Marcos Xiorro

0:09 Hello, Hello, everyone. This is Carmen and Christina and this is Estoria Unknown, a podcast where we talk about Latin American history. Sometimes it's horrible and deals with table topics like racism, corruption, and genocide. But more than that, it's also bout resistance, power and community. I had a different topic ready for today's episode, but of course, after watching Benito Bowl, Oh my god, Benito bol Yes, all I wanted to do was talk about Puerto Rico. Bee fucking here exactly. So today I'm telling you about Marcos Siiro. Have you heard about Marco Sierro No I haven't. Oh well, he was an a slave black man who led an uprising against sugar cane plantation owners.

0:49 Oh my god. It's so topical, so timely in eighteen twenty one. But before we get to that, let me give you some context. Context. We love context, we really do. So the Spanish were the first Europeans to introduce chattle slavery into the New World, to Cuba, Mexico, Peru, Puerto Rico, and Chile. The Spanish arrived in Bodinquen, which is Puerto Rico's real name, in fourteen eighty three, and that was Christopher Columbus's second voyage from Spain into the New World quote unquote, hm. He had seventeen ships with around one thy five hundred men. He landed in the island on November nineteenth of that year and named it, like it didn't already have a name, but he named it San Juan Bautista. Well, it didn't have a name because he discovered it actually of course. Yeah, yeah, nothing existed before Christopher Columbus. No BC actually stands for before Columbus exactly, but the official colonization wouldn't begin until fifteen oh nine. When Columbus first landed, he was greeted by some tainos, who he then took back to Spain to show them the Spanish crown as examples of like, oh, look at all this fun stuff waiting for us in the New World, like as they were.

2:07 The fun stuff for their stuff. Yeahs, yeah, he took back some dainos to show, like, look at this commodity waiting for us in the New World, which he also had like goal to show them. And so the Spanish then send another expedition in fifteen oh nine. Some sources at fifteen oh eight, and this expedition was led by Juan Ponte de Leon. I know that name, of course he should. And he arrived with the people which side note. One of them included a free black man named Juan Garrido, a conquistador from Congo. Oh wow. Yeah. So apparently he at some point left Congo of his own will, not like taken like others were taken from Congo, and he made his way to Portugal, where he converted to Catholicism. Wow yeah. And then at some point enslaved his own people. Yeah m hm, and assisted in the colonization of the New World. Oh wow, I know that.

3:11 According to historian Ricardo Alegria, Juan Garrido was the first free African man to set foot on the island, and there were a few other free black men on this expedition. They were usually employed by someone Spanish or Portuguese, and like, if you take into account Brazil, but in this case the Spanish, and so Juan Garrido accompanied Juan ponzad Leon and his employer or associate, Pedro Garrido around the Caribbean. No relation. Oh well, let me tell you. It was common for these free black men to take the name of the last name of their Spanish like employers, because not all of them were enslaved. Some were enslaved and taken with them on these expeditions, but others went of their own free will, but usually like as assistance too, or like working under another Spanish colonizer. And they took their last names like they were just like giving.

4:06 These new names or took these new names. Yeah, and so that's why he his last name is Garrido, like Pedro Garrido. Oh, it's Pedro Garrido. Was not another free black man, No, he is employer. Were both like free black men. They were brothers. It was crazy. Oh no, okay, this is his Spanish like boss. I guess you could say, okay. Yeah. And so Juan Garrido went with Juan de Leon and Pedro Garrido around the Caribbean, like helping in the colonization of Puerto Rico and all that. Later he joined at nan Cortes and the expedition to Mexico.

4:48 Ew yeah m hm, and fully like participated and yeah, it was common for them to some not it was like not a huge number. It was like a small number of these African men who participated as voluntary expeditionaries. Conquissadors or axillaries is what they were known as their positions, I guess you could say, and like I said earlier, they were often given the last names of the Spanish employers. Okay, anyway, this expedition was met the one now in fifteen nine or eight, they met with Cacique Awuaevana, the leader of the Tainos, and Cacique Auevana tried to keep peace between the Tainos and the Spanish, but this would not last long because the Spanish came with the intention to mine the gold and to colonize of course, h So they quickly established rapartamiento, which was part of the encomenda system, and this made it so that each Spanish colonists would receive a fixed number of tainos available to them for forced and unpaid labor. Well.

