Noboa emulates Bukele and opens a megaprison to combat the gang violence that plagues Ecuador’s prisons

Daniel Noboa aims to combat prison violence by imitating Nayib Bukele. The president of Ecuador confirmed this Monday the arrival to a maximum security prison located in an isolated area of ​​the coastal province of Santa Elena and which imitates the megaprison in El Salvador of the first 300 prisoners. A group classified as highly dangerous and among which is the former Correista vice president Jorge Glas.

This prison facility, with capacity for 736 inmates and which aims to emulate the Bukele model, was one of Noboa’s great promises when he came to power in 2023, along with another with similar characteristics that has not yet materialized.

Construction began in June 2024 with a budget of 52 million dollars (about 45 million euros) and the works were carried out by the company Puentes y Calzadas Infraestructuras, a subsidiary of the Spanish Grupo Puentes, which controls the state-owned company China Road and Bridge Corporation.

Named by Noboa as the Gathering Jail In reference to the motto of the Government of former President Guillermo Lasso (2021-2023), which the current president replaced, this prison is located in an inhospitable area of ​​the coastal province of Santa Elena, one of the most affected by the crime and violence that has devastated the country for years.

“Welcome” to Glas

Hours after the transfer of prisoners was announced, the president confirmed the presence of the former Correísta vice president in the new facilities despite the latest precautionary measures issued by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (Inter-American Court), which requested the Ecuadorian State to guarantee the physical and mental health of the former politician.

“Welcome to the new home. Other criminals will arrive soon“Noboa wrote on social networks along with some photographs of Glas, who until now was in La Roca prison, dressed in the usual orange suits of inmates.

Glas currently has three convictions for corruption crimes, and since April 2024 he returned to prison after Noboa ordered an assault on the Mexican Embassy in Quito to recapture him and remove him by force, once the former vice president had received asylum from the Mexican Government, considering him politically persecuted.

More than 600 dead

This prison was promoted by Noboa in response to the criminal violence crisis that has plagued Ecuadorian prisons in recent years, where more than 600 inmates have been murdered since 2021, most of them in a series of massacres by clashes between rival gangs such as Los Choneros, Los Lobos and Los Lagartos, among others.

As detailed by the Minister of the Interior, John Reimberg, the prison has “all the technological measures” so that “no artifacts other than what must exist within this prison center can enter,” in addition to having “everything necessary for medical care” and thus prevent prisoners from having to go to hospitals.

It is also expected that the Government hire police officers and retired military personnel to be in charge of their security, instead of the agents of the National Service for Comprehensive Attention to Persons Deprived of Liberty (SNAI), the Executive office in charge of managing and guarding the prisons.

The vast majority of Ecuador’s prisons have been militarized since January 2024, when President Daniel Noboa declared the “internal armed conflict” to combat violence in the country, which is experiencing the worst crisis in its recent history to the point of leading Latin America in homicide rates.