Introduction

Nicaragua & Sandinismo

Curated By

Yaretzi Zuni

Anti-imperialist Marxist-Leninist A Sandinista stuck in the west and concerned by the current state of the left here. Focused on pulling out from the memory hole examples of “third world” anti-imperialism.

About this Collection

About this Collection

In 1979, the Sandinistas, inspired by the anti-imperialist guerrilla leader Sandino who drove away the 20 year US occupation of Nicaragua in 1920, defeated one of the bloodiest US-backed military regimes in Latin American history. They introduced free healthcare and education and rebuilt a country ravaged by 40 years of a bloodthirsty dynasty— at least 40,000 civilian deaths in its last year alone.

Empire imposed a blockade and immediately launched a counter-revolution. They failed militarily, as their tactics were terrorism and collective punishment (50K more deaths). The elections demanded by the US under threat brought 17 years of neoliberal rot, with the FSLN organizing from below through unions and collectives. After returning to power democratically in 2007 and consolidating authority over the bourgeoisie with more ambitious foreign & domestic policy, the US sponsored another coup attempt in 2018. The Sandinistas emerged victorious once again, proving their popular support.

Read this collection online: https://unlearn.capital/collections/nicaragua-sandinismo

14 articles · 4 books · 2 reports

This ebook is about 120 pages long.

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

1. Final Nicaragua battles cost 40,000 lives.

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19790723.2.83

By NZPA-Reuter

Publication Date: July 23, 1979

2. How US govt-funded media fueled a violent coup in Nicaragua

6 pages

https://thegrayzone.com/2021/06/12/coup-nicaragua-cpj-100-noticias/

By Max Blumenthal and Ben Norton

Publication Date: June 12, 2021

In this investigation, The Grayzone editors Max Blumenthal and Ben Norton expose how US government-funded media outlets and far-right groups fueled a violent 2018 coup attempt against Nicaragua's Sandinista government. After the Sandinistas returned to power in 2006, Washington poured millions through USAID and the Chamorro Foundation into opposition media like 100% Noticias.

3. Nicaragua Celebrates its Revolution While the US Plans New Sanctions Against It

5 pages

https://www.counterpunch.org/2023/07/31/nicaragua-celebrates-its-revolution-while-the-us-plans-new-sanctions-against-it/

By Roger Harris

Publication Date: July 31, 2023

A first-person account of the 44th anniversary celebration of the Nicaraguan Revolution in Managua on July 19, 2023, contrasts the open, popular event with US plans for new sanctions. The article argues that Nicaragua is not a dictatorship but a democracy under US attack, citing Ortega's 76% electoral victory and the lack of a police state, while criticizing US democracy as influenced by wealth.

4. From Nicaraguan revolutionaries to US embassy informants: How Washington recruited ex-Sandinistas like Dora María Téllez and her MRS party

31 pages

https://thegrayzone.com/2021/11/05/nicaragua-us-informant-dora-maria-tellez-mrs/

The Grayzone

By Ben Norton

Publication Date: November 5, 2021

Former Sandinista revolutionary Dora María Téllez and her MRS party became US embassy informants supporting right-wing coups against Nicaragua's Sandinista government.

5. Ortega, Elections, and the Context Western Media Won’t Print

4 pages

https://orinocotribune.com/ortega-elections-and-the-context-western-media-wont-print/

Orinoco Tribune

By Richard Balzano

Publication Date: August 25, 2026

Nicaragua's Ortega bars US-backed opposition from elections and restricts media, framing it as sovereignty defense against Washington's long history of intervention, which Western media misreports as authoritarianism.

6. Nicaragua will build two railways in alliance with China

2 pages

https://jpmas.com.ni/nicaragua-will-build-two-railways-in-alliance-with-china/

By JP

Publication Date: October 18, 2023

A news article reports that Nicaragua is consolidating two railway megaprojects through a memorandum of understanding with a Chinese state company, CCECC. Vice President Rosario Murillo confirmed that a high Nicaraguan delegation is in China to finalize at least eight agreements for mega-projects, including signing a memorandum for the studies, design.

7. Nicaragua Shows Solidarity With Palestine in Landmark Case Against Germany on Gaza Genocide

5 pages

https://orinocotribune.com/nicaragua-shows-solidarity-with-palestine-in-landmark-case-against-germany-on-gaza-genocide/

Orinoco Tribune

By Becca Renk Foster

Publication Date: August 5, 2026

Nicaragua champions Palestine at the ICJ, leveraging its historic 1986 victory over the US to build a landmark genocide case against Germany.

8. Nicaragua and China will build a mega international airport

2 pages

https://jpmas.com.ni/nicaragua-and-china-will-build-a-mega-international-airport/

By JP

Publication Date: October 17, 2023

Nicaragua and China will build a mega international airport at Punta Huete, making Nicaragua the first Latin American nation to consolidate such a megaproject with China. The contract, signed by General Oscar Mojica and CAMC's Wang Bo, is one of eight agreements and the only one approved for the region, part of the Belt and Road Initiative's tenth anniversary.

9. Women in Nicaragua: Power and Protagonism: Delegation Report-Back (January 2023)

4 pages

https://afgj.org/delegation-report-back-women-in-nicaragua-power-and-protagonism-january-2023

By Alliance for Global Justice

Publication Date: January 20, 2023

A report-back from a delegation of 22 North Americans who traveled to Nicaragua in January 2023 to investigate the conditions and lives of Nicaraguan women. It argues that the Sandinista government's community-based programs have empowered women, citing gender parity rankings, reduced mortality, land titles, and infrastructure investments, and urges the U.S. to lift sanctions.

10. How the Sandinistas triumphed over yankee fascism once again

31 pages

https://yaretzine.substack.com/p/how-the-sandinistas-triumphed-over?r=65qp38&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

By Yaretzi

Publication Date: March 30, 2026

In this first-person political essay, a Nicaraguan author who grew up anti-Sandinista but now supports the revolution argues that the 2018 protests were a US-backed coup attempt, not a genuine democratic movement. Drawing on Mao's theory of the principal contradiction, he frames the Sandinista Revolution as a legitimate project of national sovereignty and social progress.

11. Dr. Gustavo Porras: Constitutional Reform Seeks To Strengthen Democracy, Peace and Stability in Nicaragua

12 pages

https://orinocotribune.com/dr-gustavo-porras-constitutional-reform-seeks-to-strengthen-democracy-peace-and-stability-in-nicaragua/

Orinoco Tribune

By Dr. Gustavo Porras

Publication Date: July 31, 2026

Nicaragua's National Assembly president explains a constitutional reform to bar coup plotters and foreign-backed figures from elections, ensuring sovereign, democratic processes free from interference.

12. Nicaragua’s Authentic Democracy Defends the Will of the People

7 pages

https://orinocotribune.com/nicaraguas-authentic-democracy-defends-the-will-of-the-people/

Orinoco Tribune

By Stephen Sefton

Publication Date: July 27, 2026

Nicaragua defends its sovereignty and electoral integrity against US-led media manipulation and psychological warfare, contrasting its mixed economy and social achievements with Western elite-controlled democracies.

13. Nicaragua: A top 25 country for renewable energy!

8 pages

https://afgj.org/nicanotes-nicaragua-a-top-25-country-for-renewable-energy

Alliance for Global Justice

By Nicanotes

Publication Date: March 26, 2026

Nicaragua ranks among the top 25 countries worldwide with roughly 70-80% of its power now generated from renewable sources. Long reliant on imported fossil fuels, the country has aggressively shifted toward renewables over the past two decades. Wind projects like Amayo harness trade winds, geothermal fields such as Momotombo provide baseload power.

14. Nicaragua and China Break Ground on Landmark Solar Project to Power Water Access and Energy Sovereignty

3 pages

https://www.telesurenglish.net/nicaragua-and-china-break-ground-on-landmark-solar-project-to-power-water-access-and-energy-sovereignty/

By MK

Publication Date: June 8, 2025

MK reports that Nicaragua and China inaugurated construction on the Enesolar-3 solar plant in Nindirí, Masaya, funded by an $83 million Chinese investment. The 70-megawatt facility, led by CCCC, will generate 140,000 MWh annually, covering 40% of ENACAL's electricity consumption and benefiting nearly 4 million people.

Other Resources

Other Resources

This collection also includes other media types such as books, videos, podcasts, and more.

Books

Sandinistas Speak: Speeches, Writings, and Interiews With Leaders of Nicaragua's Revolution

https://vdoc.pub/download/sandinistas-speak-speeches-writings-and-interviews-with-leaders-of-nicaraguas-revolution-5nl72duhq010

Resource Not Added

By Sandinistas Speak: Speeches, Writings, And Interviews With Leaders Of Nicaragua's Revolution [PDF] [5nl72duhq010]

This collection presents speeches, writings, and interviews by leaders of Nicaragua's Sandinista revolution, focusing on the opening years. It includes historic documents of the FSLN (Sandinista National Liberation Front) and is described as the best selection in English of these materials.

Sandinista: Carlos Fonseca and the Nicaraguan Revolution

https://api.pageplace.de/preview/DT0400.9780822380993_A35714986/preview-9780822380993_A35714986.pdf

Resource Not Added

By Matilde Zimmermann

This biography of Carlos Fonseca Amador, founder of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN), traces his life from 1936 to 1976 and his posthumous role in the 1979 Nicaraguan Revolution. It argues that the Cuban Revolution of 1959 was the crucial turning point in Fonseca's political evolution, leading directly to the FSLN's formation.

Psalms

https://archive.org/details/psalms0000card_s0m5/mode/2up

Resource Not Added

By Cardenal; Ernesto

Psalms is a 1981 collection of Nicaraguan poetry, specifically paraphrases of the biblical Psalms, published in London by Sheed and Ward. The book presents 20th-century Nicaraguan poetic renditions of the Psalms, translated into English by a team including Thomas Blackburn, John Heath-Stubbs, Dom Sylvester Houédard, Elizabeth Jennings, Peter Levi, and Anthony Rudolf.

Carlos, the dawn is no longer beyond our reach

https://archive.org/details/carlosdawnisnolo00borg/page/n1/mode/2up

Resource Not Added

By Borge; Tomás

A personal and political reflection on struggle and hope, addressing Carlos directly about the approaching dawn of liberation and the ongoing fight against imperialism.

Reports

Healthcare Developments in Nicaragua

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/7088111/

Resource Not Added

Nicaragua's healthcare system has seen significant improvements under the Sandinista government, including expanded access and better health outcomes, despite ongoing US interference and economic challenges.

Elective affinities between Sandinismo (as socialist idea) and liberation theology in the Nicaraguan Revolution

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/341353757_Elective_affinities_between_Sandinismo_as_socialist_idea_and_liberation_theology_in_the_Nicaraguan_Revolution

Resource Not Added

By Jean-Pierre Reed

Scientific paper about liberation theology and its centrality to Sandinismo, written by a Westerner and published by a US institution in 2020, which means it must be read with a critical eye. Almost all academic material about Nicaragua from Western universities have to have a disclaimer on them that denounces the modern Sandinista government.

Final Nicaragua battles cost 40,000 lives.

Nicaragua & Sandinismo — Final Nicaragua battles cost 40,000 lives.

Final Nicaragua battles cost 40,000 lives.

Article 1 of 14

By NZPA-Reuter

Originally published at https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/CHP19790723.2.83

Publication Date: July 23, 1979

How US govt-funded media fueled a violent coup in Nicaragua

Nicaragua & Sandinismo — How US govt-funded media fueled a violent coup in Nicaragua

How US govt-funded media fueled a violent coup in Nicaragua

Article 2 of 14

By Max Blumenthal and Ben Norton

Originally published at https://thegrayzone.com/2021/06/12/coup-nicaragua-cpj-100-noticias/

Publication Date: June 12, 2021

Max Blumenthal and Ben Norton investigate how the United States funded violent far-right groups and media outlets that published fake news to fuel a 2018 coup attempt against Nicaragua’s Sandinista government.

