TUESDAY, OCTOBER 16, 2012
Nicaragua News Bulletin (October 16, 2012)
1. Maritime border dispute with Colombia flares up, again2. Results from two polls favor Sandinistas
3. OAS observer mission arrives
4. New budget proposal boosts social spending
5. Project Healthy Yards expands
6. Central American mothers begin search for migrant sons and daughters
7. School retention rates are up while mathematic test scores drop
8. Land owners threaten to block Tumarin construction
1. Maritime border dispute with Colombia flares up, again
Nicaragua and Colombia exchanged diplomatic notes last week over the presence of a Nicaraguan government research boat in Caribbean waters claimed by both countries. The two nations are expecting a ruling next month from the International Court of Justice in The Hague (World Court) that will clarify the maritime border between them.
On Oct. 10, Colombian Vice-Admiral Hernando Wills said that, while Nicaraguan fishing boats sometimes visited the area near Quitasueño Key, the Mede-Pesca III belonged to the Nicaraguan Institute of Fisheries and Aquaculture and its visit marked the first time a Nicaraguan government boat had entered the zone. Wills said that the Colombian government had not given permission to Nicaragua to carry out this research and the Nicaraguan boat should leave. Nicaraguan authorities answered that the vessel was doing research on fishery resources in order to present a report to the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) which is meeting in Panama in November.
The exchange of diplomatic notes occurred on Oct. 11 and 12. Colombian Foreign Minister Maria Angela Holguin sent a note to the Nicaraguan government saying that the Mede-Pesca III had violated her country's sovereignty. Nicaragua answered the next day saying that the ships violating national sovereignty were the two Colombian warships that were threatening the Nicaraguan research vessel “in Nicaraguan waters.” The note went on to say, “It is known to you, Madam Minister, that the geographic positions in your note correspond to Nicaraguan waters based on history, geography and international law.” It added that the Nicaraguan government hoped that the aggressive action would not be repeated. Colombian Radio Caracol reported that Colombia would not be answering Nicaragua's note.
Meanwhile, on Oct. 12, Minister Holguin said that the Nicaraguan research boat had left Colombian waters. However, the Nicaraguan Army stated that the vessel continued with its scientific efforts in the same spot which it reiterated were in Nicaraguan waters. (El Nuevo Diario, Oct. 11, 13; Radio La Primerisima, Oct. 12, 13; La Prensa, Oct. 12)
2. Results from two polls favor Sandinistas
Results of two polls released last week showed the Sandinista Party (FSLN) with a strong advantage leading up to the municipal elections on November 4. M&R Consultores questioned 1,600 people throughout the country between Sept. 15 and 23 with a confidence level of 95% and a 2.5% margin of error. CID-Gallup polled 1,202 citizens between Sept. 12 and 17. Confidence level and margin of error on that poll were not reported.
The M&R Consultores survey found that 72% of those polled indicated they would vote for the Sandinistas, 5.5% for the Constitutional Liberal Party (PLC), 4.1% for the Independent Liberal Party (PLI), 10.7% did not know, and 7.%% did not respond to the question. A third of independents said they would vote for the Sandinistas. In spite of calls from some sectors not to vote in the local elections, 77.4% said they intended to vote while only 20.9% said they would not vote. With regard to the political opposition, 50.1% said that it represented no hope for the nation while 40.4% said it did represent some hope. Forty-one percent said that all of the magistrates of the Supreme Electoral Council (CSE) should be changed while 25.6% said some should be replaced and others retained and 23.6% said they should all be reelected.
The most popular figure in the nation continued to be the head of the National Police, Aminta Granera, with 89.85% approval rating. She was followed by First Lady and government spokesperson Rosario Murillo with 76.8%, President Daniel Ortega with 75.5% approval, and General Julio Cesar Aviles, head of the Army, with 64.1%. As usual former President Arnoldo Aleman led the unfavorable ratings with 77.5% disapproval rating, followed by Eduardo Montealegre with 61.3%.
In spite of accusations from the Catholic bishops and some figures in civil society, only 25% agreed with them that President Ortega is setting up a dictatorship, while 69% said he governed according to the nation's laws. Sixty-seven percent said Nicaragua was progressing while 24% said it was the same and 8% said it was going backwards. Among the most popular government programs were the Solidarity Bonus for low-wage government workers, Plan Roof, Zero Usury and Zero Hunger, all receiving approval ratings well above 70%. Fifty-six percent said there was “economic stability and less poverty.”
