Rosa Romero never thought she would one day be evicted from her modest home near a beach in Salvador. But the real estate boom and tourism, the fruit of the government’s anti-gang crusade, have pushed her into a corner. Like her, in El Higueron, 175 kilometers southeast of the capital San Salvador, hundreds of poor Salvadorans are at risk of losing the homes they built decades ago on public land.
“My children and I are worried because a lady came to say that she owned the land”says the single mother of four, who says she is facing eviction proceedings. Her house is made of tin on a dirt floor. Inside, there are no partitions or glass windows. Her sons, aged 22 and 16, fish to support the family. “We live from the sea and if we leave here, what will we live on?”she wonders.
State-owned land
Rosa Romero was 11 years old when she moved with her older sister to live near this beach with other poor families. The bloody Salvadoran Civil War (1980-1992) had just ended. The land belonged to the state and the authorities at the time had promised to give these families property titles, but they never did. El Higueron Beach, virtually virgin until recently, has attracted tourists and surfers since security conditions improved with the “war” launched by President Nayib Bukele against the criminal gangs that had until then reigned terror. And this has favored real estate development.
In August 2022, Mr. Bukele traveled to nearby Punta Mango to announce the construction of a road to Surf City 2, a hotel and restaurant area that includes El Higueron Beach. Signs indicating “Land for sale” Or “Rooms for rent” line the road, where dozens of workers are building bridges under a blazing sun.
Some 625 families in the region are at risk of eviction, according to the NGO Cristosal and the Indigenous Movement for the Integration of the Struggles of the Ancestral Peoples of El Salvador (Milpa). The land “with access to the sea are increasingly monopolized by commercial groups” that are banking on foreign tourists, notes Angel Flores of Milpa. The government has declined to discuss the issue. Flores says the megaprojects Surf City 2 and Pacific Airport, an airport near where the government wants to build the world’s first “Bitcoin City” — a futuristic metropolis financed by cryptocurrency bonds — have caused land prices to “explode,” from $3,000 to $28,000 per hectare in two years.
As part of the Pacific Airport project, the government has bought land from families with title deeds, but the rest are living in fear. About 100 kilometres away, on El Zonte beach, because of the Surf City 1 project, hotels and restaurants, some 125 families are also due to be evicted. They have been promised relocation to a nearby hill, but construction of the houses has stalled.
Facing the beach, a woman who runs a food stall laments the impending loss of her home and workplace. The modest 55-year-old shopkeeper said on condition of anonymity that she recently learned that her new “a small house will not be given to him”but that she will have to buy it. According to the Institute of Public Opinion of the Central American University (IUDOP), 13 out of 100 families have a “uncertain occupation of the land where they live”. “We have noticed a significant but also radical gentrification process that limits access to housing for Salvadorans”denounces Laura Andrade, director of IUDOP.