(Puede leer o ver este informe en español aquí.)

Transcript

When the socialist-oriented Sandinista Front returned to power in Nicaragua through democratic elections in 2006, Washington began pouring tens of millions of dollars into the creation, training, and funding of right-wing opposition groups in the Central American nation.

Millions of dollars have flowed from the US Agency for International Development, or USAID, into the bank accounts of anti-Sandinista groups.

These US-funded organizations were at the heart of a failed coup d’etat that ravaged Nicaragua in 2018, leading to hundreds of deaths and destabilizing the country.

USAID placed a special emphasis on cultivating media outlets to bombard the country’s citizens with disinformation and deception that served the right-wing opposition’s agenda.

To support the media ecosystem it sought to establish in Nicaragua, USAID channeled money through an entity run by Nicaragua’s most powerful oligarchic family, the Chamorro Foundation.

Among the most prominent recipients of the millions USAID plowed through the Chamorro Foundation was the opposition media outlet 100% Noticias.

In July 2018, The Grayzone editor Max Blumenthal visited the offices of 100% Noticias in Managua. There, he met with Miguel Mora, the station’s director, who declared openly that he wished for a US invasion of his country to remove its elected president, Daniel Ortega:

Miguel Mora: And what I see in the United States is it doing a Noriega-style operation, in Panama. They come, they grab the [Ortega] family, they take them out. And the army is not involved. In two days, 24 hours, this is solved, if this US intervention took place.

So what I see, instead of the US giving weapons, like what it did with the Contras, they come, and do a Noriega-style operation. That is a scenario that you can’t rule out.

While Mora called for a US military invasion of his country, his US government-funded network sent its reporter Lucía Pineda Ubau out to the barricades, known as tranques, where she provided armed opposition activists with a national platform to call for the death of Nicaragua’s president and vice president.

US media and elite press freedom NGOs have not only overlooked the open calls for violence and assassination by US government-funded media activists in Nicaragua; they have lionized these coup-plotting propagandists as heroic front-line journalistic freedom fighters.

During its 2019 awards gala, the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) excluded jailed Wikileaks publisher Julian Assange from its list of jailed journalists.

At the same ceremony, the CPJ gave its international press freedom award to Miguel Mora and Lucía Pineda Ubau of the right-wing Nicaraguan TV outlet 100% Noticias.

Before the awards ceremony, Mora and Pineda were granted a special meeting with Vice President Mike Pence.

In celebrating Mora and Pineda as courageous truth tellers persecuted by a repressive government, the Committee to Protect Journalists left out a few crucial facts.

In reality, the two played a key role in the chaos that rocked Nicaragua in 2018, relentlessly spreading fake news, while calling for insurrectionist violence against the government and its supporters.

During the 2018 US-backed coup in Nicaragua, 100% Noticias was the main propaganda channel of the violent elements that attempted to overthrow the country’s elected Sandinista government by force.

Early on in the coup attempt, Mora went on air to spread fake news, claiming President Ortega had already given up and was fleeing the country, and that leftist Sandinista supporters were also going to be forced into exile or face legal persecution:

Miguel Mora: He [Ortega] already surrendered! He already sought protection for him and his family. Only them. Not the others. The others are going to be prisoners. The others are going to have to leave the country. They are going to have to face judgment.

Mora’s call for a US military invasion was echoed on air by Oscar Renee Vargas, a popular opposition pundit who clamored for the US Southern Command to orchestrate a coup against President Ortega or invade to overthrow him through a Panama-style operation:

Oscar Rene Vargas: But there’s another third exit that can be done. Here we always have to remember that there is not just pressure from the US, or from the different governments from Latin America and Europe, against the government, against the executive power.

It is also against the army. The army is also pressured, And we have to remember that the army has a very privileged relationship with US Southern Command.

And the letter, we have to remember the letter from Humberto Ortega (Daniel’s brother), before this crisis began, which called on US Southcom, saying we have to find an exit here.

Here, this exit can be a coup d’etat. And the coup d’etat is going to require that the army disarm the paramilitaries. And that is also immediate.

And the fourth possibility that I see, which is always immediate, is the Noriega-style exit, that they (the US military) comes, they intervene, there are deaths, etc., wounded people and all that, to resolve the problem in Nicaragua.

Because the problem in Nicaragua is not just a problem in Nicaragua, but has transformed into a regional problem. And there are statements by different US senators, among them Marco Rubio, they have said that the problem in Nicaragua is a problem for US national security.

On 100% Noticias, Vargas even urged anti-Sandinista forces to storm the presidential residence, kill the president, die by the hundreds doing so, and hang his body in public:

Oscar Rene Vargas: But an immediate removal [of Ortega] can also be the following, the second option that can happen, is that the people, in one of these marches, which we participate in, they say, let’s go to El Carmen (the presidential house), and even if there are 200, 300, 400 deaths, it resolves it.

That would be another immediate exit, because we don’t know what is going to happen. That is, that they grab him [Ortega] and hang him, like what happened with Mussolini. Or they are able to kill 500 of them…

While Mora manned the broadcast studio, Pineda went into the field to provide anti-Sandinista elements with their own regime-change reality show, complete with a soundtrack of action music droning in the background.

And here she is in Monimbo, a Masaya neighborhood that was blockaded by anti-Sandinista elements, including armed men.

It was in Monimbo where an unarmed community police officer named Gabriel Vado was kidnapped, dragged to death from the back of a truck, and burned on camera by opposition hooligans.

Vado’s wife, Karla Torres Hernández, declared in a public complaint against Mora that she personally held him responsible for her husband’s death.

Blumenthal interviewed Vado’s wife in July 2018, just days after his murder, at the Jinotepe police station where she worked as a community officer:

Karla Torres Hernández: They dragged him through all the streets, lacerating part of his body. They tortured him; they shot him in the legs several times. His hands, all cut… That is not done by a normal person. That is never justified. I hope God brings us justice.

Nora McCurdy: Have any human rights organizations talked with you?

Karla Torres Hernández: Not one. Nobody, not one.

Max Blumenthal: Not one human rights group?

Karla Torres Hernández: None.

Max Blumenthal: Not one talked with you?

Karla Torres Hernández: Nobody.

Max Blumenthal: Why?

Karla Torres Hernández: I would say, they only do what is good for them. That could be why. They aren’t truly fair.

Mora and Pineda were ultimately jailed for six months on charges of inciting violence and hatred. They were released thanks to heavy pressure from the US government and NGOs like the Committee to Protect Journalists.

In 2012, Pineda was a guest of the US military at its Southern Command base in Doral, Florida, known as Southcom. The base is responsible for contingency planning and military collaboration in Central America.

Southcom was a central node in the training of the US-backed Contras that attempted to destabilize and overthrow Nicaragua’s Sandinista government during the 1980s.

Pineda visited the US military base as part of a larger group of Nicaraguan opposition journalists who were invited by Southcom and accompanied by the US embassy.

But don’t expect elite press freedom NGOs or the US media to scrutinize these extremist political arsonists. Anti-Sandinista media propagandists like Miguel Mora and Lucía Pineda Ubau are funded by the US government, which means they are above criticism in the eyes of Washington’s proxies in the human rights industry and media.

The Committee to Protect Journalists is itself backed by billionaire foundations and big corporations to celebrate coup-plotters like Mora and Pineda as persecuted heroes, while ignoring the plight of Julian Assange, one of the most high profile prisoners of the UK’s national security state.

Shepard Smith: Earlier this evening we celebrated the release from prison of our colleagues from Nicaragua. The award that CPJ gives to imprisoned journalists has a remarkable success rate, but the record isn’t perfect. There’s more to do.

Nicaragua Celebrates its Revolution While the US Plans New Sanctions Against It

Nicaragua & Sandinismo — Nicaragua Celebrates its Revolution While the US Plans New Sanctions Against It

Nicaragua Celebrates its Revolution While the US Plans New Sanctions Against It

Article 3 of 14

By Roger Harris

Originally published at https://www.counterpunch.org/2023/07/31/nicaragua-celebrates-its-revolution-while-the-us-plans-new-sanctions-against-it/

Publication Date: July 31, 2023

Sandinista youth celebrates the revolution. Photo: Richard Harris.

“We are fighting against the Yankee enemy of humanity,” explained Nicaraguan Vice President Rosario Murillo, setting the tone of the 44th anniversary celebration of their revolution.

Later, her husband Daniel Ortega, the country’s president, elaborated in his hour and a half address: “When we use the term Yankee we mean those who have a racist, imperialist attitude, which is not the case with the US people…Indisputably, given the weight of the capitalist system, the weight of the military-industrial complex will bend any president, who despite many promises he makes then comes to occupy the presidency of the US.”

Demonstration of the trust of the president with the people

I was among the few hundred invited “internationals” along with thousands of Nicaraguans, including a large and spirited youth contingent, who had boarded buses to the Roberto Clemente baseball stadium for the anniversary celebration on July 19.

Security was less than at your average convenience store in the States. There were no metal detectors, no checking of IDs, or even searches of backpacks when we arrived. We were seated literally within a stone’s throw of where the political leadership of Nicaragua would sit when they arrived an hour later.

In a demonstration of the trust of the president with the people, at the end of the ceremonies Ortega simply waded out into what amounted to a mosh pit of well-wishers to press the flesh and take selfies (see here at 4:25:59ff).

Then Daniel, as he is affectionately called, left the way he had come, driving his own car. The rest of the people lingered to socialize and celebrate as they had in the days immediately leading to the anniversary. If Nicaragua is a police state, as reported in the US corporate press, it was hardly apparent at this important national event.

Biden visits my neighborhood

In contrast to the popular celebration in Nicaragua, the president of my own country stealthily slipped in and out of my sleepy bedroom community north of San Francisco just a month before. In the days immediately before his visitation, low-flying NORAD fighter jets loudly asserted full spectrum dominance over the hot tubs and manicured lawns of Marin County. Shielded from the public, my president came and went in a massive Osprey military helicopter.

In a quintessentially US-style exercise of democracy, colloquially known as a “fund-raiser” – not to be confused with the crude corruption of so-called banana republics – Joe Biden privately met with a select short list of obscenely wealthy people at an undisclosed location. There they had the opportunity to directly buy influence with the government to perpetuate their privileged positions.

Biden had secured his election in 2020 with a record high $14.4 billion campaign cost, an amount equivalent to Nicaragua’s entire GDP. That money bought 51% of the electorate with a turnout of 67%.

Yet, Biden calls Nicaragua a dictatorship. However, a landslide 76% of the Nicaraguan electorate chose Ortega in their 2021 national election with six freely competing parties and a comparable turnout of 65%, despite US calls for an electoral boycott.

The most recent July poll data for Biden and Ortega reflect their popularity with their respective constituents: 39%approval rating for the US president and 79% for his Nicaraguan counterpart.

Reliving the revolutionary tradition through song

For most of the young Nicaraguan population with a median age of 24 years, the 1979 victory by the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) over the US-backed Somoza dictatorship was an event of the distant past. The FSLN name commemorates the even older Nicaraguan resistance to the US occupation, led by Augusto César Sandino in the 1930s. But theirs is a popular and ongoing revolution.

As Vice President Rosario Murillo clarified after almost an hour of music, “We have reached this 44/19 [anniversary date] with so much song in our hearts… we are…the original heroes, the warriors who live within us all, the eternal fighters.”

For a good part of the celebration on the 19th, both youth and their 77-year-old former guerilla leader were on their feet reliving the revolutionary tradition by singing the “songs of life and hope” that organically came out of that struggle. President Ortega described how, through music, the singing of the youth forges revolutionary consciousness.

Especially now that the country is recovering from the 2018 failed US-backed coup attempt, the revolutionary tradition is being invigorated with new popular songs as the nation rebuilds and repairs the public hospitals, schools, and municipal facilities that had been attacked.

