Gun control is not enough to stop the murders in Guayaquil

Not even gun control stops murders in Guayaquil.

Until last September 23, the death toll was 458. This alarming figure, since it is almost 80% more than the violent deaths that were registered in 2020.

The wave of violence in Guayaquil has generated a new debate to combat insecurity. Even the mayor Cynthia Viteri, in her speech for the 201 years of Independence, requested that a law be enacted that allows people to be armed with the objective of defending themselves.

“They shoot inside shopping centers, they shoot on street corners, they shoot in the center of the city (…), we all have rights, but whoever kills viciously lost their human condition (…) I demand that the laws that protect crime change : that those who pass the rigorous exams through the Ministry of Defense can carry weapons as they were before, “he told those present at the ceremony, including President Guillermo Lasso.

Since August 2014, the carrying of weapons for natural persons became a crime, after the Comprehensive Penal Code came into force. But, since 2011, through Executive Decree 749, it was established that citizens cannot carry firearms in their vehicle, luggage, backpack, clothes and hands.

The prohibition for people to carry weapons was even given since 1997, under the presidency of Fabián Alarcón when a regulation was issued to the law on the manufacture, import, export, commercialization and possession of weapons, ammunition and explosives. In that regulation, the prohibition that a natural person can have weapons was already empowered. Although security or dignity companies were allowed to have these inputs.
At present, only the police and the military are the only ones authorized to carry weapons. They are also in charge of confiscating this equipment.

In a coordinated manner, the two entities have confiscated 300 weapons from January to September. But despite the efforts, the gangs every day enter more weapons into the Main Port.

According to the agents, in recent months they have discovered that there are more sophisticated, automatic and heavy-caliber weapons in the city. That is why they suspect that organizations from Mexico and Colombia send their allies by land, sea and clandestine flights.

With the carrying of weapons, deaths also increase. The weekend was no exception.

The neighbors of Cristo del Consuelo. In the south of Guayaquil, they woke up at dawn on Saturday (October 9, 2021) to the noise of bullets and a motorcycle fleeing the sector. A 31-year-old was the victim.

A kilometer away, another family was demanding justice for the murder of a 32-year-old boy.

While this Sunday, the Police arrested a man who was walking through the center of the city with two firearms. Now it is being investigated if he was going to commit a crime.