TUESDAY, DECEMBER 09, 2008
Nicaragua Network Hotline (December 9, 2008)
1. Budget for 2009 and international assistance intertwined with election issue2. Nicaraguan conflicts appear at SICA Summit in Honduras
3. Sandinistas veto Sergio Ramirez for introduction to poetry book
4. Nicaraguan workers and border environment abused in Costa Rica
5. Municipal election campaign begins in the RAAN
Topic 1: Budget for 2009 and international assistance intertwined with election issue
On Dec. 5, a technical mission from the International Monetary Fund urged the branches of the Nicaraguan government to create the political conditions necessary for the passage of several bills the IMF is requiring before it will release US$25 million in loans. The IMF has already released US$38 million out of an original commitment of US$118 million as part of a three year agreement for budget support. The National Assembly, in which no party holds a majority, has been paralyzed since well before the Nov. 9 municipal elections and the deadlock has only worsened since as the Constitutional Liberal Party (PLC) has been unable to round up the 47 votes needed to pass a bill to annul the elections and the Sandinista party (FLSN) has been unable to secure the 47 votes needed to pass the 2009 budget, which must be passed by Dec. 15.
IMF officials said that the Nicaraguan budget needed to be fully funded which requires that all foreign assistance pledges be honored, but much of that foreign aid is held up at present due to the political situation. The IMF delegation met privately with the ambassadors to Nicaragua from the Nicaragua Budget Support Group which includes Germany, Denmark, Finland, Norway, The Netherlands, Sweden, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Japan, the European Union and multilateral organizations. Those countries are guaranteeing disbursement of only US$60 million of the US$115 allocated for budget support for this year.
The Bush administration is threatening to cut off as much as US$130 million from the United States Millennium Challenge Account which it has frozen. Much of this is programmed for desperately needed road construction. The Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) board will meet December 11 to decide whether to withdraw the funds. MCC spokesperson Dick Day returned a phone call from the Nicaragua Network after a Witness for Peace alert (which we had forwarded to our Nicanet list also) overwhelmed the MCC email account with more than 600 messages of protest. He suggested people send messages through their web page http://www.mcc.gov/contact/index.php, which is equipped to handle the heavy traffic. The Nicaragua Network's position is that the US owes Nicaragua more than $17 billion in reparations for the illegal contra war and therefore has no excuse to cut any funding source. We urge you to send a message to the MCC directors before tomorrow's meeting.
The 2009 Nicaraguan budget of US$1.7 billion, which is being held hostage by the opposition parties, increases poverty reduction spending by almost 20%. The budget prioritizes health care, including health centers, hospitals, medical equipment and medicines. It also increases spending for education, infrastructure, energy, water and sewers. For the first time citizens will be able to see which projects are budgeted and carried out in which department and city.
At a Dec. 1 meeting with incoming Sandinista mayors and council members, President Daniel Ortega was defiant. “Don't worry,” he said, “this deficit will be covered by Venezuela, according to what officials of that government told me as well as President Hugo Chavez himself.” When asked about the danger to future funding posed by the lack of movement on important legislation in the National Assembly, Central Bank President Antenor Rosales Rosales said, “Here the real danger that exists is the danger that more Nicaraguans continue to be poor…. More than the danger of the negotiations, I see the danger that the country might continue in a state of poverty and misery.”
PLC Delegate Francisco Aguirre, who heads the Economic Committee of the National Assembly, said on Dec. 7 that “Until the political problem is resolved the conditions are not going to exist, I believe, to give an answer to the economic problem.” He added, “Politicians of good will, not the hotheads who just disturb the atmosphere without offering any constructive suggestions, have to search for a solution to this problem that will provide tranquility to the country so it can confront the international financial crisis and also permit us to resolve our internal economic problems.”
Topic 2: Nicaraguan conflicts appear at SICA Summit in Honduras
The 33rd summit of the Central American Integration System was held in San Pedro Sula, Honduras, last week. The meeting was called to analyze the impact of the world financial crisis on the region. The presidents and ministers heard a report from the Secretariat of the organization which predicted that the region would be affected by a drop in remittances from Central Americans living in the United States. Those totaled US$14 billion in 2007. Foreign investment in Central America is also expected to drop.
Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega was again received with protests by Honduran women's groups who have vowed to protest his appearance at all international meetings in their country because of charges that he had abused his step daughter and his support for banning therapeutic abortion. Also in Honduras to protest were Eduardo Montalegre the losing candidate of the PLC for mayor of Managua. He and other defeated PLC candidates denounced what they claimed was fraud in the recent elections. He and his party were not allowed to enter the meeting.