Ortega’s speech

President Ortega recalled the long history of US intervention and opposition to democracy in Nicaragua. “Reagan stood up,” he recollected, “and even said ‘I am a Contra.’ Nothing strange, logically, that Reagan was a Contra. The strange thing would have been if Reagan had not been a Contra.” The Contras were the US-backed counter-revolutionary terrorists recruited from the remnants of Somoza’s national guard.

Ortega paid tribute to the martyred presidents of Burkina Faso and Libya, Thomas Sankara and Muammar Gaddafi, both of whom had stood in solidarity with the Sandinista cause. The current prime minister of Burkina Faso was the honored international speaker at the celebration.

The stories were retold, and tribute paid to the national heroes and heroines of Nicaragua, starting with the first Indigenous resistance to “Spanish imperialism.” The president further paid tribute to the youth, calling them the “fruit of the Sandinista Revolution” and a “divine treasure.”

Ortega invited two young people from Puerto Rico to the podium. They had earlier given him a baseball with “21” on it, the number that Roberto Clemente wore. Clemente is considered a national hero in Nicaragua. The Puerto Rican baseball player died in a plane crash bringing aid to Nicaragua after a devastating earthquake during the Somoza dictatorship. Ortega also took the opportunity to affirm Puerto Rico’s fight to be free and independent.

Ortega commented on the recent joint meeting of the European Union (EU) with the 33 nations of Latin America and the Caribbean, comprising the regional CELAC organization. He celebrated CELAC’s resistance to the retrograde initiatives of the EU.

The EU failed to get a censure of Russia in the Ukraine conflict. Also, the “Nazi president,” in Ortega’s words, of Ukraine was excluded from the meeting, much to the chagrin of the EU. However, the EU succeeded in vetoing a resolution condemning the US for sending cluster bombs to Ukraine, even though the EU supposedly has banned them.

Ortega concluded: “the solidarity of the peoples is firmly maintained even in the most difficult moments, and we see and feel it every day.”

US considering new sanctions to destabilize Nicaragua

Meanwhile, a bi-partisan bill, co-sponsored by Republican Marco Rubio and Hillary Clinton’s vice presidential running mate Tim Kaine, calls for a new salvo of economic sanctions and psychological warfare to achieve regime-change in Nicaragua.

The Trump administration first sanctioned Nicaragua in 2018. The subsequent US administration has not only renewed, but has extended and intensified the unilateral coercive measures. Once in office, Biden banned importing Nicaraguan gold and sugar, their two largest export commodities.

The new legislation would further stifle trade by Nicaragua with the US, cutting off beef and coffee exports. Likewise, restrictions on access to international financing for development projects, which were already severely limited by the 2021 RENACER Act, would be tightened to try to asphyxiate the economy.

The bill also calls for Nicaragua to repeal its own 2020 foreign agents law, which was patterned after similar US legislation and is designed to protect this small nation from outside interference into its internal affairs.

Most egregiously, Washington claims that Nicaragua poses an extraordinary security threat to the US, when in reality the opposite is the case. Yet in the face of sanctions designed to crush it, Nicaragua defiantly celebrates and continues its revolution.

Roger Harris is on the board of the Task Force on the Americas, a 32-year-old anti-imperialist human rights organization.

From Nicaraguan revolutionaries to US embassy informants: How Washington recruited ex-Sandinistas like Dora María Téllez and her MRS party

Nicaragua & Sandinismo — From Nicaraguan revolutionaries to US embassy informants: How Washington recruited ex-Sandinistas like Dora María Téllez and her MRS party

From Nicaraguan revolutionaries to US embassy informants: How Washington recruited ex-Sandinistas like Dora María Téllez and her MRS party

Article 4 of 14

The Grayzone

By Ben Norton

Originally published at https://thegrayzone.com/2021/11/05/nicaragua-us-informant-dora-maria-tellez-mrs/

Publication Date: November 5, 2021

The story of how Nicaragua’s former guerrilla Dora María Téllez and her anti-Sandinista MRS party allied with the right wing and became coup-supporting informants for the US embassy.

(Lire cet article en français ici.)

One of the most high-profile opponents of Nicaragua’s Sandinista government points to her revolutionary youth to justify her position. And while the international media constantly sings her praise, what it does not mention is that she abandoned revolutionary politics long ago, and has become a key asset in the US government’s campaign of unconventional warfare against Nicaragua.

When she was just 22-years-old, Dora María Téllez fought as a guerrilla in Nicaragua’s Sandinista Revolution, alongside current President Daniel Ortega. But she broke with Sandinismo over two decades ago, and has steadily drifted toward the US-backed right wing.

Téllez is a key figure in a group of former revolutionaries, many from elite, upper-class backgrounds, who cohered as a right-wing split out of the socialist Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) in the 1990s. Together, they formed a centrist political party called the Sandinista Renovation Movement (Movimiento Renovador Sandinista, or MRS), trading on their revolutionary histories to advance a neoliberal counter-revolution.

Under the leadership of Téllez and her colleagues, the MRS developed a close relationship with Nicaragua’s rightist oligarchy. It also collaborated extensively with the United States government, working with neoconservative members of Congress and Miami’s regime-change lobby, all while raking in funding from US interventionist organizations.

Classified State Department cables published by WikiLeaks and analyzed by The Grayzone show that Téllez and fellow leaders of her MRS party have frequently met with the US embassy and served as informants for years.

In regular meetings with US officials, Téllez, Sergio Ramírez, Hugo Torres Jiménez, Victor Hugo Tinoco, and other top MRS figures provided the United States with intelligence about the FSLN and internal Nicaraguan politics, in an attempt to prevent the Sandinistas from returning to power. They then helped Washington try to destabilize the government of President Daniel Ortega after he won the 2006 election.

The embassy clearly stated that “the USG [US government] position [is] that the MRS is a viable and constructive option, with whom the United States would maintain good relations.”

The embassy added approvingly, “if the MRS can shift votes from the FSLN and garner some of the undecided vote, it is still a viable option — and could be the key to preventing an Ortega win.”

Today, Téllez and her MRS are openly allied with the right wing – even as she and her followers cynically exploit her former revolutionary bona fides to divide left-wing support for the Sandinistas and confuse progressive observers outside of the country.

The MRS played a key role in a violent coup attempt in Nicaragua in 2018, in which extremist forces backed by the United States paralyzed the nation by erecting barricades, called tranques, while they hunted down, tortured, and murdered Sandinista activists.

With substantial funding from CIA cutouts dedicated to promoting regime change, MRS leaders helped organize and lead the failed putsch. And they used their influential positions in the media, NGO sector, and academia to craft how the violent operation was marketed to the rest of the world.

In terms of pan-Latin American politics, Dora María Téllez and the MRS likewise became a reliable ally of the region’s right wing.

MRS rhetoric is almost indistinguishable from that of Marco Rubio and the Florida lobby. The anti-Sandinista party demonizes Cuba’s socialist government as a “totalitarian” “dictatorship,” while collaborating closely with counter-revolutionary Cuban activists.

When Washington and neo-fascist Christian fundamentalist oligarchs sponsored a far-right military coup in Bolivia in 2019, Ortega’s Sandinista government staunchly opposed and condemned the plot, standing firmly with elected Bolivian President Evo Morales.

The MRS party, on the other hand, publicly supported the Bolivia coup, falsely accusing Morales of electoral “fraud” and stating that the putsch was an inspiration for Nicaraguans who wanted to overthrow their own government.

Téllez personally cheered on the coup, smearing Morales as a wannabe dictator and claiming Bolivia was “better” with him overthrown. Her MRS colleague Hugo Torres Jiménez, another ex-revolutionary turned right-wing coup-supporter, also praised the violent, undemocratic ouster of Morales.

El MRS saluda, y siente como propia, la victoria del pueblo boliviano que ha logrado la renuncia de Evo Morales quien contrarió la voluntad popular de no más reelección, del reférendum de 2016 y ejecutó un fraude electoral en las elecciones recién pasadas. Adelante Bolivia!! pic.twitter.com/UwJoAfbmmJ

— Unamos (@unamosnica) November 10, 2019

Téllez declared with glee that the coup in Bolivia had “terrified” the Sandinista government, and expressed hope that Nicaraguan military officers would be inspired to launch a putsch of their own. The MRS leader lauded the US-dominated Organization of American States (OAS) and its hyper-interventionist leader Luis Almagro, calling on him to expel Nicaragua.

Téllez told AFP that the Bolivia coup set a positive example that could scare the Sandinista government. She then conducted an interview with US government-funded opposition outlet Confidencial titled, “Dora María Téllez: ‘The Ortega-Murillo [family] are demoralized by the exit of Evo Morales’.”

After the coup against Morales, Nicaragua is “demoralized, desperate, isolated, battered,” she gloated. And what happened in “Bolivia tells them that this model is not viable.”

Téllez expressed hope that the “Bolivia syndrome” would send a message to the leaders of the Nicaraguan military to launch a putsch of their own, claiming “there is a very important part of the officer corps that” is not as loyal to Sandinismo.

Téllez and her MRS colleagues have taken an even more hardline position toward Venezuela. While the administration of President Ortega has steadfastly supported Venezuela’s leftist Chavista government against numerous US coup attempts, the MRS openly advocates for the overthrow of the Venezuelan government, dubbing it a “dictatorship.”

Hugo Torres published a video on the MRS’ social media platforms praising the Donald Trump administration for absurdly accusing Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro of drug trafficking, while referring to Venezuela as a “terrorist state.”

Téllez, too, has relentlessly demonized the elected government of President Maduro as a “dictatorship,” calling for it to be toppled.

Téllez even expressed support for Washington’s Venezuelan puppet Juan Guaidó and far-right opposition oligarch Leopoldo López, proclaiming, “We are walking together.”

Pendientes y solidarios con el pueblo venezolano que avanza a la libertad. Caminamos juntos. https://t.co/HeqLvDLIfI

— Dora María Téllez (@DoraMTellez) April 30, 2019

By 2020, Téllez and her MRS party had moved so far to the right that they decided to drop any pretense of fidelity to Sandinismo, removing all references to the Sandinista movement from their platform and changing the name of the Sandinista Renovation Movement to the Unión Democrática Renovadora (Democratic Renovation Union), or UNAMOS.

UNAMOS has openly praised right-wing Latin American leaders, such as Ecuador’s multimillionaire banker-turned-president, Guillermo Lasso.

All the while, Téllez and her UNAMOS colleagues have publicly lobbied the US government and European Union for more aggressive sanctions on their own country, which have already damaged the nation’s economy.

In 2021, the Nicaraguan government arrested a series of MRS leaders, including Téllez, Hugo Torres Jiménez, and Victor Hugo Tinoco. An investigation by The Grayzone shows that each of these figures has been a US embassy informant for at least 15 years, according to State Department cables.

Nicaragua also ordered the arrest of founding MRS president Sergio Ramírez, who has for decades served as a US government informant, a fact confirmed by the classified documents. (Ramírez lives in Costa Rica, so he was not apprehended.)

The detainees were charged with “inciting foreign interference in internal affairs, requesting military interventions, plotting with the funding of foreign powers to carry out acts of terrorism and destabilization,” and “demanding, praising, and applauding the imposition of sanctions on the State of Nicaragua and its citizens.”

These opposition figures were arrested under Nicaragua’s law 1055, which was approved by the country’s democratically elected National Assembly in December 2020. Titled “Defense of the Rights of the People to Independence, Sovereignty, and Self-Determination for Peace,” many of the world’s governments have legislation similar to this Nicaraguan law, forbidding citizens from coup-plotting, treason, and conspiring with foreign nations to attack their nation.

The detention of Téllez and the MRS leaders led to a wave of denunciations from Western governments, corporate media outlets, and even some left-wing activists and intellectuals who had supported the Sandinista Revolution in the 1980s but later turned against it.

Critics exploited the arrests to craft a warped narrative, accusing the Sandinista government of President Daniel Ortega and Vice President Rosario Murillo of having abandoned their leftist roots by arresting historic revolutionaries.

