TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 2008
Nicaragua Network Hotline (September 23, 2008)
1. Opposition march in Leon cancelled after Sandinista attacks2. Minister of Government calls campaigns to decriminalize therapeutic abortion “illegal”
3. Treasury Minister Alberto Guevara appears before National Assembly
Editor's Note: There were important events this week to which we would have liked to devote this hotline. Unfortunately the increasing political polarization which is now turning to violence demands our attention and crowds out the positive and significant stories such as:
a. The government of Daniel Ortega brought, with aid by South Korea, potable water to 73,000 residents of Juigalpa who have suffered thirst in the summer since their river began drying up.
b. The Ortega government brought on-line wind turbines which, by the end of the year will provide 40 megawatts of Nicaragua's 500 megawatt demand and which, along with hydroelectric and geothermal projects underway, by 2012 will reduce Nicaragua's electricity produced by fossil fuel to only 30% of the total.
c. Former Foreign Minister and Maryknoll priest, Miguel D'Escoto opened the 63rd session of the UN General Assembly, which has elected him President, pledging to use his term to work to democratize the UN by reducing the power of the Security Council.
Topic 1: Opposition march in Leon cancelled after Sandinista attacks
On Sept. 20, people identifying themselves as Sandinistas prevented an opposition march and rally from taking place in the city of Leon. Attacks on opposition demonstrators wounded five people; many more were bruised and battered. Sandinista activists blocked highways to prevent busses from entering Leon for the planned march. National Assembly Deputy Luis Callejas of the “Let's Go with Eduardo” Movement (MVE) told La Prensa that members of the Sandinista group broke the windshield of his car, stopped busses, and attacked with machetes three people who were taken to the Chinandega hospital. On the Pan American Highway between Nagarote and La Paz Centro, police intervened to remove Sandinistas who had blocked the highway with burning tires, boulders and tree trunks.
FSLN historic combatant, Benito Quiroz, who fought in the Sandinista war to overthrow the Somoza dictatorship, told La Primerisima Radio that the Sandinistas would not permit groups which would sell out the country to march in the city. “We are acting within our rights; it is our duty; they are not going to take the revolution away so easily,” Quiroz said, adding “Leon is FSLN territory.” Leon FSLN Political Secretary Evert Delgadillo told La Prensa that days previously it had been decided to “carry forward the battle to defend the red and black [the traditional Sandinista colors] people's bastion [of Leon].”
On the campus of the Autonomous Catholic University, Sandinistas burned a car belonging to the president of the Sandinista Renovation Movement (MRS), Enrique Saenz, and threw bags of black oil at MRS and MVE politicians. Police officers protected the political leaders until they left the city a few hours later. Horacio Roca, sub-director of the National Police, said that they were going to “evaluate the situation” in Leon. Edmundo Jarquin, former MRS presidential candidate, said that the police had a dilemma “because they tried to protect the rights of the opposition group but were reluctant to suppress the aggressors because of their Sandinista links dating to their founding.”
The opposition march was organized by the Democratic Coalition of the West including the Movement for Nicaragua, which was created and funded by the US International Republican Institute of the National Endowment for Democracy, as well as the United Citizenry for Democracy, the Civil Coordinator, the United Movement for Leon, the Pro-Vote Movement and other opposition groups whose sources of funding are unknown.
Saenz said that he placed the blame for the burning of his car directly on the FSLN candidate for mayor of Leon, Manuel Calderon. He said, “Calderon, accompanied by a red and black mob, began to throw stones and later entered private property to burn my car and destroy the truck of Felix Noel Garcia.”
The Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights (CENIDH) condemned the violent acts in a communiqué that stated, “It was publically demonstrated by their own declarations that the aggressors in the occurrences in Leon were sympathizers of the FSLN and members of the Councils of Citizen Power (CPC), groups created by President Ortega and First Lady Rosario Murillo.” CENIDH called the incidents “a form of criminal intimidation.” CENIDH called on the president to demand that his supporters guarantee the free exercise of political rights, called on the National Police to take all necessary measures to prevent further violence and called on the Nicaraguan public to avoid actions that “could put in danger the precarious coexistence of our population.”
The Nicaragua Network condemns the violence in Leon and joins in CENIDH's call for an end to officially sanctioned political violence. The Nicaragua Network also calls on the Bush regime to stop funding opposition political groups in Nicaragua which only has the effect of further polarizing Nicaraguan politics. US money also delegitimizes government opponents who haven't been corrupted by taking US government money along with those who do. In July the Nicaragua Network called on the Sandinista Renovation Movement (MRS) to disavow a banner appearing to call for the assassination of President Daniel Ortega. We are deeply saddened by the level of animosity between people who were sisters and brothers in the war for national liberation and the US-backed contra war. We call on the Ortega government to take actions to defend human rights norms and to do its part to decrease political polarization and to reconcile with its former compañeros and compañeras.
