() is a town, with a population of 13,400 (2018 census), and a

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...

, with a population of 23,017 (2018 census), in the

Escuintla department Escuintla () is one of the 22 departments of Guatemala. The capital of the department is the city of Escuintla. Escuintla covers an area of 4,384 km² and is situated in the coastal lowland region, directly south of Guatemala City, and bord ...

of Guatemala. It is most notable for the

Olmec The Olmecs () were the earliest known major Mesoamerican civilization. Following a progressive development in Soconusco, they occupied the tropical lowlands of the modern-day Mexican states of Veracruz and Tabasco. It has been speculated that ...

-influenced carved stone heads from the

Monte Alto culture Monte Alto is an archaeological site on the Pacific Coast in what is now Guatemala. History Located 20 km southeast from Santa Lucía Cotzumalguapa in Escuintla, Monte Alto was occupied as early as 1800 BC, but has a fairly light presence ...

now on display around the town square. The town possesses a small archaeological museum, the .

History

It is said that the first settlers to make home in what is now were the

Pipil people The Nahua people, also academically referred to as ''Pipil'', are an indigenous group of Mesoamerican people inhabiting the western and central areas of present-day El Salvador. Although very few speakers are now left, they speak the Nawat lan ...

, who seem to have passed through Guatemala on their way to El Salvador, where they currently reside. Evidence of what occurred in can be found in archeological sites throughout the municipality.

Infrastructure

The sugar-mill that takes up an enormous portion of the economy in is . In November 2012, the sugar mill installed a 56 Megawatts electrical plant which was connected to the electrical mainframe of the company, which already had 125 Megawatts, in addition to the electrical distribution of the country. The installation cost a total of 7 million dollars.

Municipal Government

On the 13 of September 2013, the municipality accused Ex-mayor Ramó Soto García of cheating the

Guatemalan Institute of Social Security The Guatemalan Institute of Social Security (abbreviated as IGSS, in Spanish) is the branch of the Guatemalan Ministry of Work and Social Provision that provides Hospital and Clinical services; pensions and income protection benefits, and employme ...

(IGSS) of 237,000 by falsely declaring that a relative needed medical attention as a commune worker. On the 28th of June 2015, Garcia, who at the time was once again a candidate for mayor, was captured by the

Public Ministry of Guatemala In public relations and communication science, publics are groups of individual people, and the public (a.k.a. the general public) is the totality of such groupings. This is a different concept to the sociological concept of the ''Öffentlichkei ...

. The capture was due to the suspicion that he had illicitly laundered around twelve million in 2006. For this reason, the

Guatemala Supreme Electoral Tribunal Guatemala ( ; ), officially the Republic of Guatemala ( es, República de Guatemala, links=no), is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico; to the northeast by Belize and the Caribbean; to the east by Hon ...

annulled his inscription as candidate for municipal mayor.

Tourism

is recognized for its archeological tourist sites. It is visited by many of the people of Guatemala and visitors to the country. It is also the center of study for many historians and scientists. Image:Barrigones of La Democracia Escuintla Guatemala.jpg, Stone heads in the central park

Notes

Municipalities of the Escuintla Department {{Guatemala-geo-stub