5:57 Thus in sleeping, the. Tainos and the Thaina were forced to work the gold mines, build Spanish forts do all their labor, and many died due to the conditions of this forced labor, as well as European diseases as well as like in just fighting their colonization. And that being said, of course, people don't just stand by and take their enslavement, Like, right, there's always uprisings resistance. Yeah, within a couple of years of fifteen o eight or nine, enslaved Tainos and Caribs, which isn't the other indigenous group that was like more in South Puerto Rico Celevan Tarn there was an uprising and so in fifteen eleven I Waibana the second trick, the Spanish colonizer named Diego Salcelo to go down to a river where he was ambushed and drowned. Drowned to prove that these Spanish colonizers were not gods but mere mortal men, okay, I mean with an experiment. Yeah, Sadly, this uprising was did with genocide. Juan Ponza Dalone ordered the shooting of six thousand Tainos and Caribes. Six thousand, I feel like that is like a hard number to grasp, like the just huge amount of people that was. Yeah, and so this this led many Tainos and Caribes to flee the island, die trying. Many chose to die by suicide then to

7:27 be killed by the Spanish like suicide and infanticide basically became forms of rebellions, like a form of a revolution. Because that was better than what lay ahead, you know. Yeah, And many fled into the mountains to hide. But revolution persisted, as it always does, and there was another uprising in fifteen twelve, this time involving those enslaved by de Go Colone. Do you know who dey Go Colon is? His name sounds familiar? Oh my god? That week of the Christopher Columbus's son discussing if you remember in Spanish, he's what's his name, Christoval Cologne or Christopher Yeah, I don't remember, but yeah, the last name is Cologne.

8:12 Anyway. Yeah, those enslaved by him rose up and this lasted a few months until the leaders of this uprising were captured and executed. After these two uprisings, Friar Bartolome the las Casas, a Spanish friar, protested the treatment of the Tainos to the Council of Burquos at the Spanish Court. He demanded their freedom, stating all of this was wrong. These were humans and future Christians and this was not a way for a future Christian to be treated because their mission in the New World was not to win, slave, to kill, to murder. It was to save the native population and to convert them to Christianity. And I mean, at least someone was speaking up for them, one of these, you know, colonizers. And so while he he was attempting to fight for the Tainos and for the Caribees, other Spanish colonists were also at this council, and they were worried about the last the loss of their labor. They argued that they needed this labor to work them to they're not going to work right, but for work to be done in the minds, to build their forts for sugar cane plantations.

9:23 And as much as. The friar Bartolome fought for the Tainos, it seemed that in his fight for the Tainos, for the natives, he condemned Africans because from my from my understanding and my reading of multiple sources, it seems that it was his suggestion to free the Tainos, but to but to maintain a labor force. He was the one who suggested Africans. Yeah, didn't he say, like because they're soulless or they can't be civilized or something like that. Like, didn't he say, like because they're savages? And yeah, I think I just I think I listened to that when I was listening to what was I just listening harvest the vampire. Yeah, that's why that name is time is so familiar and so like terrible things continue to be terrible. Yeah, speaking of terrible, the Spanish ignored the friars please and continue to enslave the Tainos. But after this enslavement, this genocide, genocide, the sickness, like all of that, the population of the natives of bodinggen it was depleted. And so in fifteen seventeen, the Spanish granted each colonist the right to import twelve Africans to enslave. Oh my god, just all because they didn't want to do their fucking work, because they thought they were better than because God said they're better than everyone else. Fucked these people for real, No, for real, thus kicking off the slave trade in their colonies. In

10:54 fifteen thirty there were one thy five hundred enslaved in Puerto Rico. In fifteen fifty five, that number was fifteen thousand. Damn, that's a big jump. It is a big jump, and it only got bigger by sixteen hundred, even though they of course were still around. The Tainos were completely removed from the census by the Spanish, and some could say that the condition of enslavement of Africans in Puerto Rico wasn't as terrible as like Cuba or Brazil, or like the US, because they were allowed some freedoms. They were given an area of land to maintain.