Topic 2: Minister of Government calls campaigns to decriminalize therapeutic abortion “illegal”
Equally disturbing is an apparent attempt by the Ortega government, in league with the Constitutional Liberal Party (PLC), to criminalize the campaign to return the 100 year old exception to the anti-abortion laws which permitted pregnancies to be terminated to save the life or health of the woman.
The Movement against Sexual Abuse on Sept. 18 called on the government to end its campaign of intimidation and disparagement against non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and confirmed its support for the Autonomous Women's Movement (MAM), the Center for Communications Research (CINCO), the Network of Women against Violence and journalist Sofia Montenegro. The communiqué noted that in recent days the government has added to earlier charges of money laundering, that of promoting “illegal” campaigns in favor of abortion. CINCO was accused by Ministry of Government officials of signing agreements for projects “outside of what is established as its mission.”
Minister of Government Ana Isabel Morales said on September 17 on Channel 4 Television that CINCO and the MAM could be laundering money and also violating the nation's criminal code by promoting campaigns in favor of abortion. She said that CINCO does not have within its mission promoting abortion or lending its legal status to the MAM so that the latter can receive money from abroad.
Morales said, “These campaigns try to decriminalize abortion. It's big business. This is an illegal campaign because it is promoting something that the Penal Code says is a crime and they are engaging in conspiracy to commit a crime; these are crimes against life, against the children who would be born.” PLC lawmakers also made similar statements. This is particularly troubling because between them, the FSLN and PLC have appointed all of Nicaragua's judges.
Also appearing on the Channel 4 program was Father Bismark Carballo who condemned the NGOs that operate in Nicaragua with foreign funding to promote therapeutic abortion. Carballo said, “The church has analyzed these NGOs and we have rejected them and thus have been the target of their campaign.” He added, “Evidently this thing moves gradually; they hide behind therapeutic abortion but they have other objectives. It's not rare that later they promote homosexual unions.”
The Ortega government's alliance with the most reactionary wing of the Catholic Church is indefensible and we encourage international solidarity activists to continue to support independent campaigns to return the right of therapeutic abortion to Nicaraguan women. We also hope that the women's movement will not compromise itself by accepting US government money to conduct their legitimate women's rights work.
Topic 3: Treasury Minister Alberto Guevara appears before National Assembly
Treasury Minister Alberto Guevara was grilled by National Assembly deputies on Sept. 19 about Venezuelan petroleum sales to Nicaragua. Guevara said that the aid from Venezuela under the Bolivarian Alternative for Our Americas (ALBA) does not produce public debt for the government of Nicaragua because, “It is channeled through private institutions.” Venezuelan petroleum cooperation, which amounted to US$184.9 million in 2007, according to official figures, is channeled through Albanisa which then distributes the fuel. Albanisa is made up by PDV Caribe [which is part of Petroleum of Venezuela (PDVSA)] and Petroleum of Nicaragua (Petronic). Guevara noted that aid to private entities, as in the Venezuelan case, is registered in the national balance of payments, but not in the national budget. According to recent figures, foreign assistance to Nicaragua for 2007 reached US$1.02 billion of which US$683 million was channeled through the public sector and US$337 million through private organizations.
Guevara's appearance was particularly controversial because evidently a tape recording is in the possession of the opposition which has Guevara speaking in Ocotal and saying that, because the FSLN did not have a majority in the National Assembly to budget the Venezuelan funds as it would like, a mechanism was developed to keep it outside the budget. Guevara told the National Assembly that both the ALBA funds and those of the United States sponsored Millennium Challenge Account are examples of this new style of “cooperation.”
Guevara evidently also alluded in the tape to occasional payments to deputies to get measures passed through the Assembly. However, there was not enough support in the Assembly for the audio tape to be played. Sandinista Renovation Movement Deputy Victor Hugo Tinoco speculated that it was not Sandinista President of the Assembly René Nuñez who did not permit the tape to be played but rather Liberal deputies who did not want to “open a Pandora's box” that would reveal “the list of those who had been bought.”
El Nuevo Diario also makes the accusation, based on the tape it says it has it its possession, that Venezuelan aid money was available for use in towns before the November municipal elections to help the chances of the FSLN. Evidently Guevara told Council of Citizen Power members that there was money available for projects for youth such as basketball courts, sports equipment, etc. and that they should make sure they put in a request for their share.
This hotline is prepared from the Nicaragua News Service and other sources. To receive a more extensive weekly summary of the news from Nicaragua by e-mail or postal service, send a check for $60.00 to Nicaragua Network, 1247 E St., SE, Washington, DC 20003. We can be reached by phone at 202-544-9355. Our web site is: www.nicanet.org. To subscribe to the Hotline, send an e-mail to nicanet@afgj.org.
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