Could organized crime bring an end to Latin America's leftward shift?

Jens Glüsing:

In Columbia, an international center of narcotics trafficking, voters are expected to reelect right-wing President Alvaro Uribe next weekend -- a proponent of law and order. In Mexico, where the fight against organized crime is dominating the election campaign, conservative candidate Felipe Caldéron has displaced left-wing populist Andrés Manuel López Obrador as the most popular presidential candidate in elections to be held in July.

Even Venezuela's Caudillo Hugo Chavéz, the showcase politician of the Latin American left, will eventually stumble over "the disorder in his own country," predicts US economist Norman Gall, who has lived and taught in Latin America for years. Caracas is now considered the most violent city on the continent. Not only does Venezuela have the highest murder rate in the world, according to a recent United Nations study, but that rate tripled between 1998 and 2005.

An especially brutal crime caused a wave of anti-government demonstrations: Three children aged 12, 13 and 17 were kidnapped along with their chauffeur at the end of February; their corpses were found after more than 40 days. They had been killed by shots to the back of the head, execution style.

The demonstrators accused Chavez of neglecting the fight against crime and corruption. "Many people voted for Chavez because they hoped he would act against the violence," says security expert Marcos Tarre. "But the government has not developed a clear policy in this area."

Even as Chavez supplies allied governments across the world with cheap oil, terror rules on the streets of Caracas. In Petare, the country's largest slum, many people refuse to leave their houses at night for fear of the violent youth street gangs, known as pandillas. The police are considered corrupt; many officers are involved in kidnappings and murders.

A former police officer who worked as a hit man is responsible for the death of newspaper photographer Jorge Aguirre, murdered in early April. Aguirre, who worked for the daily El Mundo, was stuck in a traffic jam on his way to a demonstration against organized crime when a black-clad motorcyclist stopped next to his car. The killer stepped off his motorcycle and fired several lethal shots at the photographer.

As he died, Aguirre managed to take several pictures with the digital camera on his lap. The shaky images are not just a document of the daily violence that plagues Latin America -- they helped identify his killer too.

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