TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 11, 2008

Nicaragua Network Hotline (November 11, 2008)

1. Liberals continue to challenge Managua results; FSLN wins majority of municipalities
2. Coffee harvest season begins with problems
3. Civil society leaders report threats and break-ins
4. Project Love's effort to end child labor attracts US aid

Topic 1: Liberals continue to challenge Managua results; FSLN wins majority of municipalities

The Liberal Alliance candidate for mayor, Eduardo Montealegre, continued to contest Sunday's electoral defeat by Sandinista candidate, and boxing champion, Alexis Argüello. Montealegre brought complaints of fraud before the Supreme Electoral Council on Tuesday, but produced proof of discrepancies in only two of Managua's 2,200 polling places.

According to official CSE returns, Sandinista (FSLN) candidates won 10 of Nicaragua's 15 departmental capitals and at least 94 of 146 municipalities, with six not yet decided and 6 postponed until next year due to slow recovery from Hurricane Felix. It appears that the FSLN will increase its current lead in municipal governments by at least four. If anything the numbers understate the FSLN victory since the majority of municipalities won by the Sandinista candidates are more populous than those won by the right-wing Liberal Alliance. Managua alone contains 20% of the country's population.

Reports of chaotic voting in Managua and some irregularities elsewhere gave legs to right-wing charges of fraud, but Montealegre's appearance before the CSE does not lend credence to a challenge of the Managua results unless more evidence is forthcoming. In Leon, El Nuevo Diario reported the discovery of thousands of ballots marked for the Liberal candidate for mayor in a local recycling collection spot.

International observers from three Latin American associations of election officials said that “the logistics were well designed and well administered,” adding that “We did not find any areas where the secrecy of the vote of citizens was vulnerable and this is an extremely important principal in electoral processes, nor did we find any element of coercion of the voters.” They admitted that they were able to observe some questionable incidents but said they considered that in all processes there are difficulties. The observers summarized by saying, “We have not found any incident, in the places where we observed, that could constitute fraud and we agree that if any political party has an allegation of fraud, it has the obligation to prove it before the appropriate authorities.” The three organizations appear to focus on the technical mechanisms of elections.

The better known international observer groups such as the Organization of American States and the Carter Center were not certified to observe this election. OAS Secretary General José Miguel Insulza expressed his “concern about the election and called on all parties to resolve the disputes through “dialogue” after several incidents of Liberal Alliance-led violence on Monday that resulted in several injuries.

The FSLN's past experience with international observation has not been positive with groups like the Carter Center certifying the 1990 election as “free and fair” despite massive US intervention in the campaign during which the US spent $20 per Nicaraguan voter in support of its hand-picked candidate, Violeta Chamorro. On the Saturday prior to the current election, President Daniel Ortega spoke about the 1996 elections after which, he said, Jimmy Carter, former and current Costa Rican President Oscar Arias, and OAS Secretary General Caesar Gaviria, told him in a private meeting that the results would not have been accepted in other countries, but pressured him to “sacrifice himself” to avoid bloodshed in the first national election after the end of the contra war. In public the three officials said there were some “incidents” and “irregularities” but that they did not “delegitimize the process.”

The CSE did not certify national observers either for this election as it has in the past. Several groups, including Ethics and Transparency and the Institute for Development and Democracy (IPADE) had applied to observe the elections. Ethics and Transparency has had a fairly good reputation since its founding in 1996 (and its “quick count” confirmed Ortega's win in 2006) but it receives its major funding from the US National Endowment for Democracy, which along with the US Agency for International Development, are the two primary tools of US government efforts to manipulate foreign elections.

Nevertheless, the absence of most international and all national observers provides fodder for those who claim fraud. Each party in the election by law was permitted to have observers at the polling sites during voting and during the count, although there were reports of isolated polling places where poll watchers were turned away on technical grounds or were expelled if they raised issues about the vote.

Topic 2: Coffee harvest season begins with problems

The coffee harvest season began in the face of low coffee prices on the world market due primarily to the crisis in international financial markets and analysts predict the price will remain depressed for the remainder of the year. According to a report on prices by the National Coffee Council (Conacafe), the price for coffee futures has been affected by the weak dollar and high oil prices, and according to producers, a flood of low-quality Vietnamese coffee. World coffee demand has fallen 3.4% according to the World Coffee Organization. Nicaragua is expected to produce 1.6 million hundredweights of exportable coffee this year, a drop of 300,000 hundredweights from last year.

