TUESDAY, JULY 29, 2008
Nicaragua Network Hotline (July 29, 2008)
1. Colombia denounces Nicaragua at the OAS2. US finances NGOs for election work
3. Bosawas Nature Reserve and Lake Nicaragua under threat
4. Property ownership issues still in search of an answer
5. Nicaragua receives no interest loan from World Bank
6. Gioconda Belli: “In Nicaragua the rhetoric is about to drown us.”
Topic 1: Colombia denounces Nicaragua at the OAS
On July 24 at a meeting of the Permanent Council of the Organization of American States (OAS), Colombia's ambassador to the OAS Camilo Ospina attacked Nicaragua, accusing President Daniel Ortega of protecting the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC). Nicaraguan's ambassador Denis Moncada counterattacked, calling Colombia a “narco-state” and accused that government of exercising “state terrorism.”
Ospina said that Ortega had a “hostile attitude” toward Colombia and was protecting terrorists by treating the two young Colombian women who have taken diplomatic asylum in Nicaragua “like princesses.” The women were wounded in Colombia's attack in Ecuador of the FARC camp where prisoner releases were being negotiated. Ospina also attacked the trip to Nicaragua by six FARC members to attend the ceremonies celebrating the 29th anniversary of the Sandinista revolution. Other than an article in the conservative newspaper La Prensa, there is no evidence that this trip took place. Ospina said that he would demand an investigation by the Nicaraguan justice system if it can be proven that Ortega met with FARC representatives.
Nicaraguan Ambassador Denis Moncada accused Colombia of being a “production platform for drugs” that converts many countries of the region into dangerous transit zones. Replying more directly to the accusations of the Colombian ambassador, Moncada said that the FARC was a “national liberation movement” and that his country “was obligated” to give asylum to pursued persons who had been “victims of an attack of state terrorism and of the atrocities of the Colombian government.” Moncada said that his government would do “everything within its power” to achieve peace and stability in the region. US Ambassador to the OAS, Hector Morales, denied that the FARC was a national liberation movement, rather saying that it was a terrorist organization. Later, OAS Secretary General Jose Miguel Insulza distanced himself from the accusations of both Colombia and Nicaragua saying that the accusations “offered nothing” toward peace.
Topic 2: US finances NGOs for election work
On Thursday the US Embassy in Managua met with nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) from 31 municipalities to hear proposals for” monitoring” the municipal elections set for November. The Embassy is providing “small donations” of between US$2,000 and US$40,000 over the course of the months leading up to the elections. A similar election manipulation program in the 2006 presidential election funded only the anti-Sandinista NGOs.
Funding is from the “Transparency Program” of the US Agency for International Development (USAID), which Radio La Primerisima noted is “the same organization that is conspiring to destabilize the government of President Evo Morales in Bolivia.” The Bush regime has turned USAID from its traditional role of “foreign aid” provider to direct election manipulation primarily in Latin America and Eastern Europe.
The NGOs must present proposals to USAID describing their small projects that support the “consolidation” of democracy, according to the Embassy. Projects must be located in the following cities: Boaco, Bluefields, Condega, Ciudad Sandino, Chichigalpa, Chinandega, Granada, Diriamba, Estelí, Jinotega, Jinotepe, Juigalpa, León, Managua, Masatepe, Masaya, Matagalpa, Nagarote, Nandaime, Nueva Guinea, Ocotal, Camoapa, Puerto Cabezas, Rivas, San Carlos, San Marcos, Sébaco, Somoto, Matiguas, Wiwilí and Siuna. La Primerisima noted, “The US embassy does not hide its objective of involving itself in issues that are the affairs only of Nicaraguans.” This is the second disbursement the US embassy has made to NGOs this year. Twenty-five groups received financing just a few months ago.
Topic 3:. Bosawas Nature Reserve and Lake Nicaragua under threat
The government must decide what to do about the 17,000 people living in the Bosawas Nature Reserve after delaying the decision for a year according to Brigadier General Orlando Talavera Siles. He described the situation of the natural reserves as balanced “on a knife's edge.” “We know there are around 17,000 people living in Bosawas, and that that is illegal,” said Talavera. He said each year each family chops down between 1.7 and 5.1 acres of trees to plant corn and beans. “With people eating away at the reserve more and more every day, soon there will be nothing left,” Talavera stated. He indicated that Bosawas and Indio Maiz are the most important reserves left in the country and act as the “lungs of Nicaragua.” Their disappearance would result in climate change, lack of water, erosion and would contribute to a world-wide problem.