The CID-Gallup poll did not ask respondents specifically which party they would vote for but rather which party they sympathized with. Fifty-six percent said they sympathized with the Sandinista Party, 35% with no party, 4% with the PLC and 3% with the PLI. Luis Haug, general manager of CID-Gallup, said that this advantage would give the FSLN a majority of 60% in the municipal elections. The CID-Gallup results differed from the M&R results in its predictions of voter turnout. Haug said that his poll results predict only a 50% turnout in contrast to the M&R figure of 77%. As for the CSE, 18% had high confidence in the magistrates; 36% medium confidence; 26% little or no confidence.
The Police and the Army showed high favorable ratings in the CID-Gallup poll but three out of five people considered that crime had increased and one in five had been a victim of crime recently. Fifty-five percent want the authorities to continue to confront organized crime. (El Nuevo Diario, Oct. 9, 11; Informe Pastran, Oct. 9, 11; Radio La Primerisima, Oct. 9)
3. OAS election observer team arrives
The Supreme Electoral Council and representatives from the Organization of American States (OAS) signed an agreement under which a 65 member team from the OAS will observe (or accompany, as its activities are being called) Nicaragua's Nov. 4 municipal elections. The head of the mission, Lazaro Cardenas (former governor of Michoacán and grandson of the revolutionary president of Mexico of the same name), said on Oct. 11, “It is a great satisfaction to be in Nicaragua answering the invitation to accompany this municipal electoral process.” He said that after the elections his team would present a report to the Permanent Council of the OAS and to the Nicaraguans. Supreme Electoral Council President Roberto Rivas said that this was the tenth election that the OAS had observed in Nicaragua.
The OAS team met with all the candidates for mayor of Managua, including Alfredo Gutierrez of the Independent Liberal Party (PLI), Eduardo Fonseca of the Constitutional Liberal Party (PLC), and Daysi Torres of the Sandinista Party (FSLN). The opposition Liberal parties said that they told Cardenas and the team from the OAS of their concerns about the vote counting process and asked the OAS to give that process special attention. PLI leader Eduardo Montealegre said, “It is better that the OAS be here than that it not be here.”
Opposition civil society groups questioned the presence of the OAS team in Nicaragua. Julio Icaza Gallard, a member of the Citizens' Union for Democracy (UCD), said that if the OAS team recognizes the results of the voting “it will be an accomplice to yet another fraudulent election.” Opposition parties and groups also questioned the use of the term “accompany” instead of “observe” but Cardenas reassured them that the agreement “we signed with Nicaragua establishes clearly that, although we are calling it accompaniment, we are referring to exactly the same thing as observation; our work is the same.”
In related news, the office of the Human Rights Ombudsman announced that it will organize 4,500 national observers. Sixto Ulloa, Special Ombudsman for Citizen Participation, said that they have already participated in the process, observing the producing of the ballots and the registration of the participating political parties. (Informe Pastran, Oct. 11, 15; El Nuevo Diario, Oct. 11, 13, 15; La Prensa, Oct. 12; Radio La Primerisima, Oct. 11, 15)
4. New budget proposal boosts social spending
The government of President Daniel Ortega submitted its 2013 budget proposal to the National Assembly last week. The US$1.999 billion budget increases poverty reduction funding from 10.5% of Gross Domestic Product to 10.7%. But the real story is that higher tax revenue and a growing economy have made the budget “pie” larger so the poverty reduction piece, while increasing only slightly as a percentage, is increasing substantially in terms of dollars allocated. Zero Usury, Zero Hunger, Plan Roof, school spending, etc. are all increased substantially according to government spokesperson Rosario Murillo. She said, “Nicaragua continues advancing in the process of restoring rights, and the families, in unity, are appropriating political, social and economic spaces that have opened in the State. Assimilating the family unit is the key to success.”
Zero Usury spending under the 2013 budget will increase 18% providing some 100,000 new loans to women with small and micro businesses. Zero Hunger will help 25,000 additional women and families become food self-sufficient. The Healthy Yard Program will benefit 75,000 more families in 2013. Environmental Packages which have the objective of restoring or preventing deforestation and environmental destruction will benefit 50,000 families throughout the country.
