The senator for the Cabildo Abierto party, Guido Manini Ríos, said that the current numbers of crime “are simply unacceptable” when questioning the management of the Minister of the Interior, Luis Alberto Heber, who appeared today in Parliament at the call of the Broad Front before the sustained increase in crime in recent weeks.
“For us, the current crime numbers are simply unacceptable, as they should be for the vast majority of Uruguayans. Of course, the crime numbers, prior to this administration, were much worse than these,” said the far-right legislator when taking the floor. “But all of them are unacceptable and a lot of work has to be done, the minister has said, that we are just on the way to improve that reality”, he continued.
He also stated that “today’s session has something of surrealism”, in a sentence in which he would criticize the Broad Front: “those who undoubtedly failed miserably in conducting security in the three periods of government they had, with the necessary parliamentary majorities to implement the changes they wanted, today they stand as little less than instructors, teachers of what needs to be done to change a reality that is complex”.
FA’s fault
In his speech, he continued talking about the opposition party, asserting that “in these 15 years of government there were some policies that marked reality, that were conditioning until reaching the reality that we live in today”, despite the fact that two years and three months have elapsed since the government of Luis Lacalle Pou took over.
In his opinion, the FA did not have “a strategic security plan” that could be updated every year during the 15 years that the FA was in power. He recalled the “release of hundreds of prisoners in the first government (of Tabaré Vázquez)” that caused “recidivism and criminal habituality.”
Manini stated that “changes must be made in prison protocols” and that “prisoners must all work compulsorily.” “There is 70% who do not work, it would be very healthy for the prisoner and society if the prisoner acquires work habits and skills,” said the retired military officer.