11:35 For their own crops, they were allowed to have a family, some were provided A big number was provided education by their enslavers, which then allowed them to educate their children. And so the enslaves were seen as superior to the tainos. Really that's surprising, yes, because the Spanish felt that they were. It was easier for the enslaved Africans to assimilate to According to the Spanish, the enslaved Africans were more willing to learn Spanish, they were more willing to convert to Christianity. Maybe that's because they were enslaved, right and like taken taken from their homes and trafficked across the Atlantic.

12:16 That's as ridiculous to me. They're so willing to learn, it's like bitch. They were enslaved, yes, exactly, and this put in the hierarchy of like the social classes or whatever regional classes. They were put above the tainos, which it was surprising to read about to me, but of course many continued their own religious practices in secret. Yeah. Over the years, Spanish and slavers had children with their enslaved as well as with Thino women, which is now where we get all the other classes that were later added on, like mestisos mulatos, there's like another, there's different categories and they're all, you know.

12:56 Place in order of who's better. Mulatos were like, then are you a free one or an enslaved one? Am I? Who was time to come up with all these hierarchies man like, Well, they weren't working, so they are all the free time to hire, to cast people and rank them in Yeah, based on eugienis and racist beliefs exactly, That's why they had time. In seventeen eighty nine, El Negro, the Black Code was passed, which allowed an enslaved person to be freed under specific circumstances like purchasing themselves from their enslaver, which and I don't remember if you remember our episode on Celestina Correro.

13:41 The name sounds familiar. Was she the one that was like a teacher? Yes, she's basically known as like the person who brought public education to Puerto Rico like her and her brother Rafael Correro. And in that episode, I was like, back, you know, hears ago movi we did that. I was like, I don't know how her father was born like a free black man. Oh, that's how. He purchased himself his freedom and then his children. So that's why they were enslaved. Yeah, So just in case any will listen to that's that's it was the Black Code. Also, this was a little more rare, but if a slave enslaver was found to be a traitor to the Spanish crown, it would make them free. Oh wow, Yeah, it was very rare for this to happen, but it was written in the Black Code. By this point, when the Black Code was written seventeen eighty nine, there were two hundred and sixty thousand enslaved, outnumbering the Spanish population, and then you add to that the mixed face population. They were outnumbered, which made them paranoid, and by eighteen seventy three there were more than twenty uprisings by the enslaved. In eighteen twelve, in the Puerto Rican capital San Juan Bautista, around Christmas, a conspiracy was spread. There was a rumor that the Spanish Cortes extra Ordinarias so like a court declared that slaves should be free, and then surrounding areas heard the same rumor, and it just spread and spread. It turned

15:15 out that this was a bill proposed by a Mexican member of the so like. This was still not Mexico, but a Spanish person in Mexico proposed this bill to be applied to yeah, or for all the colonies oh ic ic Yeah, and so had this bill been passed, this would have abolished the slave trade. Oh okay, okay, and so Ramon power E Hieralt that's his last name, a Spanish naval hero and captain in the navy and a member of this court, was there when this was proposed, and he wrote a letter to his mom after this session court whatever, and he was apparently also one of the proposers of this bill anyway, So following the meeting session, he wrote to his mom that if this proposal was approved, then she should be the first to grant the people she enslaved their freedom.

16:08 Okay. Somehow one of the enslaves like people under her found this letter and they spread the news. Only they said, hey, we're free. They like, I don't know, misconstrued the letter. Yeah, and so that's how the rumor spread, which led to several confrontations between enslaved, the military and enslavers, which was just like contributing to unrest that spread from San Juan to surrounding areas. This was worsened by the fact that in eighteen eleven, before this letter, slavery was abolished in Spain itself, the motherland of Spain, but not in the colonies, and they're not applied to the colonies, so Gouba, Puerto Rico, San Domingo didn't apply and slave Cubans. They began to revolt, causing unrest in the region, and of course, like adding to this, the Haitian Revolution is also happening. In eighteen twelve, though, adding fuel to the fire, there was again another rumor, Oh no, sorry, this is the same letter, the rumor that slavery had been abolished, and so enslaved people began to demand their freedom, stand up to their enslavers. Again, people were arrested. There was clashes between these people, between the groups and Encorto. The unrest grew and grew, which leads us to Marcos Sierro, who led one of these uprisings okay or attempted uprisings. Marcos Sierro was the name