But the reality is the complete opposite: participants in the failed coup attempt such as Téllez and her MRS party broke with Sandinismo decades ago and became loyal allies of the right wing, and the United States, ever since.

Washington responded to Nicaragua’s arrest of two dozen US government-sponsored, coup-plotting opposition leaders by imposing a new round sanctions on the Central American nation, and by attacking the legitimacy of its November 7 elections. The administration of President Joseph Biden made it clear it would refuse to recognize the results of the vote.

At a special October session of the Organization of American States (OAS), convened for the sole purpose of condemning Nicaragua, the Sandinista government defended itself against these accusations by stating, “In our country there is not a single detained candidate, not one; not a single innocent is prosecuted, not one. Those who are being subjected to legal processes are foreign agents, plainly identified within the payrolls of foreign governments, who, using the structures of private organizations, received millions of dollars to destroy, kill, bankrupt the economy, and subvert the constitutional order.”

While Western governments and corporate media outlets have condemned statements like these as propaganda, what Nicaragua said is factually correct. It is a matter of public record that those detained received millions of dollars in funding from the United States and European states, and subsequently used that money to organize a coup attempt, violating numerous laws on foreign agents, money laundering, and treason.

Moreover, the accusations made by the Nicaraguan judicial system, which maintains that the MRS leaders it arrested had conspired with a foreign power in a bid to overthrow their government, are confirmed by numerous classified US State Department cables released by WikiLeaks.

State Department cables expose Dora María Téllez and fellow MRS leaders as US government informants

The Movimiento Renovador Sandinista party that Dora María Téllez helped found has enjoyed support from the US government for at least 15 years.

In the lead-up to Nicaragua’s 2006 national elections, when Téllez served as president of the MRS, the party chose the former mayor of the capital Managua, Herty Lewites, to serve as its presidential candidate. Lewites showed little commitment to any coherent political ideology, but he was charismatic and had a base of support.

That February, Lewites met with the US ambassador for breakfast. The former Sandinista wanted to reassure Washington that, if his party won the upcoming November elections, it would maintain close relations with the United States – the very country that had supported far-right Contra death squads and waged a brutal terror war against Nicaragua.

Lewites was once part of the Sandinista movement, but when the FSLN lost power in 1990, he initiated a series of alliances with the right wing and became a businessman. He went on to create an aquatic park, and, never one for modesty, named it after himself: Hertylandia.

By the time 2006 rolled around, Lewites was a bitter rival of the Sandinista Front, and explicitly preferred the right winning over Daniel Ortega return to power.

A State Department cable titled “Herty seeks cordial, constructive, cooperative relations with the United States” made it clear that the MRS presidential candidate was more than happy to ally with Washington against his former comrades in the FSLN.

“Lewites was effusive in his desire to maintain cordial, constructive, and cooperative relations with the United States,” the embassy wrote contently. It added that, “if he is elected, he will request a high-level U.S. delegation to attend his inauguration to demonstrate that the two governments will be strong allies.”

Lewites told Washington he approved of its attacks on Ortega, and insisted that “the Ambassador and other officials [should] continue to strike hard against Ortega.”

The MRS candidate not only sought close ties to the country that had repeatedly invaded and militarily occupied Nicaragua; he also supported neoliberal economic policies. The cable happily noted that “Lewites was unequivocal in his support for CAFTA,” the Central America Free Trade Agreement imposed on the region by the George W. Bush administration.

Lewites reassured the ambassador that his ideal vision for an MRS-led government in Nicaragua would be textbook neoliberal, run by “young technocrats,” with “cuts in government fat” and pro-corporate policies to attract “foreign investment.” He promised that his “consensus government” would be a centrist “balance” between the left wing and right wing.

The embassy cable revealed that almost all of the funding for Lewites’ presidential campaign came from outside Nicaragua, mostly from wealthy oligarchs and corporations in Panama, Costa Rica, Guatemala, and El Salvador.

It also noted that Lewites had been meeting with fellow presidential candidate Eduardo Montealegre, a fanatically right-wing and notoriously corrupt, Harvard-educated multi-millionaire banker. Lewites and Montealegre hoped to come together in an anti-Sandinista alliance to prevent Ortega from becoming president again.

Lewites had in fact publicly called for this cooperation with the right in a 2005 interview on the US government-funded media program Esta Semana. The MRS candidate admitted he had repeatedly asked Montealegre to make a “public agreement” with him so they could push through constitutional reforms that would make it almost impossible for the Sandinistas to return to power.

“Remarking that he will not be upset if Montealegre wins the election because he knows Montealegre will also lead the nation forward, Lewites argued that the two need one another,” the US embassy wrote after its February 2006 meeting. “He believes that between the two of them they can gain the 56 National Assembly seats required for much-needed constitutional reforms. Lewites hopes to sign some sort of pre-election commitment with Montealegre agreeing to work together if either of them wins the presidency.”

Lewites’ call for a pact with Montealegre was highly hypocritical, because the MRS had endlessly criticized, and capitalized on, a short-term agreement that Ortega’s Sandinista Front had made with Liberal former President Arnoldo Aléman, known as the “pacto,” in order to rewrite electoral law to allow presidential candidates to win in the first round if they had more than 35% of the vote.

But this was just the first instance in a long record of the MRS party openly allying with and supporting Montealegre, one of the most infamous right-wing oligarchs in Nicaragua.

Lewites unexpectedly died of a heart attack in July 2006. His vice-presidential pick, Edmundo Jarquín, became the MRS’ new presidential candidate in the November elections, and ultimately got just 6% of the vote.

From then on, the MRS continued to lurch further and further to the right. And the party’s leaders collaborated more and more closely with the United States.

A September 2006 State Department cable, titled “MRS: ‘We want to bring Ortega down,’” is one of the clearest examples of the US government supporting the Sandinista Renovation Movement party.

The document reveals that after the death of Herty Lewites, his nephew Israel Lewites, the spokesman of the MRS party, met with the embassy’s polcouns (political counselor) and doubled down on his request for Washington’s support.

“The MRS is the only viable option for the 2006 election,” Israel Lewites insisted. Desperate to maintain US backing, “Lewites emphasized that the MRS would never return to an FSLN controlled by Ortega.”

In turn, the embassy’s “Polcouns reiterated the USG [US government] position that the MRS is a viable and constructive option, with whom the United States would maintain good relations.”

Israel Lewites “made a point of mentioning to poloffs [the political officer] that he had studied in the United States (at the University of Texas in Arlington) and believes in ‘the American dream’ and supports responsible capitalism — since it so clearly benefited him,” the embassy wrote happily.

The MRS spokesperson did however acknowledge that the party’s presidential candidate, Jarquín, was having trouble gaining traction. (The cable noted, for instance, that “Jarquin expressed his support for legalizing elective abortions, a procedure opposed by a large majority of Nicaraguans.”)

But Washington still clearly saw the MRS as useful in its crusade against Ortega: “Though current polls show Jarquin in third place, if the MRS can shift votes from the FSLN and garner some of the undecided vote, it is still a viable option — and could be the key to preventing an Ortega win,” the embassy hoped.

The document also revealed that the US government’s International Republican Institute (IRI), a sibling of CIA cutout the National Endowment for Democracy, had trained roughly 30% of MRS party poll watchers for the 2006 elections. (IRI has been used to fund coups and regime-change operations across Latin America and the world, targeting elected left-wing leaders like Haiti’s President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.)

The State Department evidently considered this cable on the MRS to be very valuable, because it forwarded it to the CIA, DIA, National Security Council, secretary of state, and US embassy in Venezuela.

But this is just one of a dozen cables showing how the United States has worked with leaders of Nicaragua’s MRS party to destabilize the Sandinista government of President Ortega.

In November 2006, Dora María Téllez met with US diplomats as well. It was the eve of the elections, and she was worried that the Sandinista Front might return to power.

A classified State Department cable, titled “Dora María Téllez concerned about fraud, possible FSLN government,” reveals that the former revolutionary was conspiring with the US embassy in Nicaragua to try to prevent the Sandinista Front from returning to power in that month’s elections.

At the time, Téllez was president of the Movimiento Renovador Sandinista, and a candidate to be a deputy in the National Assembly.

In her rendezvous with the US embassy’s “Polcouns and Poloff” – political counselor and political officer, respectively – Téllez was joined by Israel Lewites, the MRS spokesman.

“Tellez has often been critical of U.S. policies, but showed an apparent openness to discuss issues with emboffs and to pursue future meetings,” the State Department wrote after the engagement, using an abbreviation for “embassy officers.”

It added that Téllez “told emboffs that she would be interested in encouraging dialogue between MRS members and the United States.”

“Tellez, who says she has a cousin in the United States and a nephew fighting in Iraq, stated that she does not have an issue with the United States, but believes that Nicaraguans often manipulate Americans to do ‘their dirty work,'” the cable noted.

In the meeting, Téllez provided the US embassy with intelligence about the inner workings of Nicaraguan political parties, and accused the Sandinista Front of planning to win the election through supposed “fraud.”

This State Department cable was classified by the George W. Bush administration’s ambassador to Nicaragua, Paul A. Trivelli, who helped lead a full-scale meddling operation in a failed bid to tilt the 2006 election against Daniel Ortega.

Trivelli threatened that Washington would destabilize Nicaragua if Ortega won. The US embassy used hundreds of millions in USAID dollars as leverage to essentially bribe people to vote against the FSLN, while heavily pressuring anti-Sandinista parties to unite against Ortega.

Despite the US intervention campaign, Ortega and the Sandinista Front won the 2006 election, while the presidential candidate from Téllez’s MRS, Edmundo Jarquín, barely eked out 6 percent of the vote. (In subsequent elections, the MRS’ support base shrunk even further.)

Following Ortega’s victory, files published by WikiLeaks show how Téllez continued her role as an informant for Washington, providing it with sensitive information in an attempt to destabilize the new Sandinista government.

Another State Department cable classified by Ambassador Trivelli in January 2007 shows that Téllez and MRS leaders met with the embassy for a “cocktail” meeting that was “relaxed and cordial.”

Titled “MRS loses caucus status but continues as most vocal opposition group,” the document reveals that Téllez was joined at the meeting with US emboffs (embassy officers) by the failed MRS presidential candidate Jarquín, National Assembly member Enrique Saenz, and party co-founder Luis Carrion.

It is noteworthy that the US embassy chose to meet with these MRS leaders at a cocktail event, highlighting their shared elite backgrounds.

Carrion is the son of a wealthy banker from a powerful family, and Saenz has long been in the foreign NGO sector, working for the European Union and United Nations.

Jarquin is married to the ultra-rich oligarch Claudia Chamorro Barrios (a daughter of the US-backed right-wing President Violeta Barrios de Chamorro). He worked for more than a decade at the neoliberal Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) in Washington, DC after the Sandinistas lost power in 1990.

The elite background of these MRS leaders clearly reflected the base of the party, which back then and still today has been with upper-middle and upper-class Nicaraguans, highly educated, fluent in English, with opportunities to travel, and lucrative jobs (paid in dollars) in the non-profit industrial complex, academia, and media.

The Sandinista Front, on the other hand, has always remained firmly associated with poor and working-class Nicaraguans, with its base in impoverished barrios where residents didn’t even have paved roads in the 1990-2007 neoliberal era, and in rural areas where people did not have electricity or potable water.

In fact, the anti-Sandinista opposition is notorious for mocking FSLN supporters with classist tropes, claiming Sandinista Youth militants are uneducated and demeaning them for not being able to correctly pronounce English words.

In their friendly 2007 cocktail meeting with the US embassy, MRS leaders provided the foreign diplomats with sensitive information about the inner workings of Nicaraguan politics.

The WikiLeaks document shows that Téllez fed Washington intelligence about the country’s police commissioner and police chief.

Yet these two meetings were by no means the only times representatives from Nicaragua’s MRS party met and conspired with the US government. The cozy relationship continued well beyond.

