The red and black flags have been flying since Monday, July 4, in the five mayoralties that the regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo took over
militarily
in historically opposition towns in Nicaragua.
The new authorities imposed by the central government raided the offices after a kind of coup d'état was consummated at the local level.
The deposed mayors handed over power meekly to avoid being imprisoned and the looming scenario, four months after municipal elections without guarantees, is that Sandinismo will fit into almost 100% of the country's municipal seats.
The presidential couple thus consolidates the implementation of a single-party regime.
That interpretation has given rise in recent weeks to comparisons.
"A single-party regime like that of Cuba and North Korea," agree opponents and political analysts from Costa Rica, the epicenter of Nicaraguan exile, and where those expelled by the Ortega-Murillos try to counterbalance a regime that is increasingly fierce and intolerant of dissent.
The five opposition mayors governed by the outlawed Citizens for Freedom Party (CxL) were the last institutional redoubt that the opposition held in Nicaragua.
Of the 153 municipalities that exist in the Central American country, only 18 had been won by the opposition in the last elections.
Of those, five were CxL;
the rest, the government had assigned in previous electoral maneuvers suspected of fraud to the so-called "zancudos parties", that is, groups of comparsas of the ruling party.
"What has happened with the mayors' offices is particularly important because it confirms that the Ortega-Murillos are migrating from the hegemonic party to the single-party regime," former opposition deputy Eliseo Núñez explained to EL PAÍS.
“Although after the elections other political parties remain,” he says in reference to the “stilt walkers,” “if the Sandinista Front takes power in all the mayor's offices, it would already be acting as a single-party regime.
In addition, those parties that the Government allows to survive are not interested in making a real opposition, and if at any time they have the strange idea of making it, they will eliminate them.
What Núñez describes has already happened with comparsa politicians in the 2021 general elections, when Ortega and Murillo perpetuated themselves in power without competition after outlawing opposition parties and arresting all presidential candidates.
There are examples: Reverend Guillermo Osorno was a presidential candidate for the Camino Cristiano party.
He denounced "irregularities in the process" and was punished by the Electoral Power, he was stripped of his seat in Parliament.
At the last minute, the Conservative Party refused to participate in the elections and his legal status was annulled.
"The other part of the establishment of a single-party regime has to do with the massive closure of NGOs," Núñez also points out.
To date, the Government has
guillotined
958 government organizations.
From institutions that work on issues of governance, strengthening of the media, to medical, scientific, charitable, environmental, feminist associations..., or even the Nicaraguan Academy of Language, the Poetry Festival of Granada or the Congregation of the Sisters of the Charity founded by Mother Teresa of Calcutta, a group of nuns who were expelled a week ago by the Government.
“The objective of closing the NGOs is that no one else provides services to the population other than the State.
Although there are components of political revenge in this or the supposed argument of foreign interference, the main issue is leaving the population without the ability to find alternatives outside the State.
Create an absolute dependency of the citizen for anything,” said Núñez.
Family admiration for the unique party
The Ortega-Murillo family has never hidden its admiration for single-party regimes.
On repeated occasions, both have praised Cuba and North Korea.
In 2019, in a message to Raúl Castro, they emphasized that Cuba "inspires them as an example of firmness and decision."
And in 2021, they expressed to the North Korean leader, Kim Jong-un, the following: “We keep in our hearts the dear and great leader Kim Il-sung, the dear leader, Kim Jong-il, and you brother president Kim Jong-un, with whom we invariably share ideals and values”.
The auction was given by one of the most mediatic sons of the presidential couple, Juan Carlos, who said that they are committed "to direct democracy based on a single party model [sic]".
The longing has come true, points out the economist and political analyst Enrique Sáenz, who identifies three pillars that support the Ortega-Murillo model.
The first is ideological and dates from the 1980s, since the "original conceptions of the Sandinista Front were Leninist, but they were covered up with political plurality, when it was a hegemonic party with other subordinates."
"In another statement, Ortega states that the ideal is the Cuban single-party regime, because, he said, the existence of various parties divided the nation," says Sáenz, adding that the other element is "Ortega's messianic conception of himself. same in the history of Nicaragua”.
“That is clear in his last speech in the public square [on June 23, 2022] during the anniversary of Carlos Fonseca's birth.
He said that Christ had been considered illegitimate by the workers, the poor, etc..., he did a rhetorical juggling to associate Christ with his own figure and the concept of illegitimacy that in Nicaragua is only associated with him and his exercise of power, "he analyzes. Saenz.
“I only put that recent example for the messianic conception that he has of his role.”
And the third element, adds the former deputy in exile, is the economic one.
This makes the model forged by the Ortega-Murillo family based on electoral fraud, demolition of the institutional framework, total control of the State, the armed forces and generalized repression unique.
"He began to worship the golden calf," warns Sáenz.
“Ortega is probably the man with the wealthiest family in Nicaragua.
That added a new ingredient to the exercise of power: accumulating wealth under the protection of impunity and omnipotence that gives control of power.
That's how he got into the business of fuels, energy, gold...;
that is to say, he gets involved in all possible businesses with a rentier vocation.
And then there you have, it seems to me, the cocktail that explains this clinging and this conception of the unique power in Ortega”, affirms Sáenz.
The resolute support of the Police shields this transition of the Ortega-Murillos to the single-party regime, those consulted for this article agree, who emphasize that "they are sustained mainly by the use of force" and economic arguments, such as being a Government with
IMF
measures
that keep the macroeconomy afloat, and the increase in family remittances, caused by the exodus of Nicaraguans since 2018.
“The model that they are proposing is one in which they imprison opponents, immobilize their capacity and generate fraudulent elections, which are accompanied by economic growth,” says Núñez.
“So the message they send is very clear: 'those to blame for the lack of economic growth are those who are in prison today;
we can make the country grow without the need for democratic values'.
They install the message that it is more important to get people out of poverty than to have institutions, a completely demagogic discourse when the whole world leaves Nicaragua due to poverty and lack of opportunities…, but it is a dangerously bought message by multilateral [institutions] ”, concludes the former deputy, referring to the World Bank and the Central American Bank for Economic Integration (CABEI).
“The Ortega-Murillos have been implementing their own model that has components similar to totalitarian regimes,” says exiled jurist María Asunción Moreno, recalling the situation of torture that some of the political prisoners go through.
“Unfortunately, we Nicaraguans are suffering from the most cruel and ruthless regime in Latin America.
The script to follow is: kill, imprison, banish, repress, threaten, monitor, expropriate, confiscate, disappear whoever tries to oppose it, ”she says.
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