Nearly 300 fishermen from the Jaramijó canton, in Manabí, are detained for drug trafficking in prisons in Central and North America. The drug-criminal organizations offer them between USD 5,000 and USD 30,000 for a ’round’.
International mega operation, which included Salinas and Manta (Ecuador), in which they captured 12 Mexicans, four Colombians, four Panamanians and three Ecuadorians with more than 11 tons of drugs.
In the last decade, in Ecuador the reports of fishermen who are recruited by international narco-criminal structures to send drugs to the United States and Central America have increased.
According to the Association of Mothers and Wives of Fishermen Detained in Other Countries, there are at least 2,000 Ecuadorian fishermen in prisons in Colombia, the United States, Mexico, El Salvador, Puerto Rico, and Honduras.
Patricio Almendáriz, commander of the Police in Manabí, told PRIMICIAS that they handle a similar figure and adds that in Central and North America there are approximately 1,200 Ecuadorian fishermen in jail.
Most of them are from Jaramijó, a canton in the south center of Manabí, which has approximately 28,000 inhabitants and is known as the ‘cradle’ or ‘cove’ of fishermen.
But the Police in Manabí accept that there is a big drawback: “The silence of illegal activities.”
In this context, from the Association of Mothers and Wives of Detained Fishermen, located in Jaramijó, they assure that there are between 200 and 300 fishermen from this canton detained in various countries.
And that at least 40 fishermen are missing.
The Association seeks the Government to support them with repatriation, so that they can serve their sentences in Ecuadorian prisons.
For now, the Jaramijó Artisanal Fishermen’s Cooperative announced that a census will be carried out to identify how many boats there are, what their activities are and the number of registered fishermen in this canton.
The best boatmen
The Police recognize that Manabí, having a broad coastal profile, is a “strategic space for drug trafficking.”
This makes it an area “desired” by criminal structures for the collection and shipment of large shipments of cocaine by sea to international consumer markets.
In addition, artisanal fishermen from Manabita are targets of transnational structures because they know the maritime routes.
And Jaramijó, a canton where more than 40% is dedicated to fishing, is considered “essential” for drug-criminal groups.
This canton limits to the north with the Pacific Ocean, to the south with Montecristi, to the east with Portoviejo and to the west with Manta.
Fishermen, a vulnerable population
Representatives of the fishermen and boatmen, and even family members, justify that the people of Jaramijenses are involved in illegal activities, because they do not get the necessary economic income in their daily activities.
“Since the situation is so critical, I imagine that this leads them to commit these crimes, because there is no money to support the family,” says Milagro Vélez, manager of one of an Artisanal Fishermen’s Cooperative.
Which means that the narco-criminal structures manage to penetrate this “vulnerable” group, because, according to the Police, the illicit economic revenue is triple what they normally obtain.
According to the authorities, criminal structures offer a fisherman from USD 5,000 to USD 30,000 to move a load of cocaine by sea to the United States and Central America.
How do they operate in Manabí?
The province has more than 350 kilometers of beaches and not all of them are inhabited, so the organizations take advantage of this to take large quantities of cocaine by sea in speedboats to international markets.
The map of illegal operations in Manabí, according to police intelligence information, is as follows:
The beaches of Pedernales, Jama, Sucre, San Vicente and Puerto López are used for the collection and shipment of cocaine in speedboats to Central America.
In Crucita (Portoviejo), Jaramijó and Manta recruit fishermen and boatmen.
In addition, these areas serve as logistic points for fuel supply or the so-called ‘floating gas stations’ .