A US government cable from April 2007, titled “MRS focused on legislative agenda, municipal elections,” reveals that the party’s National Assembly deputies Enrique Saenz and Hugo Torres, along with Torres’ alternate Victor Hugo Tinoco, had met that March with the embassy’s political officer, as well as analysts from the Bureau of Intelligence and Research (INR), the intelligence agency of the US State Department.

The MRS leaders gave the foreign diplomats information about the newly elected Sandinista government and the MRS’ plans to undermine it, which they deemed an “authoritarian project.”

Torres fed the US government officials intelligence about the Nicaraguan military, which he hoped could be used to undermine the elected president.

“Torres commented that he holds hope for the future of the military,” the embassy wrote. “Omar Halleslevens, Chief of the Nicaraguan Army, and Torres were schoolmates and Torres respects him. He believes that Halleslevens will be able to stand up to Ortega.”

Saenz, the other MRS lawmaker, reassured the embassy “that Nicaraguans recognize the importance of the relationship with the United States.”

Torres’ collaboration with the US government continued for years. Another State Department cable from July 2008 shows Torres providing Washington with detailed analysis of the inner workings of the Sandinista government.

In June 2021, Torres and Tinoco were arrested on charges of conspiring with and taking funding from foreign powers to destabilize the government, in violation of the sovereignty law 1055.

While Washington claimed the charges were baseless and politically motivated, its own classified State Department cables, published by WikiLeaks, tell a totally different story.

Founding MRS leader Sergio Ramírez has served as US embassy informant for decades

Washington’s collaboration with MRS leaders goes all the way up to the founding president of the party, Sergio Ramírez Mercado, who has in fact served as a US government informant for decades.

Ramírez had been an elite member of Nicaragua’s intelligentsia under the US-backed dictatorship of Anastasio Somoza. Although he played no role in the armed struggle, he supported the Sandinista Revolution, and as a conciliatory symbol was selected as Ortega’s vice president from 1985 until the Sandinistas lost power in 1990.

Like many other wealthy Nicaraguans who had joined the Sandinista Front out of opportunism, Ramírez took a turn to the right in the 1990s. He and Dora María Téllez, among others, created the MRS as a right-wing factional split out of the FSLN in 1995.

Ramírez led the party until Téllez took over from 1998 to 2007. He ran as the MRS’ first presidential candidate, in the 1996 election, earning just about 1% of the vote.

Although he served as the leader of the MRS for a mere three years, the party was so closely associated with Ramírez – and his self-importance was so notorious – that Nicaraguans joke that he named it after himself: MRS is the inversion of his initials, SRM.

Hardly any average working-class Nicaraguans supported Ramírez and his MRS. However, he had the ear of the US government – and internal documents published by WikiLeaks show that he has served as a US government informant since at least 1978.

In January 2007, mere days after President Ortega returned to power, Ramírez met with the US ambassador, Trivelli, for a friendly tete-a-tete.

A classified State Department cable titled “Ex-Sandinista VP Sergio Ramirez: Recent Ortega actions do not auger well for Nicaragua” shows that Ramírez provided the US ambassador with valuable intelligence about Ortega’s cabinet picks and the newly elected president’s relationship with the military and police.

“Ramirez lauded the USG’s [US government’s] approach towards President Ortega,” the document stated contently.

The MRS leader’s rendezvous with the ambassador was also apparently aimed at generating more financial pressure on Managua from Washington. The report recounted that “Ramirez noted the important role of international donors, who must hold Ortega accountable.” He stressed the influence that European Union economic aid to Nicaragua had gained over the neoliberal period, and said “the EU and a number of member countries should tie their assistance to” political demands.

In the meeting, Ramírez flaunted his right-wing stripes, attacking the democratically elected government of Venezuela’s President Hugo Chávez and claiming he was a secret puppet master who “calls the shots” in Nicaragua.

In the same vein, Ramírez demonized China, Iran, and Cuba – making it clear beyond a doubt that he was firmly on the side of the United States.

The embassy cable delightedly added that, before the 2006 election, Ramírez had publicly called on Nicaraguans to vote for neoliberal candidate Eduardo Montealegre, the corrupt right-wing multi-millionaire banker. It was just one episode in the long relationship between the MRS and Montealegre.

In May 2007, the US ambassador in Nicaragua hosted a dinner aimed at unifying the opposition, seeking to defeat the Sandinista Front in the 2008 municipal elections. Trivelli invited the banker Montealegre, former MRS presidential candidate Edmundo Jarquín, and Sergio Ramírez, among others.

A formerly classified cable reveals Washington’s plans to craft “The opposition’s recipe for success: A Montealegre-Jarquin-Rizo alliance.” The document shows that, in the May 3 “dinner hosted by the Ambassador, Montealegre and Jarquin deliberated opposition unity with five prominent Nicaraguan political analysts and Embassy officials.”

Ramírez was one of those five influential pundits. He dined alongside the US embassy’s PolCouns (political counselor) and deputy chief of mission (DCM), as well as figures from Nicaragua’s conservative and liberal movements.

Together, the anti-Sandinista opposition leaders blatantly conspired with the US government, plotting ways to weaken and ultimately overthrow the democratically elected administration of President Ortega.

In the dinner, MRS veteran Jarquin complained to the US diplomats that Ortega has a “visceral loathing of free market economies, and [an] ingrained dislike for the United States.”

Another WikiLeaks document from 2008 recalls a trip that the US State Department’s office director for Central American affairs, John Feeley, took to Nicaragua that March. Feeley met with Ramírez, who said he “supported the USG’s [US government’s] general engagement policy in Nicaragua.” (The cable also laments that “USAID’s democracy partners warned that a divided and weakened civil society is incapable of mounting organized opposition to Ortega.”)

These meetings in 2007 and 2008 were far from the first time Sergio Ramírez had served as a US government informant. Back in October 1978, on the eve of the Sandinista Revolution, he was already feeding inside information to Washington.

A State Department cable from that year shows that Ramírez had met with the US embassy and given it intelligence on the anti-Somoza opposition.

Ramírez was “open and friendly,” the embassy recalled. It emphasized that he was more than willing to compromise with “more moderate elements.”

“We plan to continue our direct contact with Ramirez,” the cable stated.

Ramírez’s role as a US government informant indeed continued from there. In August 1979, just a month after the triumph of the Sandinista Revolution, Ramírez reunited with the US ambassador, Lawrence Pezzullo, and provided him with intelligence on Nicaragua’s new revolutionary government, with an emphasis on its internal foreign policy debates and education strategy.

That November, the supposed revolutionary met with embassy staff and Florida Congressman Dante Fascell. Ramírez reassured Washington that the Sandinista government would not threaten the private sector, and called for boosting exports to the US.

Ramírez was also more than happy to throw Fidel Castro’s movement under the bus, insisting that “Nicaragua has no intention of becoming a new Cuba, and is, indeed, a little irradiated at this false accusation,” the embassy recalled.

These documents clearly show that Ramírez – the founding president of the MRS party – was never truly committed to the Sandinista Front’s socialist and anti-imperialist ideology. Instead, he opportunistically joined the Sandinista movement when it was ascendant; and when it lost power, he quickly abandoned it.

In September 2021, Nicaragua ordered the arrest of Ramírez, accusing him of conspiring with foreign governments to destabilize the country. The US government, grateful for the intelligence he had fed it for so long, immediately showed support for Ramírez, as did Spain, the former colonizer of Nicaragua.

Ramírez faced no consequences for his decades of collaboration with the US embassy, given that he lives in Costa Rica, a major US asset in the hybrid war on Nicaragua. But the wealthy Nicaraguan author did take advantage of the charges against him to become a regular fixture in the Western corporate media, frequently appearing on outlets from CNN to the BBC to demonize Nicaragua’s Sandinista government.

MRS leaders lobby neocons in Washington for more US meddling in Nicaragua

While the Movimiento Renovador Sandinista has never been able to get more than a few percent of the vote in national elections, it has significant influence in the non-profit sector, academia, and media, both inside and outside of Nicaragua.

This is largely because MRS leaders overwhelmingly come from wealthy, privileged backgrounds, and while they cannot connect with poor and working-class Nicaraguans, they are most comfortable rubbing elbows with politicians, think tanks policy-makers, and media pundits in the Global North.

Many MRS leaders run NGOs and media outlets that are funded by the US government, via the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and/or USAID.

A case study of these MRS leaders who are cultivated by elite Western institutions and turned into loyal neoliberal foot soldiers is Ana Margarita Vijil Gurdian, who served as president of the MRS from 2012 to 2017.

Vijil, who is Dora María Téllez’s longtime romantic partner, has enjoyed a jet-setting life of luxury, while the vast majority of Nicaraguans make very little money and could never afford to fly outside the country.

After she graduated from Nicaragua’s most elite private university, la Universidad Centroamericana (UCA), Vijil moved to the Netherlands, where she worked at the Hague and the notoriously corrupt Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) – which has been exposed by multiple whistleblowers to essentially be a tool used by Western governments to attack independent nations like Syria.

Vijil was then awarded a Fulbright Scholarship from the US State Department, which she used to secure a master’s degree in political science in Arizona.

After completing her US government-funded studies in the United States, Vijil returned to Nicaragua to try to enter politics as a hardcore anti-Sandinista activist. She soon climbed the ranks to become president of the MRS – the position once held by her mentor and life partner Téllez.

In her capacity as MRS president, in 2016, Vigil returned to the United States to lobby for Washington’s support for regime change in Nicaragua. There, Vigil met with neoconservative Florida Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, the former representative of hardcore right-wing anti-Cuba and anti-Venezuela elements in Miami.

Joining Vigil in the meeting with Ros-Lehtinen (standing to her right in the photo) was right-wing Nicaraguan activist Violeta Granera, an inveterate conservative and former World Bank official who comes from a powerful family that strongly supported the dictatorship of Anastasio Somoza.

Granera is a vocal advocate for the coup-plotting hard-right leader of the Organization of American States (OAS), Luis Almagro, who oversaw a military coup against Bolivia’s democratically elected socialist government in 2019, led by fascist extremists.

In June 2021, the Nicaraguan government detained Téllez, Vigil, and Granera, all on charges of conspiring with foreign governments to destabilize the country.

While the arrests of MRS leaders and other prominent coup-plotters were vociferously condemned by Western governments and the foreign corporate media, many Nicaraguans who survived the bloody 2018 putsch attempt that these opposition leaders orchestrated were in fact relieved.

Family members and friends of victims of the coup, whose loved ones were targeted, tortured, or even killed by the US-backed tranquistas, held the detainees responsible.

A security guard for the mayor’s office in the city of Masaya, named Reynaldo Urbina Cuadra, was kidnapped and brutally tortured by anti-Sandinista extremists during the US-sponsored 2018 coup attempt. He was so badly wounded that he nearly died, and lost his left arm.

Urbina filed a formal complaint with the state accusing fanatical right-wing media pundit Miguel Mora, of the US government-funded outlet 100% Noticias, of bearing responsibility for inciting the violence against him and his colleagues at the mayor’s office.

Mora was detained by the Nicaraguan government in June 2021, in a move widely denounced by Western capitals.

In an interview with The Grayzone, Urbina praised the Nicaraguan government for arresting Mora. “This is the beginning of justice,” he said. “But nothing can bring back what those terrorists took from me.”

Urbina’s comments about the Sandinista government’s arrest of roughly two dozen opposition leaders in 2021, all of whom were deeply involved in the violent coup attempt, are often heard repeated in working-class communities in Nicaragua.

While Global North governments and legacy media exploited the arrests to portray President Ortega as authoritarian, the detentions were quite popular in poor, humble barrios, where Nicaraguans who survived the terror of the tranques consider the opposition leaders to be coup-plotting criminals who should have been behind bars long before 2021.

MRS’ origins in the class contradictions of the Sandinista Revolution

The key role of the MRS in the bloody 2018 coup attempt in Nicaragua made the party’s blatant alliance with the Nicaraguan right-wing completely undeniable.

