Nicaraguan Assembly approves law regulating non-profit organizations

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(CNN Spanish) --

The Nicaraguan National Assembly approved this Thursday the new General Law for the Regulation and Control of Non-Profit Organizations, which prohibits them from carrying out political proselytism, as well as actions "to violate public order" or promote campaigns of destabilization in the country.

The bill was presented by the president of the National Assembly, deputy Gustavo Porras, and was approved with the vote of 77 Sandinista deputies and their allies, while 12 parliamentarians who the opposition considers close to the government abstained.

The document repeals Law 147, on Non-profit Legal Entities.

According to what is established in article 47 of the new law, the State will keep the properties of organizations whose legal personality is cancelled.

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Among the causes of state retention of assets are the commission of illicit acts to violate public order, hindering the control and surveillance of the entity in the matter and distorting the objectives and purposes of the creation of the body.

Also not reporting financial statements and changes in the boards of directors and the organization of activities contrary to its nature.

The president of the closed Fundación del Río, Amaru Ruiz, when consulted by CNN, stated that the law will annul organizations that have no ties to the government.

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“We are facing a law that is practically going to sweep away civil society organizations that have no ties to the regime. It is easier to purge the organizations that are not supporters of the regime than to cancel them one by one or en bloc. such as cancellation decrees that we have seen before," Ruiz said.

The law is approved after the cancellation of more than a hundred civil organizations, from 2018 to date, mostly for alleged breaches of their obligations before the regulatory entity, not presenting detailed financial reports or not updating information from their boards of directors.