Mayor Brigitte Garcia shot dead in Ecuador

Despite official talk of a reduction in insecurity and the militarization of the streets, violence in Ecuador is not decreasing. Earlier this Sunday, San Vicente Mayor Brigitte García and her partner Jairo Lure, who was also the head of the municipality’s communications sector, were assassinated while they were in a vehicle. It is the first crime of its kind faced by the government of Daniel Ngoba, who on January 9 ordered a state of emergency and the existence of an internal armed conflict after a wave of attacks that ended in the takeover of a television channel. Was.

Brigitte Garcia, a nurse by profession, was 26 years old when she won the 2023 sectional elections for the Citizens Revolution political party. With 35% of the votes, she became the youngest mayor in the country. San Vicente is a small town with a long list of basic needs like drinking water. Located on the coast, about 25,000 inhabitants live there who are dedicated to fishing, tourism and commerce. The canton is part of Manabi province, one of the areas most affected by high crime rates. Its location is strategic for international drug trafficking due to its exit from the Pacific Ocean. According to police, more than 120 violent deaths have occurred in 2024.

According to the first investigation, Mayer was shot three times and Loor was shot two times. The police hypothesis is that the killer was inside a vehicle that had been rented a month earlier. According to reports, the bullets were fired from inside the car. No person has been arrested yet on charges of this murder.

President Daniel Noboa has not commented on the mayor’s murder, but the government and the Ministry of the Interior expressed regret over the fact through a bulletin on social networks. “We reaffirm our commitment to use the full power of the State to ensure that these crimes do not go unpunished,” the statement said.

The Citizen Revolution Party, promoted by former President Rafael Correa, also expressed its outrage. Quito’s mayor, Pablo Muñoz, wrote in a direct request to the executive in X, “We need real information about the current situation of this famous ‘war’ that is leaving death, pain and anger.”

Brigitte Garcia is the third mayor to be murdered in Ecuador in a year. They are all from Manabi Province. The crime has deepened the insecurity crisis that Ecuador has been experiencing for three years, but despite permanent states of exception, governments have not managed to control the violence. On January 17, after the President had acknowledged the existence of internal conflict, prosecutor Cesar Suárez was assassinated as he drove to a hearing in his vehicle. In 2023, in the midst of the presidential campaign, candidate Fernando Villavicencio was shot while leaving a political event at a school in Quito. A month earlier, the mayor of Manta, Agustín Intrigado, had fallen victim to a hitman while visiting a construction site under his management. Other mayors, like Luis Chonillo of Duran, cannot go to their offices in the municipal building due to constant threats to their lives.

Follow all international information Facebook And xor in our weekly newspaper,