But although the MRS had previously portrayed itself as a center-left social-democratic party, its historical roots were always in the political right.

Self-declared “leftist” critics of the Sandinista Front and President Ortega – many of whom live outside Nicaragua and have not closely followed its internal politics since the neoliberal era began in 1990 – often point to the revolutionary past of some older MRS leaders to try to depict the party as the real torchbearer of Sandinismo.

But this revolutionary past has been directly contradicted by decades of overt right-wing activities.

On the surface, the story of Dora María Téllez in particular seems compelling. In August 1978, when she was just 22 years old, Téllez served as the third-in-command of a major operation in which the Sandinista Front took over the National Palace in the capital Managua, earning her the nom de guerre “Comandante Dos” (Commander Two).

But how Téllez transformed from this young revolutionary to becoming a US embassy informant allied with the coup-plotting right-wing is a process that reflects the political contradictions present in the Sandinista Revolution since its inception.

In July 1979, after years of struggle, Sandinista revolutionaries overthrew the US-backed dictatorship of General Anastasio Somoza, whose family dynasty had ruled the country for decades.

But in some ways, overthrowing Somoza was easier than governing. When he ruled the country with an iron fist, it was easy to unite opposition forces against Somoza, from across a wide range of class interests.

The Sandinista Revolution had broad support from several classes, not just poor and working-class Nicaraguans. Significant sections of the middle class and even part of the upper class had lost faith in the Somoza dictatorship.

Somoza had pursued backwards economic policies that served the class interests of the wealthy elites, but his regime became increasingly decadent, corrupt, and incompetent, and thought the solution to all problems was more violence and repression. It was only a matter of time until there was a social explosion.

Most of the founders and leaders of the MRS were from the comfortable upper-middle class of Nicaraguans who opposed Somoza and initially supported the revolution.

Many were also quite young. Téllez was a medical student when she joined the Sandinista Front as an activist, and at the time of the victory of the revolution, she was just 23 years old.

Téllez worked with the Sandinista Front for just 15 years, before later becoming one of its staunchest opponents, spending the last 27 years organizing against it. So her time as a Sandinista militant is greatly outnumbered by her time as a US embassy informant and ally of the Nicaraguan right wing.

Toppling an unpopular dictator is not as difficult as governing a country under attack by the world’s hegemon. And internal political contradictions quickly emerged in the 1980s.

Right-wing oligarch Violeta Barrios de Chamorro, who represented the upper-class elements that had opposed Somoza, turned swiftly against the Sandinista Revolution in early 1980.

The US government then launched a terrorist war on Nicaragua, with the CIA pouring millions of dollars into arming and training far-right death squads, known as the Contras, who massacred civilians; assassinated Sandinista leaders, judges, police, and state officials; and burned down hospitals, schools, and government buildings.

Washington also imposed a devastating – and internationally illegal – blockade, which crippled the impoverished Central American nation’s economy. The US goal was to terrorize the Nicaraguan population into submission, overthrow the Sandinistas, and install a compliant neoliberal regime.

Faced with such a relentless onslaught waged by the most powerful empire on Earth, Nicaragua’s Sandinista government lost the support of the middle class that had once supported the uprising against Somoza.

Washington recruited the Nicaraguan wealthy elites and disenchanted middle class, and eventually succeeded in breaking the Sandinistas. The FSLN did win a 1984 election in a landslide, but by the end of the decade, many Nicaraguans had been sapped by the US-led war and economic depression.

In 1990, the Sandinistas lost the vote to Violeta Chamorro, the right-wing oligarch from one of the most powerful families in Nicaragua, whose presidential campaign had been created, advised, and funded with millions of dollars by the US government.

This meant that the Sandinista Front went from being the governing party to the political opposition. And cracks soon began to emerge.

MRS founders lead right-wing split out of Sandinista Front

In the 1990s, revolutionaries watched as leftist movements around the world were overthrown, with coups in the former Soviet Union and subsequent US-backed neoliberal “color revolutions” in its former republics.

Given both the national and international context of counterrevolution, the Sandinista Front was gripped by a series of serious internal debates.

Two main factions emerged in the FSLN: On one side was the left-wing faction loyal to the revolution, called the principistas, which consisted more of working-class activists who were close to the labor unions, sought a confrontational approach against the neoliberal US-backed government of President Chamorro, and remained committed to socialism and anti-imperialism, despite the end of the Cold War. The principistas were led by Daniel Ortega.

On other side was the right-wing faction, the renovadores. They sought dialogue with the other neoliberal political parties and a more conciliatory strategy with Chamorro, and wanted to turn the Sandinista Front into a moderate social-democratic party, modeled after the European center-left.

The renovadores were led by Sergio Ramírez, with other prominent members such as Dora María Téllez and Luis Carrión Cruz. They demonized the revolutionary principistas led by Ortega as “archaic,” “obsolete,” Marxist-Leninists.

In an “Extraordinary Congress” meeting in 1994, the FSLN held an internal vote, and the renovadores were defeated. So some of their top followers left the party in protest, including poet Ernesto Cardenal and writer Gioconda Belli.

These members of the right-wing faction of the front subsequently published an open letter titled “For a Sandinismo that Returns to the Majorities” (“Por un Sandinismo que vuelva a las Mayorías“).

This letter would essentially become the founding document of the MRS, and was signed by all of the major figures in what would soon be the new party, representing a Who’s Who of anti-Sandinista opposition leaders:

Dora María Téllez

Sergio Ramírez Mercado, a wealthy author

Luis Carrión Cruz, a rich activist from an oligarchic banker family

Carlos Fernando Chamorro, a media mogul from Nicaragua’s most powerful dynasty, who runs major anti-Sandinista media outlets with US government funding

Xavier Chamorro Cardenal, another media oligarch who ran the anti-Sandinista newspaper El Nuevo Diario

Claudia Chamorro Barrios, yet another member of the Chamorro dynasty

Carlos Mejía Godoy, a prominent musician

Ernesto Cardenal, a Catholic priest and renowned poet

Gioconda Belli, a novelist from a rich Nicaraguan family who previously worked as a Pepsi-Cola executive

Oscar René Vargas, an academic who called for a US military invasion and bloody coup in Nicaragua

Sofía Montenegro, a liberal feminist who runs NGOs funded by the US government

It was noteworthy that almost all of these figures came from wealthy families, and many were educated in the United States and spoke English.

They represented the upper-class, upper-middle-class, and bourgeois factions who had supported Sandinismo in the 1980s, many of whom had enjoyed comfortable government positions as ministers or advisers, but who turned against the movement when it lost power in the 1990s.

These Nicaraguan elites had happily worked in the government when they had an opportunity to taste power, but when the FSLN entered the opposition and they had to do the hard work of organizing with working-class people, most left the country for the Global North, and they quickly drifted to the right.

In 1995, more figures from the renovadores faction resigned from the FSLN, and they officially formed a separate party: the Sandinista Renovation Movement (Movimiento Renovador Sandinista, or MRS).

At the time, it was obvious that the MRS was a right-wing split out of the front. This is clearly reflected in the party’s founding document, “For a Sandinismo that Returns to the Majorities.”

In the open letter, the MRS leaders intentionally left out any reference to socialism or anti-imperialism. Neither word is mentioned. Instead, the document only expresses opposition to “neoliberalism.”

Moreover, the MRS founding letter made it clear that the new party’s leaders wanted to reconcile with US imperialism, stating explicitly, “Our relations with the United States should be mutual respect.”

To understand the ideological divisions and history that eventually led to the split, The Grayzone interviewed prominent FSLN leader Carlos Fonseca Terán, a son of the founder of the front and leading member of the revolutionary left wing of the party.

Fonseca Terán explained that the many debates going on inside the Sandinista Front when it entered the opposition in the 1990s boiled down to four fundamental issues:

1. Socialism

– the renovadores, who became the MRS, wanted to drop socialism from the FSLN’s mission

– the principistas, led by Ortega, were committed to socialism

2. Popular struggle

– the renovadores were against any and all forms of violence by the working class, including peasants trying to defend their lands from violent takeovers by landowners and companies or workers engaging in militant struggle against corporations

– the principistas did not want to return to the armed struggle, but did support the right of Nicaraguan workers to defend themselves

3. Anti-imperialism

– the renovadores wanted to abandon anti-imperialism and seek good relations with the United States

– the principistas were firmly committed to anti-imperialism above all

4. Vanguard character

– the renovadores considered the vanguard model to be outdated and wanted to emulate European social-democratic parties

– the principistas continued seeing the FSLN as the vanguard party that would lead the working class in its struggle against capitalism and imperialism

“As time passes, the MRS’ rightwing character became more obvious. It couldn’t be denied,” Fonseca Terán reflected. “But from the beginning they were right wing.”

“They were always reformists,” he added. “And they never cared about anti-imperialism.”

Fonseca Terán said the MRS’ critiques of the Sandinista government’s economic policies is especially hypocritical, given the party has repeatedly shown support for neoliberal reforms over many years.

“The only way for our economic program to be more left-wing would be to start expropriating properties,” Fonseca argued, referring to the current FSLN-led government.

MRS forms alliances with Nicaragua’s right-wing elites

The creation of the MRS as a right-wing, social-democratic break with the Sandinista Front mirrored similar splits that happened inside revolutionary socialist parties around the world at the time.

Given their elite class positions and knowledge of English, MRS leaders quickly burrowed into the media, NGOs, and academia, taking control of these sectors and turning them into anti-Sandinista outposts. They also used their friends abroad to try to turn the international left against the FSLN.

Yet after it split of the FSLN, the MRS struggled to find popular support at home. In the 1996 presidential election, the party’s candidate Sergio Ramírez got just 1% of the vote (compared to 38% for the FSLN’s Ortega).

Having been thoroughly defeated and embarrassed, the MRS did its first and only second-guess, deciding to form a brief alliance with the Sandinista Front for the 2001 election. But when they lost that vote, the MRS turned against the FSLN once and for all, and embarked upon its long journey to the right.

In 2006, MRS presidential candidate Edmundo Jarquín earned a mere 6%, against Ortega who won the election with 38%.

This year saw the beginning of the MRS’ alliance with notorious Nicaraguan oligarch Eduardo Montealegre, of the right-wing Independent Liberal Party (PLI).

A multi-millionaire banker, Montealegre is infamous in Nicaragua for his corruption, closely linked to a massive debt bonds scandal.

“The term conservative doesn’t work anymore in Nicaragua. Anyone who uses the word loses support. So all the right-wing call themselves liberals,” Fonseca Terán explained in his interview with The Grayzone. “But Montealegre is not even a liberal; he is a conservative, an ally of big capital.”

The 2006 State Department cable recounting the US embassy meeting with Dora María Téllez noted that then MRS presidential candidate Edmundo Jarquin had been secretly meeting with Montealegre behind the scenes and “renewed their prior agreement not to attack one another.” The US embassy noted that “MRS ads criticizing Montealegre have disappeared.”

For his part, Montealegre was also a US embassy informant. A 2007 State Department cable published by WikiLeaks reveals that he met with Washington’s Ambassador Trivelli in January of that year to provide sensitive information.

When the MRS and Montealegre’s PLI lost the 2006 election and the Sandinistas returned to power, the MRS began to openly collaborate with the plutocratic banker.

In 2008, Montealegre ran for mayor of the capital Managua, and the MRS publicly supported his right-wing campaign against FSLN candidate Alexis Argüello, a legendary Nicaraguan boxer, who ultimately won the election.

Téllez herself endorsed Montealegre, while in characteristic fashion bending herself into an ideological pretzel claiming that she and her party did not support him.

“The MRS is calling to vote for Eduardo Montealegre, although we are not supporting him under the table,” Téllez insisted.

To justify their undeniable alliance with the right wing, fellow MRS leader Edmundo Jarquín argued, “This is not a conflict between the right and left; it is between dictatorship and democracy.”

