for 70,000.
Since the mid-1980s in the mid-1990s, when many countries in the region have passed military dictatorships to democratic governments, Latin American Americans have associated democracy with popular vote, explains Monterroza, political scientist.
Decades, he says, it is clear that some leaders who win the elections turn to authoritarianism once in office. According to El Salvador’s regime, it is easy for a person to be captured by the police, transformed and taken to a criminal center – probably for good.
“It becomes,” says Monterroza, “a plan to intimidate the population.”
In the early hours of February 22, a seller called Goca in tears on their order of expulsion. She therefore published a video of the sellers, spoke of imminent expulsions and encouraged buyers to help.
“For me, it was not a political declaration. It was not a demonstration, ”explains Goca. “It was in the hope that they did not shoot them. Really, the only thought that crossed my mind was:” How many people who love this place do not know what will happen? “”
His videos have made a national news. This weekend, thousands of people came to the city center to buy from sellers, who sold their products for everything they could get.
The sellers do not feel ready to retaliate, says Goca. They are afraid.
Two months ago, the daughter of Salma Hernández, a seller, was expelled from the city center. Now, Hernández, who has a grocery store, worries that the same thing happens to him. She is 59 years old and cares about her 70 -year -old brother. His business has not been the same since the launch of the government of the revitalization initiative. Where she won US $ 200 per day, she said, she could only bring in US $ 20.
At the same time, she said, she lives peacefully now, thanks to Bukele. She no longer lives with the uncertainty and the danger that once permeated the city center.
“Here, there is democracy,” she says, “because democracy is when you are happy.”