Bad roads, including damage to 1,100 kilometers during the recent sustained heavy rains, “are an enormous headache” for producers and low prices have producers worried that they will make less than it costs to produce the coffee this year. After three years of high prices, topping out at $160/hundredweight, last week the price fell below $110/hundredweight. The cost of fertilizer has also skyrocketed. According to Constitutional Liberal Party Deputy Freddy Torres, “Last year a hundred pounds of urea cost between US$15-17. Now it costs US$40.” The Union of Coffee Producers has told the Ministry of Labor that a minimum wage for this season higher than 18 cordobas (95 cents) per tin (roughly a cubic meter) would threaten the harvest. Last harvest season the minimum wage was 13.5 cordobas plus food.

The government of President Daniel Ortega had initiated an ambitious reactivation program for the coffee sector this year with an investment of more than US$100 million, according to Minister of Agriculture Ariel Bucardo. Last year coffee producers protested the implementation of a 15% tax. This year they are asking that the tax be suspended because of the poor international futures market in coffee

Topic 3: Civil society leaders report threats and break-ins

Numerous activists in the women's and human rights movements have reported threats to their lives and health, and that of their family members, as well as break-ins where valuables were left behind and computers and papers were taken. Gonzalo Carrion, Legal Area Director of the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights (CENIDH), said last week that the recent break-in at the home of Marlen Chow, where the only item stolen was her lap top computer, is just another in a string of incidents of harassment suffered by leaders in the Autonomous Women's Movement (MAM), the Network of Women against Violence, the Institute for Development and Democracy (IPADE), the Civil Coordinator and CENIDH itself. Chow is a member of the left-wing Movement to Rescue Sandinismo and an activist in the Autonomous Women's Movement.

CENIDH lawyer Uriel Pineda said that the theft from Chow's house was not a common crime but was carried out to frighten the victim. He said that a report was sent to Police Commissioner Aminta Granera asking for attention to the case. He added that even though CENIDH staff members know who stole the organization's camera several weeks ago (during an encounter with attackers) and made the proper report to the authorities, nothing has come of it. In another recent case, three robbers overpowered a watchman and stole the hard drives of an unnamed organization's computers.

On Nov. 5, Patricia Orozco, who belongs to a group working for the reinstatement of therapeutic abortion, reported that she had received telephone calls which were at first offensive, of a sexual nature, but that then began to threaten her and her family. “Damn bitch, we are going to shut you up!” was the last message that she found on her cell phone. On Nov. 6, she turned over to the police the number of the caller as revealed on the cell phone. In still another case, Ana Maria Pizarro, of MAM, has been threatened with the kidnapping of her son.

Vilma Nuñez, President of CENIDH, says that she has been told of serious plans against her life. Both Bayardo Izabá and Gonzalo Carrion of CENIDH have been threatened by telephone. Carrion said that members of the Sandinista Party have told him that his personal activities are being investigated and that he should be very careful because he “speaks too much and too strongly.”

Carrion summed up the tactics of what he considered to be those of governments oppressing their citizens, “The robberies where what is lost are documents or computers, strange accidents, threats, vehicles that follow you, these are the modus operandi to tell the person being watched that they know where you work, the places you go; they know your address, who your family is and that ‘something' could happen to you if you continue your criticisms.” He added, “When [official] harassment by the authorities doesn't silence the person, then they resort to these dark forces that act at night, disguised and in the shadow of impunity.”

Topic 4: Project Love's effort to end child labor attracts US aid

U.S. Ambassador Robert Callahan announced on Nov. 4 that the United States Department of Labor was making a donation of US$5 million to the project promoted by Nicaraguan First Lady Rosario Murillo known as Project Love which works to eradicate child labor through an integral community-based approach. Callahan said that the donation was for a period of three years and would be used for, among other things, the construction of schools on coffee plantations. Callahan said that he was “very impressed” by this government program which brings together ministries and institutions which are in charge of a variety of programs. The secretary of the office of the president, Salvador Vanegas, said that the money would be handled by the National System of Social Welfare which brings together all the ministries which work in that area.

Official figures show that about 53,643 children between 10 and 14 years of age (out of a total of 681,548 children in that age group) work in Nicaragua in spite of the fact that work by children under 14 is forbidden by the Labor Code. Of these children, 12,503 are in urban areas while 41,140 live in rural areas. Forty-six thousand are boys.

Meanwhile, Maria Jesus Conde, representative of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) in Nicaragua, praised Project Love, saying that it coincides one hundred per cent with the goals of UNICEF in the area of children's human rights. She said that it was an integral program that, while it has the child at its center, focuses on the family and the rest of the community. She said that what is new about the program is that it integrates “a bunch” of actions that were carried out separately in years past. “The more integrated a program, the greater the impact it will probably have,” she said, adding that “We will support any government that carries out actions to strengthen the human rights of children.”

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
Labels: Archives Hotline