The rightward drift became a lurch from there, and by the 2010s, the MRS had totally abandoned its alleged commitment to the left and become a right-wing party.

In 2015, the MRS once again signed an agreement with the right-wing Independent Liberal Party (PLI), hoping to defeat the FSLN in the 2016 election as part of a short-lived National Coalition for Democracy (Coalición Nacional por la Democracia).

When the Nicaraguan government approved plans for a Chinese company to build an interoceanic canal that could challenge the monopoly held by the US-dominated Panama Canal, the MRS helped organize opposition against the project, promoting xenophobic slogans like “Chinese out!” and “We won’t allow the Chinese invasion!”

No permitiremos la invasión China, nosotros queremos Rivas para los rivenses! pic.twitter.com/H5JCeky9uD

— Unamos (@unamosnica) November 1, 2014

Téllez and other MRS leaders exploited liberal environmentalist talking points in order to push the geopolitical agenda of Washington, which desperately, yet successfully, sought to halt construction of the canal.

A blatant example of the MRS’ right-wing character came in 2016, when the party posted a meme on its Facebook page (where it scarcely has any followers) cheering on the recent death of Cuban revolutionary leader Fidel Castro, as well as the 2013 demise of Venezuela’s socialist President Hugo Chávez.

“The hour arrives for all pigs, the next is Daniel Ortega,” the MRS wrote. “In Hell he will pay everything that he owes the people.”

MRS president Ana Margarita Vijil, Téllez’s partner, wrote an op-ed in 2017, titled “The MRS and private enterprise,” that demonstrated the party’s complete descent into neoliberalism.

Published in the US government-funded right-wing newspaper La Prensa, which is owned by the oligarchical Chamorro dynasty, Vigil’s rhetoric in the article sounded totally indistinguishable from that of a World Bank official.

“We believe in permanent dialogue and the alliance between the public and private sector,” Vijil wrote.

Welcoming “big business” to Nicaragua, while giving lip service to supporting “small businesses” as well, Vigil declared, “We welcome foreign investment,” in order to “inject capital flow into the country.”

When the violent US-backed coup attempt kicked off in 2018, the MRS played a crucial role. The MRS took a lead in running the Unidad Nacional Azul y Blanco (Blue and White National Unity), a neoliberal opposition alliance that strongly supported the putsch, with backing from Washington.

But when the coup failed, the MRS faced a crisis, and decided to rebrand.

MRS rebrands and drops any reference to Sandinismo

The MRS once absurdly claimed to be the true representative of Sandinismo, but it abandoned that cynical marketing strategy in 2020.

That year, the MRS held an internal vote and decided to renamed itself the Unión Democrática Renovadora (Democratic Renovation Union), or UNAMOS for short.

By rebranding, the MRS cast off its mask of Sandinismo once and for all. In an interview with Nicaragua Investiga, a right-wing media outlet funded by the US government, Dora María Téllez admitted that MRS/UNAMOS, the party she helped found, was a big-tent party with no real coherent ideology.

“We have people who come from liberalism, from Sandinismo, from conservatism, people who have not been in any political party,” Téllez said.

While MRS supporters outside of Nicaragua had spent decades depicting the group as a supposed “leftist” alternative to the Sandinista Front, Téllez and her allies admitted that they had no real loyalty to Sandinismo, and no longer even pretended to be a left-wing party.

The MRS had long used socially liberal issues like LGBT rights and support for abortion to appeal to leftists outside of Nicaragua, but there is nothing socialist about the party.

In fact, for the MRS’ foreign sponsors, the group’s decades-long rightward drift was entirely predictable. The centrist renovador reformists who split from the FSLN in 1995 and formed the MRS were never very ideologically dedicated in the first place.

A 1978 US government cable published by WikiLeaks shows how former Sandinista militant Hugo Torres Jiménez, who went on to become vice president of the MRS, never embraced a coherent leftist ideology.

The document also reveals that US journalist Tad Szulc, who was a reporter for the New York Times and Washington Post, had been a State Department informant.

On the eve of the revolution, Szulc met with top leadership of the Sandinista Front – co-founder Tómas Borge, Edén Pastora (Comandante Cero), Hugo Torres (Comandante Uno), and Dora Maria Téllez (Comandante Dos) – for a lengthy interview. Szulc then recounted his meeting in close detail to the US government, so that it could use the intelligence to undermine the FSLN.

Szulc told the US embassy that Borge was “a militant ideological Marxist” and was the most ideologically committed of all of the leaders. He noted that “Borge seemed to have a clearer idea of where he was going and how to get there than either [Comandantes] Zero [Pastora] or Uno [Torres].”

“There was a distinct split between the rescuers (led by Zero [Pastora] and Uno [Torres] and the rescued (led by Borge),” Szulc explained to the US embassy. “The Borge group is allegedly intransigent in its determination to seize power in Nicaragua without bourgeois help, whereas Zero and Uno are more inclined to flexibility in tactics.”

That is to say, Torres was part of the less ideologically socialist, more opportunist right-leaning faction from even before the revolution triumphed, and he was always willing to make a deal with Nicaragua’s capitalist oligarchs.

On the other hand Borge, one of the original leaders the FSLN, who remained loyal to the party and to President Ortega right up until his death in 2012, had always been the most ideologically committed.

When Torres was arrested in June 2021, his detention was cited by putative “left-wing” critics as a sign that Ortega had supposedly betrayed the revolution. But the reality is Torres and his MRS allies had always been willing to compromise with the United States and form alliances with Nicaragua’s conservative oligarchic elites.

The reality is there is a long history of self-identified “leftists” in Nicaragua allying with the right wing and US imperialism against the revolutionary Sandinista Front.

In the 1990 election which dynastic oligarch Violeta Chamorro won thanks to a campaign run and funded by the US government, the CIA helped her set up a National Opposition Union (Unión Nacional Opositora, or UNO) that was made up of more than a dozen small political parties.

Two of the members of this US-created, anti-Sandinista UNO alliance, working alongside hard-line right-wing parties, were the Communist Party of Nicaragua and Nicaraguan Socialist Party.

Both groups were tiny and basically irrelevant, run by obscure academics and little-known intellectuals. But it was an early example of the so-called “left opposition” to the Sandinistas forming alliances with Washington and the most rabidly conservative and neoliberal forces in the country.

Nicaragua’s history is replete with examples of self-described “leftists” undercutting the Sandinistas and joining hands with the US government and right-wing oligarchy. The MRS/UNAMOS, and leaders like Dora María Téllez, Sergio Ramírez Mercado, Hugo Torres Jiménez, and Victor Hugo Tinoco are perhaps the most high-profile case studies, but they are far from alone.

Ortega, Elections, and the Context Western Media Won’t Print

Nicaragua & Sandinismo — Ortega, Elections, and the Context Western Media Won’t Print

Ortega, Elections, and the Context Western Media Won’t Print

Article 5 of 14

Orinoco Tribune

By Richard Balzano

Originally published at https://orinocotribune.com/ortega-elections-and-the-context-western-media-wont-print/

Publication Date: August 25, 2026

By Richard Balzano  –  Aug. 21, 2026

“Crackdown.” “Democratic backsliding.” “Authoritarian grip.” Journalists persecuted, opposition parties crushed—and now, according to the latest eruption from the Western press, Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega has abolished elections.

The peripheral left offers another interpretation: Ortega is preventing U.S.-backed political organizations implicated in subversion from participating in elections, while Nicaragua has restricted media organizations with subversive ties to Washington amid ongoing U.S. hostility. Whether one approves is beside the point. Nicaragua is behaving as though the United States poses a threat to Nicaraguan sovereignty. How could they possibly have gotten that idea?

First, the elections. During his July 19th address commemorating the Sandinista Revolution, Ortega declared that the era of parties “installed by the Yankees” returning to government was over: “There will be no more elections, there will be no more [elections] through which they can try to seize the government, seize power.” He immediately called for laws erecting a “wall” or “block” against golpistas and vendepatrias—coup plotters and traitors—adding that “no matter how much money the Yankees give them, they will not succeed.” Western headlines performed emergency surgery and emerged clutching: “There will be no elections.” The missing words alter the diagnosis. Nicaragua will hold elections, and perhaps candidates with ties to Washington will not be allowed to participate—that doesn’t seem all that radical given the context.

Ortega’s crackdown on journalism deserves reconsideration. Western accounts and institutions describe Nicaraguan journalists being persecuted, but few ask what those journalists were actually doing. Journalists “silenced” by Ortega hardly constituted some pristine Fourth Estate floating above Nicaraguan politics. Washington poured millions of dollars through USAID, the National Endowment for Democracy, and allied institutions into an opposition-media ecosystem, much of it routed through organizations such as the Violeta Barrios de Chamorro Foundation, supporting and training journalists and outlets including 100% Noticias and others embedded in the anti-Sandinista milieu. The Chamorro network itself straddled journalism, NGOs and opposition politics, while during the 2018 upheaval sections of this media apparatus did considerably more than observe from the press gallery: 100% Noticias broadcast sympathetically from the opposition tranques,* provided anti-government activists a national platform, and its director Miguel Mora openly advocated a “Noriega-style” intervention to remove Ortega. When the government investigated foreign collusion, it closed outlets and prosecuted some of the figures involved. Western accounts largely began the story there, but foreign financing disappears, political participation becomes journalism, organizations intertwined with the opposition become merely “independent media,” and a confrontation between the Nicaraguan state and a U.S.-supported political-media apparatus is transformed into a familiar dictatorial repression narrative.

Nicaragua has good reason to take American meddling seriously. During the Banana Wars, U.S. Marines occupied the country for much of 1912–33 in what historian Greg Grandin called the United States’ “first Third World quagmire,” until resistance leader Augusto Sandino won a war of attrition, sending occupation forces packing. Washington has a legacy of leaving poor institutions behind in the wake of its occupations, and the Nicaraguan national guard was one of them, serving as the primary instrument of repression in the succeeding decades. Sandino was murdered by National Guard leader Somoza, and the Somoza dynasty followed: four decades of kleptocratic anticommunist family dictatorship.

A civil war unfolded in which Sandinista revolutionaries took power in 1979, at which time they committed an unforgivable crime of improving people’s lives. Literacy campaigns, healthcare, education, agrarian reform: resources began flowing toward ordinary Nicaraguans. Oxfam called Nicaragua exceptional for its government’s commitment to improving the people’s condition and encouraging their participation in development, and gave Washington’s nightmare its proper name: “the threat of a good example.” That a poor country might successfully direct resources toward peasants instead of oligarchs and foreign capital, and that neighboring peasants would notice, was considered a U.S. national security threat.

Washington set about making the example fail by financing the torturous Contra insurgency, plastering the media with disinformation, and squeezing Nicaragua economically. Washington mined Nicaraguan harbors, and when the International Court of Justice found the U.S. in violation of international law and liable for reparations, the U.S. quit the ICJ, vindicating long held suspicions that international law and human rights institutions were designed to police the Global South, not the other way around. Meanwhile, Nicaragua diverted enormous resources from social development into fighting a U.S.-sponsored war, while continuing to make payments on odious debts inherited from the Somozas, to the detriment of ordinary Nicaraguans. In 1990, battered Nicaraguans voted the Sandinistas out, and they left quietly. Daniel Ortega, a first-generation Sandinista revolutionary, returned sixteen years later through the ballot box.

All of which vanishes when Nicaragua appears in American media. Occupation becomes ancient history; the Contras become Cold War trivia; foreign financing becomes philanthropy; regime-change organizations become “civil society”; Washington-funded media become “independent”; and golpistas become merely “opposition politicians.”

