On Sunday, the streets of El Salvador were packed with protesters marching against President Nayib Bukele, who has sparked fears that he is steadily consolidating power, and who changed his Twitter handle to ‘Emperor of El Salvador’ late that day.
According to local media, at least 4,000 people marched across the capital. They carried banners and messages denouncing Bukele’s removal of Supreme Court judges, the possibility of the president seeking a second term, and the acceptance of bitcoin as a medium of trade as a result.
Bukele’s apparent joke in combination with his Twitter profile comes after he altered it to say ‘Dictator’ of a Central American country last month.
Protesters on Sunday chanted phrases such as ‘What is El Salvador’s goal? Getting rid of the dictator is a must!’. Some people set fire to an effigy of the 40-year-old president near the capital’s main square.
It was at least the second such demonstration in less than a month, following protests in September against bitcoin being legal tender alongside the US dollar.
In May, a Congress dominated for the first time by Bukele’s New Concepts party decided to fire the judges on the Supreme Court’s constitutional panel, including some of the country’s most senior jurists, as well as the then-attorney general. Replacements who were perceived as friendly to Bukele were quickly voted in, drawing heavy criticism from the United States of America as well as major international human rights organisations.
The United States of America then turned against Bukele’s administration after Supreme Court judges ruled that the president may seek a second consecutive term, which Washington deemed illegal.
‘As a result of their recent failure to follow the laws, we’re all losing our liberties. What happens here is that Nayib’s desire is carried out,’ Rosa Granados, a fraternity member who took part in the protests remarked.
On Twitter, Bukele, a seasoned and infrequently provocative user of social media, dismissed the protests as a ‘failure.’
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