Topic 3: Government institute vetoes Sergio Ramirez for introduction to poetry book
The Nicaraguan Institute of Culture, a governmental body, vetoed the publication of a book of poetry by Nicaraguan poet Carlos Martinez Rivas by a Spanish publisher because it was to include an introduction by historian, novelist and former Sandinista vice-president Sergio Ramirez who has been harshly critical of the government of President Daniel Ortega. The book, which was to be part of a series of “great 20th century poets of the Spanish language,” was scheduled to be published on May 27, 2009. The Institute of Culture, which holds the publication rights to the works of Martinez Rivas, sent a letter to the publisher saying that it had given the right to study the work in question only to scholar Pablo Centeno Gomez, editor of the volume. Jose Caballero Bonald, editor of the series, called the development an act of censorship and an attack on the integrity of culture as well as vengeance on the part of Ortega. Thirty writers attending the International Book Fair in Guadalajara, Mexico, called the decision “incomprehensible” and lamented that the voice of the late Martinez Rivas, noted for the eccentricity and strength of his work, would not be heard.
Also at the International Book Fair in Guadalajara, Nicaraguan writer Gioconda Belli received this year's Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz prize for the best novel written by a woman for her novel El infinito en la palma de la mano. The work was chosen from among 50 entries and carries a prize of US$10,000. In awarding the prize, the jury said that the book was written with “exquisite, precise, fluid prose which overflows with resonance.”
Topic 4: Nicaraguan workers and border environment abused in Costa Rica
The Costa Rican Immigration Board and Labor Ministry inspected worker barracks and camps of the country's major construction projects to detect conditions that cause health risks to workers and to verify that the workers have legal work permits. They said that some Nicaraguan workers are forced to live in deplorable conditions. Mario Zamora, director of Immigration, and Minister of Health Maria Luisa Avila announced that at a construction project in Matapalo de Sardinal, in the province of Guanacaste, hundreds of workers were found living in unhealthy conditions and a Nicaraguan worker died there from fever and vomiting that also affected 300 other workers. In Parrita de Puntarenas, the Ministry of Health encountered unhealthy conditions where 200 Nicaraguans were suffering vomiting and diarrhea apparently from bad food.
Meanwhile, a group of 21 Costa Rican environmental professionals were scheduled to meet on Dec. 5 to protest President Oscar Arias' anti-environment policies. Members of the group accused the government of “double speak” with regard to the environment, citing as an example the Las Crucitas open pit mine. The project is owned by Vanessa Ventures, a Canadian transnational corporation. The company has encountered opposition because it is seeking a permit to cut down more than 350 hectares of forest and because it will contaminate the San Juan River which is only three kilometers away. The San Juan River is wholly owned by Nicaragua and constitutes the border between the two countries. Nicolas Boeglin, a law school faculty member at the University of Costa Rica, said that it is absolutely unrealistic to think that a system of levees, lagoons, or obstacles, in a tropical zone with high rainfall, could keep the contaminants from reaching the San Juan River. He anticipated a demand from Nicaragua for millions of dollars under the 1992 Rio Declaration for damage to water quality from Las Crucitas pollution.
Topic 5: Municipal election campaign begins in the RAAN
Municipal elections were postponed from Nov. 8, 2008, to Jan. 18, 2009, in the eight municipalities of the North Atlantic Autonomous Region (RAAN) that had felt the full force of Hurricane Felix in Sept. 2007. The region, which is one of the poorest in Nicaragua, has 142,000 inhabitants. The Sandinista Party (FSLN) launched its campaign in seven of the eight municipalities on Dec. 6. In Musawas, a Mayangna community, candidate Alexander Lam offered a government that he said would be transparent and democratic and promote development that emphasized environmental responsibility. In the mining town of Rosita, hundreds of Sandinista sympathizers marched down the main street with mayoral candidate Arturo Ibarra. Ibarra promised to reactivate a project to supply the town with potable water and to connect residents with the national electricity grid. He also pledged to build a public high school and promote the Zero Hunger Program in the area. Sandinista candidate for mayor of Bilwi Guillermo Espinoza served as mayor from 2000-2004 with what the daily newspaper La Prensa called “good success.” His running mate for vice-mayor, Martha Downs, is director of an organization that works with the handicapped and the daughter of a Moravian pastor.
The Constitutional Liberal Party opened its campaign in the RAAN on Dec. 7 in Bilwi (Puerto Cabezas) before a crowd of 700 in the city's central park. The surprise of the afternoon was that all the candidates for mayor and city council of the Nicaraguan Resistance Party (PRN) dropped their candidacies and declared their support for the PLC candidates. Alvaro Ramirez, the PRN mayoral candidate, said, “We cannot offer a truce to President (Daniel) Ortega with all the damage he is causing the country.” He complained that there were leaders of his party who worked as high level advisors to the Ortega government but, he said, “We are going to join the democratic forces of the Caribbean Coast.” Osorno Coleman, PLC mayoral candidate, who comes from YATAMA, led protests in April when YATAMA leader Brooklyn Rivera joined the Sandinistas in supporting the postponement of the elections.
The Nicaraguan Liberal Alliance (ALN) will launch its campaign on Dec. 13 according to a party activist. Other parties running in the elections in the RAAN include, besides the PRN, the Movement for Coast Unity (PAMUC) and the Alliance for Change (AC).
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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