17:43 he was given. His real name and origin story have been lost to history. It is not known where he was born, what region of Africa he was trafficked from. Like these details have been lost. All we know is that Marco Sierro is a name he was given and that he was enslaved by a man named Aimed Vicente Andino, a militia captain who owned a sugar plantation in Bayamon and Bayamon, by the way, by this year eighteen twenty one, was the leading producer of sugar in island through the hands of the enslaves, not the Spanish. Marcos Sierro planned this uprising to take place on July twenty seventh, eighteen twenty one, during religious during the religious celebrations dedicated to Saint James, because they would be distracted exactly, and sugar cane fields were vital to his plan for the uprising and so seeing those sugar kinge fields during the Benito Bowl beautiful. So this uprising was to take place at midnight and it involved different groups of other enslaved from neighboring aciendas in Bayamon, which included Angus McBean.

18:53 What the fucking name is. That, Angus McBean, Cornelius Courtrightlino and Fernando Fernandez. And so yeah, I'm enslaved from these I say, that's we're all part of this plan. They were to escape their plantations and mean at the sugar cane fields of the enslaver Miguel Figetis. There they would grab swords already hidden in a bundle of cut cane, which would be they are ready for them across the path in the field. Smart, smart, very. Then they would start their attack at the mayor's house and the next part of the plan was to set fire to the town and cut the throat of all whites.

19:36 Which listen, you won't you won't find me judging that because these are people signing up to their oppressors. I mean, they had no freedom at all, Like what would you do for your freedom? Yeah, And it is the right of all to stand up against oppressors in whatever means they find right to them. You know. Yeah, it's because there's people that are like if you guys were around during like slavery, slavery, you would be like justifying it. Yeah, people saying that now about other people, you know. Anyway, Mario and Pedro another two enslaved from one of these other aciendas. They would then inform another group to carry out the same plan and another plantation, and so there were four separate groups to cover the four corners of Bayamon, and after taking Bayamon, they would march for the capital San Juan. Their meeting point was the Martin Pegna Bridge, where the other groups from Rio Piedras, Palos Eco and Guaynabo would be there waiting for them. Then all of these groups would head for the Media Floridas Hill district where they would declare. One source said Mario would be declared king, but another sort of said Marco Sierro, which makes more sense to me because he's the one was like the liner of it. Yeah, yeah, so that's the one that makes for sense. But both sources named or different sources named these two separate people. But unfortunately the

21:09 plan never came to fruition because of an enslaved person named Ambrosio who was loyal to his enslaver Miguel Figettis, which is the plantation where they were supposed to meet. Yeah. Plus, and I don't know if it's as much as that he was like loyal to his enslaver or that he had an incentive to snitch, right, And this is how these systems are set up. This is why they made this back. Then, with encouraging like people to snitch on each other, creating that system of hierarchy with the house what they call the house slaves right against the fuel slaves. The I forgot the name, but the person who would be like punishing the enslaved people, oh yeah, the out line, and some people call him enforcers. Sometimes they were called like aciendas and like they use the same the same system, the same system, and all the way to present day with the hotlines being set up to snitch on your neighbor in Latin America for example, of it or yes, exactly, yeah, And so the Spanish colony, the government they rewarded any enslaved person who reported these kinds of conspiracies by paying them five hundred vessels, which would buy their freedom.

