A helping hand? Amid pandemic, gangs cast themselves as protectors.
“We’re not on vacation, we’re in quarantine,” an announcement blasted from a car-mounted megaphone, bidding residents of a crowded Rio favela to remain indoors after 7:30 p.m. Thousands of miles north in the Mexican state of Guerrero, a banner told people to stay home: “If we find you outside, we’ll pick you up.”
Similar messages have been broadcast over the past two months in vulnerable communities across Latin America, from Colombia to El Salvador, Venezuela to Honduras. But these aren’t government PSAs. Leaders in Mexico and Brazil, in particular, have been late to react to the pandemic, and have denied its seriousness.
Local gangs and organized crime are taking advantage of government leadership vacuums, sometimes playing up their roles as pseudo-caretakers of forgotten citizens in marginalized neighborhoods. From setting curfews and enforcing them to handing out boxes of food and face masks,
Mexico: Gangs press their advantageBrazil: Business as usual