A factory in Quito cannot keep up with the dozens of cars waiting their turn to be transformed into dark glass armored vehicles. Their owners have paid fortunes to protect them from the violent drug trade that grows with Ecuador’s security industry.
Most high-end trucks arrive at the workshop, where the the workers dismantle them and reinforce them to the last corner with specialized materials to resist bullets.
By hand and with machines, they cover any hole through which a projectile could enter and end the life of the driver or his passengers, as happens every time. more common in Ecuador.
There The demand for security is increasing in the country of 18.3 million inhabitants: politicians of all persuasions frightened by threats and attacks, businessmen who fear being kidnapped for the purpose of extortion, media, among others.
Given “the level of insecurity we are currently experiencing (…) people are looking for this alternative,” Nicolás Reyes, an armored car manufacturer, told AFP.
A little over a year ago, he inaugurated his production plant in the capital, new hotbed of terror imposed by drug trafficking after years when violence mainly hit the port of Guayaquil (southwest) in the Pacific.
“We are not safe anywhere, it is a constant now in the country (…) It also depends on we take care of ourselves complains Cristian Bravo, a 46-year-old foreign trade professional.
“Spilling the Glass”
“At least in our city, here in Quito, this last year doubled or tripled “the sale of armored vehicles, also explains the businessman Fernando Sánchez.
The boom coincides with the outbreak of violence besieging the capital with the approach of the elections of this Sunday, and which left on August 9 its first assassination. A Colombian hitman shot and killed presidential candidate Fernando Villavicencio as he just got into his unarmored van.
Gone are the days when the nation was a bulwark of peace in the midst of Colombia and Peru, the greatest world cocaine producers . Now its ports are crucial for the export of drugs, while corruption in state agencies is growing, experts say.
The day after the assassination, a customer calls it was raining ask for quotes Sanchez said. The frenetic pace of manufacturing led him to expand his company’s facilities due to lack of space.
Reyes agrees: Villavicencio’s attack ‘was without a doubt… the straw that broke the camel’s back’.
Without official figures, for Carla Álvarez, expert and academic on security issues, “there is a boom” in this industry. It is a “natural response to perception” lack of protection for Ecuadorians.
The Gallup poll revealed earlier this year that Ecuador is the country with the highest feeling of insecurity in Latin America (62% of respondents) by 2022.
More guards than police
Other presidential candidates protect yourself with bulletproof vests as well as journalists covering the election campaign. Candidate Daniel Noboa attended the only official debate on Sunday wearing this type of armored suit.
Villavicencio’s party and other political currents they blame the current government of Guillermo Lasso for the crisis. Some claim he outsourced security to private entities, such as companies that protect buildings.
In Ecuador, there are some 120,000 security guards, double the number of police, Interior Minister Juan Zapata told Ecuavisa.
For expert Álvarez, the security industry in Ecuador follows in the footsteps of expert countries in the field deal with cartels or guerrillas with the compounding factor that the tiny nation has worse murder rates.
” mass “
The most economical armors for automobiles are around $20,000 in a country with a minimum wage of $450.
“People who live in elite areas feel very vulnerable,” says Álvarez.
Small businesses without this buying power resort to other alternatives to deal with the nightmare of crime.
Security expert Christopher Eggeling sells more every day helmets and bulletproof vests from $280.
“A lot of people bought us, doctors, teachers, they bought us also in the shrimp sector, what carriers are, including heavy haul,” he says.
In Guayaquil, shrimp farmers go further and have formed their own security forces to keep safe the shellfish thieves . Ecuador is the main producer and exporter of shrimp in the world.
Vests are a “product that has become mainstream,” Eggeling notes.
Source: Latercera
I am David Jack and I have been working in the news industry for over 10 years. As an experienced journalist, I specialize in covering sports news with a focus on golf. My articles have been published by some of the most respected publications in the world including The New York Times and Sports Illustrated.