22:23 Damn. I mean, I feel like anybody could fall for this or be like, well, my freedom. It's hard. I think a lot a lot of times people think about themselves like, oh my freedom, I'm okay right now, So I don't really care what happens to other people. Yeah exactly, So I'm Brossio told on them, and Miguel Figuettes went to the mayor, who quickly mobilized five hundred soldiers. These soldiers then pursued and captured the conspirators. Sixty one were in prison in Baiamon and San Juan, but Marcos Sierro managed to escape this this time, but he was caught on August fourteenth in Mayagues. The next actually, the day after he was caught, August fifteenth, eighteen twenty one, the court trials against the sixty one were completed, and seventeen, who were named the planners, the leaders of the yeah ring leaders, they were executed and it's not confirmed, it was never documented, but Marcocierro, he was tried separately, and like the outcome of that trial is not written anywhere, but it's likely that he was also executed. Oh so there's like just no information after that about him. Yeah, oh, I mean it makes sense if he was the leader of it, yeah, exactly. The Spanish believes that Jean Pierre Boyer, the then president of it Haiti had assisted the conspirators of this uprising, and they were correct. The Haitian the

23:55 Haitian government was trying to help all the enslaved because they were like, well, we rose up, we were able to end slavery through this uprising, and they wanted the same for their people, of course, so yeah, they. They helped, they helped, and what and what. And well which And at the same time, there was uprisings in Cuba also happening, and more smaller revolts continue to take place, leading up to El Grito de Lattice, which I assume you know what this is. No Eldo Latte began Puerto Rico's independence, the war for independence against pain and at eight oh I love it, yeah, same, same, Yes, we love a grito, but that's what it's called. Which many, many enslaved participated in this uprising, which sometimes they're left out of the narrative. But yeah, they were a big part of the war. I mean sense that they wouldn't want to be that, they would want to be independent of Spain, the country that was enslaving them, you know, exactly exactly. And slavery wouldn't be officially abolished until March twenty second, eighteen seventy three. And even then it wasn't a full emancipation. They had to the enslaves had to buy their own freedom at whatever price their enslavers set. Bullshit, And so because of this, many continue to work for

25:27 their former enslavers under a type of indentured servitude, which is another form of enslavement. But this indentured servitude did have a limit of three years, and so if they didn't pay their price set by the enslaver by those three years, they would still be free. So within the three years with yes, exactly, and of course leaving out of this because we're only talking about like a brief history of slavery in Puerto Rico along with the uprising of Marco Sierro being out, like when the US then invaded what you have talked about in other episodes we have, Yeah, but after las and after winning the war against Spain, it was like the US helped with their own interests in mind, you don't, Yeah, and that a whole other thing which we have talked about and we will continue to talk about. Yeah, And so yeah, that was the story of Marcos. Okay, cool, cool, love that hate that it didn't work. How different things might have been. I always think about that. And now we have something we haven't done in a while, but we do do it once in a while our b Bulsha tegment. Yes, and if a new year and wondering why we do this, it's because we are we don't like dictatorships. So that

27:02 also that I can't even remember when we first started our book le Bucha segment. It's been a minute. It's been a minute. I think it's like three years ago or so. Yeah, I don't know when the podcast started. Shortly after and yeah, pretty recent after we started. Yeah, okay, So back in January, Costa Rica hosted Want to Be President but Actual Dictator Bukele to inaugurate their new mega prison, Yes, modeled after Secote and constructed with the help of the Bukel administration. And there Bukell said the following quote everything we did in se quote will be replicated any Costa Rican version end quote. This facility is going to be named CaCO unfortunate name. Yeah, sorry to say, yeah, Center for High Containment of Organized Crime, and it's eleven miles outside of San Jose, the capital of Costa Rica. It will have the capacity of five one hundred inmates, which increases the country's prison capacity by forty percent. Surely this prison will be put to good slash evil use. As the right wing candidate Lauda Fernandez Selgado won the election on these seconds of February, and some say with US interference, which I fully believe. Yeah, crist inside She and the previous president Chavis of the same party. So they both ran on platforms that mentioned mass imprisonment, but as always disguised

28:35 as safety, right right, Like they said safety in their speeches, but like we're saying it as what it really is, mass imprisonment, and under the message of safety is always usually underlying a system, a carcural system of mass imprisonment. Like that's just usually how things. Are, because they never say what they mean, right, because if they said what they meant, no one would be for it. Like family value, Oh what does that actually mean? Oppressing anyone who doesn't fit into the heteronormative pattern, you know, Yeah, although people would probably support that too if they just outright send it. No true, yeah, but anyway, And speaking of writing presidents in Latin America, Chile's president cast son of a Nazi literal son of a Nazi visited in Saralo at the end of January to tour sikop and to discuss adopting and Sarlod's security measures to Chile. And just another reminder, he's the son of a Nazi and not only that, but his older brother was a Chicago boy for Pinochet, which we have pet episodes on. If you like you're like, what is what is all this?

