El Salvador's Attorney General is looking into allegations that former President Francisco Flores misused approximately $10 million in donations from Taiwan between 2003-2004. Flores was president representing the ARENA party between 1999 and 2004. During his term, El Salvador received $10 million from Taiwan in order to help a Salvadoran government agency register land for poor farmers. Unfortunately, the money never made it to the state agency. Guatemala's President Alfonso Portillo was extradited to the US earlier this year to face charges that he misused had funds from Taiwan as well. Must be something in the water.
Flores has been leading the charge in the US against a new Millennium Challenge Corporation Compact and is currently Norman Quijano's campaign director. ARENA presidential candidate Quijano is under investigation as well for the misuse of funds. Former ARENA President Tony Saca appears to have gotten filthy rich while president but the Constitutional Court is going to let the voters decide whether he should return to the presidency. Just about everyone connected to ARENA is under investigation for something right now. It is sort of what we expected when Mauricio Funes was elected. I just don't think that we expected the investigations to take nearly five years into Funes' term to be realized.
El Salvador's score on Transparency International's Corruption Perception Index 2013 remained the same from 2012. It scored 38 out of 100 with 100 being the better score.
More to come.
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