Mexican authorities are offering a reward equivalent to Dh12 million for information leading to the recapture of drug baron Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman, who escaped from a high-security jail near Mexico City on Saturday night.
But few, if any, will be willing to take the money, given that a painful and torturous death would likely follow at the hands of Guzman’s compadres in the Sinaloa cartel. Guzman’s second escape from a maximum-security prison in 14 years is a huge embarrassment for President Enrique Pena Nieto’s administration, which had celebrated the capture of the world’s most-wanted drug baron just 17 months ago. That El Chapo fled through a tunnel constructed over a kilometre long shows the level of complicity needed for his daring escape. The warden of the jail has been arrested.
Guzman and his criminal ilk only thrive in the shadows where the Mexican federal government fails to act. Corruption and bribery have contaminated officialdom and policing. This entire episode shows how powerful these drug barons are — and the lengths to which a government must go to eradicate them once and for all.