29:46 What is what does this mean? We'll listen to our series on Pinochet and then a separate episode on the Chicago the School of Chicago. Yeah, and gust himself as reminisced on the good old days of the Dictatorship mind you, a seventeen year brutal dictator ship where thousands died and were tortured, others were stolen, Yes, appeared m the thrown out of planes into the sea. And he's like, oh I do shure missiles, good old days. It's nostalgic for him, Oh my god. And he's also stated his admiration for Ice and there are military style raids on Mi Greet communities in the US. And of course he loves Trump and Buckle bad times, bad times everywhere. Yes, speaking of Trump and yes. These two were just at the National Prayer Breakfast where both he and Trump spoke Buokla and Trump.

30:40 Yes. And for those wondering what the National Prayer Breakfast, I actually learned about this because I was watching a documentary about Oh my God. C Street. Have you heard of that? No, it's like a Christian nationalist almost like secret group that wait, I know you forget it. Family. Yeah, the Family. I've done this. I've heard of this, and I think the documentary is called The Family, if I remembering right, yes, yeah, And so anyway, there are fixtures at the National Prayer Breakfast, and it's supposed to be well, it's a yearly event held in DC, usually the first Thursday in February. Also, I was watching a video and there was two National Prayer Breakfasts this year, but I'm not sure why.

31:26 But I did. I went during that from the New Evangelicals YouTube channel. Someone that I know why. I was going to look into that, but I forgot about it. So it's supposed to be very sorry, I'm just laughing about that. It's supposed to be a bipartisan event of spiritual reflection, but it's more like a right wing Christian nationalist thing. Dwight Eisenhower was the first to attend one, but they've been happening for seventy plus years and since then, presidents have attended every year since Eisenhower. So at this year's National Prayer Breakfast, Bugelet credit credited God for the crackdown on gang violence. He said, it's impossible to have such big change without the intervention of God.

32:07 And it's like, bitch, that was all you. What do you talk about? That was you and your corruption. Yeah, and colluding with the gangs. Yeah, like every other fucking president has before. Anyone's like, shut up, we know everyone else did too. Yeah. Then you ACQ saw therowing gangs of worshiping Satan. Oh my god, ridiculous, And that the Satan worshiping gangs operate in the US too, and he said he said the gangs didn't just murder, rape, extort, they also worship Sayan just straight up literally end a quote. He said, he said that just straight up, straight up literally. Oh my god. I can't with him. Well, he's the coolest dictator, so there is. I don't think they straight up like literally worship Satan, but some adutles do have like devil horn.

32:57 So I don't this essentially did it's wrong. He might be right about this, but also let's remember that not everyone in prison at SECOD or any other prison in the Lord is a gang member. A lot of people are not. They're just accused of gag member. But due process has been suspended four years now because of the state of exception. So exactly, the state doesn't have to prove that you're a gay member. They just say you're a gay member and arrest you. Yeah. Yeah, so there's that. Yes, yes, we had to Yeah, of course clarify that. Also at the prayer breakfast, Trump took the opportunity to accumulate his famib and reinforced racist tropes about Soudorians. Oh and so he went on to repeat what he always says about Southdorians not sending their best, how their the meanest and with vicious criminals, and that he send us some bad ones and is it true you won't send us a few of your good ones?