Lake Nicaragua (Cocibolca) is another one of the country's natural treasures that occupies the attention of the Army. The protection of the lake is such a high priority because it acts as a reservoir that could supply water not only to Nicaragua in times of crisis, but also to the rest of Central America. The army has established 12 positions around the lake to monitor erosion and prevent contamination from the 20 municipalities located around the lake. Sewage from those towns goes into the lake as does the fertilizer and pesticides from rice farming along the banks as well as pollution from factories that produce leather, soap and other products.
Topic 4: Nicaragua receives no interest loan from World Bank
On July 25, at the Nicaraguan Embassy in Washington, Nicaragua signed a no interest loan agreement with the World Bank for US$300 million. Laura Frigenti, director of the Bank for Central America, said that the signing was not a special effort to move closer to the government or to silence Ortega's critics, but rather the beginning of a “new policy” that will be extended to other Latin American countries. “I think that this is a signal that the procedures and attitudes of the Bank are changing,” Frigenti said.
Nicaraguan Treasury Minister Alberto Guevara said that the initial disbursement of US$40 million will be spent in the Atlantic Coast autonomous regions. US$20 million will go for improvements to water and sewage services in rural areas and the remaining US$20 million will promote the competitiveness of micro, small, and medium sized businesses as part of the national fight against poverty. The loans, which are from the International Development Agency (IDA) of the World Bank have a ten year grace period and are to be paid back over 40 years.
Topic 5: Property ownership issues still in search of an answer
Over 1,500 former contras met with representatives of the Verification, Reconciliation, and Peace Commission headed by Cardinal Miguel Obando y Bravo and created by President Daniel Ortega to resolve property ownership issues for demobilized from the contra war. Former Sandinista National Assembly member Nelson Artola, now Executive Secretary of the Commission, heard testimony about the problems faced and the impatience of the demobilized for legalization of their land and a definitive solution to the property problem. Artola acknowledged that the Achilles heel of the issue continues to be the irresponsible way the Chamorro, Aleman and Bolaños governments gave the same land to different groups “originating discord between brothers” which in many cases has ended in bloodshed.
Commission member Yara Perez assured the demobilized contras that the commission will verify ownership case by case to give a definitive answer. The former commanders of the Resistance reaffirmed their decision to continue working with the Commission because they have “total confidence” in Cardinal Obando. On July 31 the commission will meet in Somoto with the demobilized from the Department of Madriz.
Things did not go so well on the El Timal plantation, in the municipality of Tipitapa, where two groups have fought over competing claims to the land resulting in denunciations, death threats and arson. On Thursday one group was driven out and they moved with their families and animals to the sidewalk outside the Attorney General's office in Managua. They complained that authorities in Tipitapa ignored their plight and national human rights groups are not interested. The group remaining on the land guarded its approaches armed with clubs and machetes and refused to talk to reporters. The evicted ones claimed their attackers were Sandinistas, a charge echoed by Nicaraguan Resistance Party president Julio Caesar Blandón, “Kalimán.” They have given the government and the Peace Commission until July 29 to act after which they promise a series of protests.
Topic 6: Gioconda Belli: “In Nicaragua the rhetoric is about to drown us.”
Nicaraguan poet and novelist Gioconda Belli, writing in El Nuevo Diario on July 22 said that “In Nicaragua the rhetoric is about to drown us,” adding that “Our country is divided between two sides that feel they are right and both feel equally mistreated.” But, she said, “This cannot continue being a competition to see who can yell the loudest or who can put more people on the streets or in the plazas.” President Daniel Ortega, she postulates, wants to believe that the revolution of 1979 is back in power with all the dreams that were held at that time. As many times as others repeat that this is not true, he and many other Sandinistas are unable to hear.
The democracy that the FSLN began, she said, led to a system where there were fewer economic and political barriers to those who did not belong to the party in power and the result was what she called “an unequal, imperfect, but still democracy.” The present administration should understand that the people achieved advances during that period that are worthy of being conserved and not discarded. Those who oppose Ortega's manner of exercising power are not against the poor or against free education and health care, housing or paved streets, she said. “We are against exclusion, fear, loss of liberty, loss of institutionality, loss of the possibility of dialogue; we fear being punished economically or politically if we are not part of the government party,” she wrote. She called for a true national dialogue adding, “What we want is a country for all with preference for the poor but with freedom for all…, an open political arena and a government that does not impose its version of the truth as the only valid version.”
“If Daniel Ortega could understand,” Belli went on, “that he doesn't have to create enemies to be a respected leader; if he would give an opportunity for dialogue, if he would understand that unity is not achieved by excluding but rather by including, if he would have more confidence in opening up and would respect what we have accumulated as a people … I think that many people … would be open to listen and collaborate to confront the difficult times that are ahead. And I'm sure that for the next July 19, the communications media, which ignored the enormous rally this year …, would be more objective and perhaps put photos of the plaza on the front page.”
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