Primary school attendance is expected to increase by 2% next year while participation in government literacy programs is expected to see a 43% increase. School solidarity packets, which include uniforms and school supplies, will grow by 20% to benefit 250,300 students and the school meal program will grow by 5% covering 1,306,000 students and 100% of public primary schools and pre-schools. Finally, 1,253 schools will be renovated, expanded or repaired, improving 5,630 classrooms. In addition, 180,000 desks will be delivered to classrooms; 120,000 of them repaired and the rest new. (Radio La Primerisima, Oct. 10; El Nuevo Diario, Oct. 15)
5. Project Healthy Yards expands
Rosario Murillo, coordinator Council of Communication and Citizenship, announced that 3,300 families in Juigalpa, Rio San Juan, and Managua will benefit from the Healthy Yards (Patio Saludable) Program. The program was established by the Sandinista government to fight malnutrition by providing people who have a small plot of land, such as the yard around their house, with fruit and vegetable seeds and training so they can provide their families with a healthier diet. Sixty thousand families have already benefitted from this program and, according to Murillo, another 15,000 will benefit this year.
Murillo also announced that President Daniel Ortega decided to move administration of the Zero Hunger program to the new Ministry of Family Economy. Over 100,000 Nicaraguan women who own, or have access to, a plot of land, have received the “food production package” which includes pregnant animals, seeds, shelter building materials, and training. The program is modified according to region, climate, and size of landholding. Murillo announced that 3,750 “special bonuses” will be given out in the more urban Managua area. Recipients will receive machetes, shovels, corn grinders, 10 hens and a rooster, a henhouse, fruit trees, vegetable seeds and other plants. (Radio La Primerisima, Oct. 9, 15)
6. Central American mothers begin search for migrant sons and daughters
Mothers from Honduras, Nicaragua, and Guatemala began a caravan north on Oct. 14 from Guatemala to search for their sons and daughters who disappeared after they left their homes to migrate to the United States. The 56 members of the caravan plan a 4,600 kilometer trip through 14 Mexican states which they expect will last at least 19 days. The participants, most of them mothers, are 28 Hondurans, 19 Nicaraguans, and seven Guatemalans. Each year, according to Mexican government figures, 140,000 Central Americans enter Mexico intending to migrate to the United States. Non-governmental organizations put the figure much higher. Among the organizations sponsoring the trip are the Jesuit Migration Service, the Jesuit Rafael Landivar University in Guatemala, the National Roundtable for Migration of Guatemala, and the Pastorate for Human Mobility also of Guatemala.
Carmen Lucia Cuarezma, who left Chinandega with the other Nicaraguans on Oct. 12, said, “I have hopes of finding my son alive. I would like to reunite with him; it would be a miracle if God would put me on the right road.” When they were passing through El Salvador, two mothers, one from Honduras and one from Nicaragua, received the good news that groups that work with migrants in Mexico had found their sons. The family reunions were planned for Oct. 15.
Father Juan Luis Carvajal of the Pastorate for Human Mobility said, “We want this to be a call to unify efforts, to put together a data base and identify what is happening in this situation of so much pain, where there is so much loss of life. We know that there is much violence; Mexico has become a cemetery for migrants but they have names, places of origin, culture, and families that are waiting for them and praying for them.” (Radio La Primerisima, Oct. 15; La Prensa Oct. 14; El Nuevo Diario, Oct. 13)
7. School retention rates are up while mathematic test scores drop
On Oct. 11, Communications Coordinator Rosario Murillo announced that the Ministry of Education reported record high retention rates at 90% at all public and private schools for the 2012 school year which finishes in December. Primary education retention rates are at a record 95%, with an 86.6% passing rate. Although the results were good and an improvement from 2011 statistics, Murillo says that the government will continue to strengthen the education system until 100% of students are completing their primary and secondary education. Murillo attributes the improvement to the volunteer teachers, including young people from the Federation of Secondary Students (FES).
While retention rates are up, the Ministry of Education and the nation's universities are working together to confront the low test scores on university entrance exams, especially in mathematics, according to Education Minister Miriam Raudez. "This is a systemic problem. We have to work with the universities to develop better curricula and assessment tools,” Raudez said. In 2012 only one out of 2,258 students got an “excellent” score on the National University of Engineering entrance exam and only five others obtained a grade of “outstanding” (90% or above). (Radio La Primerísima, Oct 11; El Nuevo Diario, Oct 11)
8. Land owners threaten to block Tumarin construction
Some 120 farmers and residents of Apaguas in Cruz de Rio Grande are threatening to block roads starting Oct. 10 to prevent construction of the Tumarin Hydroelectric Project. In an agreement signed three years ago with the Brazilian company building the US$607 million, 220 megawatt hydroelectric dam, landowners who would lose land to the project negotiated a price of US$470.21 per acre. Owners are saying the company now wants to pay them only US$402.30 per acre. There are 13,920 acres in play. The company declined to comment. According to the signed agreement, payment was due April 15 of this year, but only 12 landowners have been paid. (El Nuevo Diario, Oct. 13)
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