33:55 And he straight up said that. He turned to him, straight up, literally, he's straight to He just straight up literally turned to Bukele and literally directed that Abu Yeah, and Bukela is like just smiling like a dumb ass, what's going on? And which Trump and then trumped, Yeah, literally, I saw this exchange. I'm like, you're you're stupid, You're all stupid. Trump was like, look, he's just going on. He's just sitting there. What's going on. It's like, what's going on? He's like, but you're not supposed to make fun of me in person like this or in public like this, right right. And one more update it was reported by empayis that on February ninth, and Sarlo's Attorney General froze a money laundering investigation into Venezuelan oil funds that implicated Bukele. According to the investigation, the president received nearly three point three million dollars from companies linked to Alba Petroleos consortium. The case was opened in twenty nineteen by then Attorney General Raul Melara, who was investigating Bukelets administration for alleged corruption and supposed to packs with Msertine and Barrio Diso Gains. Melaa was removed from from office on May first, twenty twenty one.

35:05 The same day. The same day, the ruling party took full control of the Legislative Assembly, preventing the investigation from moving forward to the court, which is one step and the ladder of authoritianism that Bukela was enacting. Yes. Yeah, that day, lawmakers aligned with Bukele also dismissed, also dismissed the justices of the Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court and appointed five replacements who were loyalists loyal to Bukele. Get another step in the latter. Yeah. On May thirty first, twenty. Nineteen, one day before Bukele took office, the Attorney General's Office Andre Melaa raided the offices of Alba Petrolios and Sarvalo SEM and twenty seven other companies linked to this group, including Alba Limentos SA, Alba Gas SA, and innes valosas S, a firm supposedly dedicated to financing real estate projects. Two former prosecutors with direct knowledge of the case saying two former prosecutors that were fired of course, yeah, of course they were fired because let's say, actually investigating, yeah, and trying to hold Bokele in his regime to account.

36:13 So of course they were fired. Yeah. And so they said that as of December, there's been no progress in this infistigation because of course that's why they were fired, so that there would be no more progress in this investigation. Quote, not a single sheet of paper has moved in that file since the legato arrived at the Attorney General's office. The outcome of that investigation is not convenient for him or for the president. One of them said, under the condition of anonym noonymity and noonymity economic clothes enough, okay, And of course they're afraid for their lives. People people run away. From a load for actually investigating crimes, alleged crimes, and for exposing his wrongdoing, and for that, if they don't run away and escape, they are put in prison.

37:04 And I think him. Boule at this National Prayer breakfast stating and repeating how the Satan worshiping gangsters are in the US two is paving the path for tps to be taken away from Salvadorians. Oh yeah, so they can be deported back to Sarador. So then he can imprison more people, not only in SECO, but all of the prisons. And SECO is one of the most eyes on it. But there's rest tons of prisons. Yeah. Also worth pointing out. I don't know if I wrote it in these notes. Actually it was kind of del Gato, the Attorney General, is also implicated in this investigation that he froze. I don't think you had wrote it, but it was kind of assumed like when yeah, I didn't implicity you write it. But just to make it very clear, they are both implicated in this and this is the first time that has been accused of some sort of fraud like backing COVID that money went to him and his friend and his family, not to the people of going back to his days as mayor.

38:09 Yes, so yeah, so what. Was that thing you would always say, stupid slogan, no, no file does some shit like that. It wasn't that exactly, but it was the one that sentiment and it's like, yeah, you first, you first stopped sealing from the people. Yeah, so yeah, yeah, those are some updates on book at it because. It's been a while. It has been a minute, it has. Okay, I guess this brings us to the end of the episode. Yeah, I believe. So thank you everyone for listening. If you have enjoyed our podcast this topic, recommend to a history loving friend, a tees my loving friend. Rate us please five stars, give us a nice little review. Also, if you listen on Spotify, you still use that leave us a five star rating because every time we mentioned Brook, we start getting bombarded with the one stars. Yeah, just for saying the truth. Yeah, I mean not cool, not cool, So yeah, very uno. Feel free to do that, leave us five stars there especially, but anywhere everywhere you listen, you can also leave a comment and yeah, we hope that this was one less Estoria Unknown for you.

39:24 Bye bye. Astoria Unknown is produced by Carmen and Christina, researched by Carmen and Christina, edited by Christina. You can find sources for every episode at Historia's Unknown dot com and in our show notes. Creating the podcast has a lot of work, so if you want to help us out financially, you can do so by supporting us on Patreon at patreon dot com slash. She studied as an own podcast