The Nicaraguans They began voting this Sunday in an election with a predictable victory for the president Daniel Ortega to assume a new mandate after 14 years in power, without much competition, with seven opposition candidates imprisoned.
Ortega, who came to power at the polls in 2007 and will turn 76 on Thursday, is preparing to start another five years as president, at the head of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN, left) and together with his powerful wife Rosario Murillo (70), running for vice-presidency for the second time.
His tenure in the presidency is not in doubt. The former Sandinista guerrilla, who also ruled in the 1980s after the FSLN overthrew dictator Anastasio Somoza in 1979, faces five right-wing candidates, unknown and branded as government collaborators.
The 13,459 polling stations installed throughout the country opened at 7 in the morning (local time) for some 4.4 million voters called to also elect 90 deputies of a Congress that, like all the powers of the State, is under control official.
“I voted because it is a right and because the progress of the country continues,” Carlos Reyes, 39, told AFP at an electoral center in the Larreynaga neighborhood, in eastern Managua.
The opposition in exile called for abstention. “There is no one to vote for. This is an electoral circus. If they are so sure that the people love them, why did they imprison the presidential candidates? “A 51-year-old secretary, who preferred not to reveal her name, told AFP.
The focus of the election in this Central American country of 6.5 million inhabitants is not who to vote for, but whether to abstain or participate, and the reaction of the international community that considers these elections neither free nor democratic.
In some voting centers there were lines, but many streets were empty. The FSLN mobilized house to house to call to vote, while the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights (Cenidh) has denounced that there is fear and social control over the population that intimidates people to vote.
Electoral crisis
These elections are held three and a half years after the protests that demanded the resignation of Ortega and whose repression left at least 328 dead and more than 100,000 exiles.
With the elections approaching, in June an offensive against the opposition began: three parties were outlawed, seven presidential candidates were arrested and another 32 political and social activists, businessmen and journalists, who joined some 120 opponents who are still imprisoned since the 2018 protests. .
The most recent detainees are accused, according to laws approved at the end of 2020, of undermining sovereignty, promoting international sanctions, “treason against the fatherland” or “money laundering”, as is the case of the favorite opposition candidate, Cristiana Chamorro , daughter of former President Violeta Barrios (1990-1997) and who is under house arrest.
Ortega is singled out by his critics for “nepotism” and for establishing a “dictatorship.” He accuses opponents of “coup plotters” sponsored by Washington.
From exile, in Costa Rica and other countries, the opposition prepared for this Sunday marches against what they describe as “electoral farce.”
On the eve of the vote, Murillo, the only government spokesperson, called for participation in the “electoral party” which, he said, would be a “ratification of peace.”
The government plans to call for a dialogue, but critical analysts believe that it is a strategy to gain legitimacy and that it will not be real with the opponents imprisoned or exiled.
“Do not be fooled by siren songs,” Cenidh president Vilma Núñez told AFP.
International pressure
The international community, led by the United States and the European Union (EU), previously disqualified the elections, which Ortega described as “unacceptable interference.”
US President Joe Biden, whose country like the EU adopted sanctions against Ortega’s inner circle, is getting ready to sign an arsenal of measures under the RENACER Act, to increase the pressure.
The situation in Nicaragua will be debated this week in the General Assembly of the Organization of American States (OAS), where the suspension of the country’s participation in the regional bloc could be considered.
Analysts warn that isolation will worsen the socioeconomic situation and trigger migration, although the government predicts a GDP growth of 6% with the injection of remittances – US $ 1.4 billion from January to August -, international credits and the non-imposition of restrictions despite to the advance of the pandemic.
The government on Saturday accredited some 200 “electoral escorts” and foreign journalists whom the government considers “friends.” According to the independent observatory Urnas Abierta they are “Sandinista militants” who replace the international observation of the OAS or the EU and international media.
Some 30,000 police and military guard the polling stations that will close at 6 in the afternoon (local time). According to the Supreme Electoral Council (CSE), there will be results around midnight.
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