Remember Russiagate? Americans raged that foreign interference represented an existential assault on democracy. Americans will not tolerate journalists taking money from foreign governments (except Israel) to disseminate stories cultivated by foreign intelligence agencies (except Mossad). Are we that drunk on American exceptionalism, and historically amnesic, that we believe it’s okay when we do it abroad? Americans reserve for themselves an unlimited right to vigilance while demanding extraordinary political permeability from countries whose sovereignty Washington has repeatedly violated. Post-colonial nations subjected to occupation, proxy wars, sanctions, coups and continuing foreign interference must tolerate foreign-funded journalism, NGOs and Trojan-horse political parties catering to classes enriched by the colonial economic order—or be declared authoritarian for exercising the vigilance necessary to preserve their sovereignty. The State Department cries “authoritarianism,” and well-intentioned folks in the imperial core who value a (relatively) free press and some semblance of (oligarchic) electoral democracy are too quick to believe it. Try running an American television network on CCP money while publicly calling for Putin to conduct a “Noriega-style operation” in Washington, and see how philosophical the State Department becomes about press freedom.

Richard M. Balzano is an historian and political analyst peddling truths at several institutions of higher learning, quietly devoted to the art of sedition and comfortably resigned to the peripheral left.

(The New Hampshire Gazette)

Richard Balzano

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Nicaragua will build two railways in alliance with China

Nicaragua & Sandinismo — Nicaragua will build two railways in alliance with China

Nicaragua will build two railways in alliance with China

Article 6 of 14

By JP

Originally published at https://jpmas.com.ni/nicaragua-will-build-two-railways-in-alliance-with-china/

Publication Date: October 18, 2023

Nicaragua is consolidating two railway megaprojects that will link different cities in the Latin American nation, through the development of a memorandum of understanding with a state company from the People’s Republic of China.

The Vice President of Nicaragua, Rosario Murillo, confirmed the conversations that a high Nicaraguan delegation is holding in China, to finalize at least eight agreements for the construction of mega-projects.

“We are going to sign a memorandum for the studies, design and construction of a Managua-Masaya-Granada railway. We are also going to formulate the Managua-Corinto-Bluefields Railway Master Plan,” with the Chinese company CCECC, Murillo said.

Major road construction works

Likewise, the vice president detailed that the agreements are being worked on to carry out road works such as the expansion of the Guanacaste-Nandaime-Rivas and Rivas-Sapoa Highway, and for the Coastal Coastal Highway Project, Phase 2, with the Chinese state company, CSCEC.

Within the framework of the III Belt and Road Forum in China, the Nicaraguan delegation, led by the Minister of Transportation and Infrastructure (MTI), has made progress in strategic negotiations with different state companies of the Asian giant.

Among the Nicaraguan representatives, there is also Tania Díaz, vice minister of the MTI; Amaru Ruiz, director of the Transport Regulatory Institute of the Municipality of Managua (IRTRAMMA); and the Nicaraguan ambassador to China, Michael Campbell.

CCECC, the Chinese counterpart in the development of railway agreements, is recognized as «a large-scale state-owned enterprise with Chinese national super grade qualification for railway project engineering and has been listed among the world’s top 225 international contractors», according to their website.

You can read: Nicaraguans support Free Trade Agreement with China

The Nicaraguan authorities also highlighted the signing of a contract with the Chinese company CAMC Engineering Co., Ltd, for the “Reconstruction, Expansion and Improvement of the Punta Huete International Airport”.

You may be interested in: 91% of Nicaraguans support the construction of the Interoceanic Canal

The Sandinista Government affirmed that the Nicaraguan delegation will also hold meetings with the Chinese companies Yutong and CSCEC with the objective of giving, respectively, continuity to the bus supply programs and the housing program in Nicaragua.

Nicaragua Shows Solidarity With Palestine in Landmark Case Against Germany on Gaza Genocide

Nicaragua & Sandinismo — Nicaragua Shows Solidarity With Palestine in Landmark Case Against Germany on Gaza Genocide

Nicaragua Shows Solidarity With Palestine in Landmark Case Against Germany on Gaza Genocide

Article 7 of 14

Orinoco Tribune

By Becca Renk Foster

Originally published at https://orinocotribune.com/nicaragua-shows-solidarity-with-palestine-in-landmark-case-against-germany-on-gaza-genocide/

Publication Date: August 5, 2026

“Nicaragua expresses its unchanging solidarity with the heroic Palestinian people, who continue to face suffering, occupation, destruction and displacement perpetrated by the Zionist government of Israel and its occupying forces,” reads a statement from Nicaragua’s government released on July 29.

The declaration condemned Israel’s renewed attacks, calling them an “unacceptable escalation of violence against the Palestinian people,” and repudiated “the continuous, growing violations of international and humanitarian law, as well as Israel’s attempts to criminalize the Palestinian population who seek only to protect their families, homes and livelihoods.”

This statement is Nicaragua’s most recent demonstration of solidarity with Palestine in its long history of friendship with the Palestinian people: Nicaragua was the first Central American country to establish diplomatic ties with Palestine. In 1980, just one year after the triumph of the Sandinista Popular Revolution, Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat made a historic visit to Nicaragua which marked the beginning of diplomatic relations between the State of Palestine and the Republic of Nicaragua.

Nicaragua leads South-South solidarity
From that time, the two countries have maintained friendship which has strengthened since the Israeli genocide in Gaza began. On the global stage, Nicaragua has been at the forefront of the south-south mobilization of support for Palestine: reaffirming solidarity with Palestine on October 7, 2023; sending its foreign minister to Ramallah to meet with Palestinian authorities in December 2023; signing on in February 2024 as the first of 18 countries to intervene on behalf of South Africa in its case against Israel at the International Court of Justice (ICJ); and on March 1, 2024, bringing charges against Germany at the ICJ for aiding and abetting genocide by providing political, financial and military support to Israel and by defunding the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).

Nicaragua’s pressure on Germany at the ICJ has already leveraged positive results for Palestine: as of April 2024, Germany reversed its policy on stopping UNRWA funding to Gaza and declared it has resumed aid. This March, Germany’s Foreign Ministry announced it was withdrawing support for Israel in the South Africa case in order to focus on its defense in the legal proceedings initiated by Nicaragua.

Nicaragua v. United States
Nicaragua, a country the size of New York state with a population of just under seven million people, is one of the countries in the world with the most experience in the ICJ. In fact, in 1986 the World Court ruled in Nicaragua’s favor in a landmark case against the United States over the Contra War.

Immediately following the ousting of US-backed dictator Anastasio Somoza by young Sandinista revolutionaries in 1979, the US created, financed and directed a “counterrevolutionary” force known as the contras. While the Nicaraguan Sandinista Revolution taught its illiterate population to read and write and made health care and education free, it was simultaneously fighting US-armed contra guerillas. The contras attacked civilian targets that represented the gains of the Revolution–health care workers, teachers, schools, and farming cooperatives–killing 50,000 in country of just three million people at the time.

“The situation progressed so much that in 1983 there was an attack in our main port of Corinto and over 1.6 million gallons of gas exploded,” remembered Ambassador Carlos Argüello, Nicaraguan’s agent to the International Court of Justice, during a video conference from the Netherlands on May 4, 2024. “This act was carried out by the CIA under the direction of the US.”

A few months later, the US placed underwater explosive devices in Nicaraguan ports without notifying other nations; a UK national was killed.

“It was astounding,” remembered Argüello. “Publicly in Congress they were discussing how much money to give the contras, and there was no question of international law…So that is why we went to the World Court, because it wasn’t simply a matter of the most powerful nation doing whatever it wants, [we needed] to remind the world that international law exists.”

In 1986 the ICJ handed down its verdict in the case of Nicaragua vs. the United States, convicting the US of violating the fundamental principles of general and customary international law, making the US the only country in the world to be convicted by the ICJ of massive human rights violations. The Court ordered the US to pay reparations, which it has never done. To this day, the US has an outstanding debt to the Nicaraguan people estimated at $12 billion in 1988, now worth at least $36.5 billion.

Nicaragua case a turning point
Speaking on the occasion of the 40th anniversary of the ICJ ruling in the Nicaragua case, Augusto Zamora Rodríguez, former Nicaraguan Ambassador to Spain and professor of international law who worked on Nicaragua v. United States, explained that the case marked a turning point in international law.

“[It] left the United States stripped of legal arguments. And it stripped them bare forever, because what was said about Nicaragua in 1986 applies today to Iran; it applies today to countries under attack, such as so many in Africa and some in Latin America. And it also serves to remind governments that applaud these kinds of policies that they are absolutely illegal—not because someone says so voluntarily or out of conviction, but because the United Nations’ principal judicial body said so.”

Zamora went on to highlight that the precedent set in the Nicaragua case can be availed of by other countries suffering unjust attacks.

“In that sense, our country, the Revolution, and the Sandinista government rendered an enormous service not only to the country but also to the international community and to the world’s poor. We left them with a ruling they can rely on, and I am certain that in the case of the genocide in Gaza—the barbarity that Israel has been perpetrating against the Palestinian people for 80 years—when the Court rules on the genocide case, it will cite the Nicaragua ruling more than once.”

In Zamora’s view, the Nicaragua case is more pertinent than ever. “…The Nicaragua ruling has not only lost none of its relevance,” he said, “but continues to gain in significance and has established an essential legal framework for the defense of the rights of peoples and weak nations—who are, in fact, the ones who truly need to invoke this right…It is already a different world, but that world, I believe, will find in this Court’s ruling a quite competent and solid framework for building the new multipolar order that international society needs.”

Nicaragua: Rooting for the Underdogs

Another landmark case
Similarly, the case Nicaragua has brought against Germany in the ICJ is also now being described as a “landmark case.” Nicaragua was unable to bring charges against the US for aiding the Gaza genocide because the US withdrew from accepting the compulsory jurisdiction of the ICJ. Bringing charges against Germany, however, is significant not only because Germany remains Israel’s second-largest arms supplier after the US, but also because Germany’s far right is currently seeking even closer ties with Israel: recently Germany’s upper house approved a bill to criminalize the denial of Israel’s “right to exist,” punishable by up to five years in prison.

Although any legal proceedings in the World Court advance very slowly, there is now new movement in Nicaragua v. Germany: on August 1, the International Court of Justice announced that it will hold public hearings September 7-10 on preliminary objections raised by Germany challenging jurisdiction and admissibility in the case brought by Nicaragua.

Despite being a small nation from the global south, Nicaragua will certainly be drawing on its long experience with the ICJ and its consistent adherence to international law to defend the Palestinian people at the World Court.

“Nicaragua’s people will continue to raise their voices in favor of the Palestinian cause and cry out for justice and peace, for the freedom and dignity of the Palestinian people,” read Managua’s recent statement. “The two-state solution is an international demand and the only way to a just and lasting peace.”

(Popular Resistance) by Becca Renk Foster

Becca Renk

Becca Renk grew up in North Idaho and has lived in Nicaragua since 2001 working in sustainable community development in Ciudad Sandino with Jubilee House Community and its project Center for Development in Central America.

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Nicaragua and China will build a mega international airport

Nicaragua & Sandinismo — Nicaragua and China will build a mega international airport

Nicaragua and China will build a mega international airport

Article 8 of 14

By JP

Originally published at https://jpmas.com.ni/nicaragua-and-china-will-build-a-mega-international-airport/

Publication Date: October 17, 2023

Nicaragua became the first nation in Latin America and the Caribbean to consolidate a megaproject in cooperation with China, with the agreement to reconstruct, expand and improve the Punta Huete International Airport, known as “Panchito.”

Within the framework of the Anniversary of the Belt and Road Initiative held in the Asian giant, a high delegation of representatives of the Nicaraguan government signed with the Chinese company CAMC Engineering Co., Ltd, the contract for “Reconstruction, Expansion and Improvement from the Punta Huete International Airport.”

Nicaragua would sign eight megaprojects with China

The agreement for this megaproject, according to a statement from the Government led by the president, Daniel Ortega, «is one of eight contracts that will be signed this week» and highlighted that it is «the only project approved for Latin America and the Caribbean, which shows the “strategic and mutually beneficial relationship between China and Nicaragua.”

The written statement of the Latin American country detailed: “Signed within the framework of the Tenth Anniversary of the Belt and Road Initiative, this important air connectivity project will be a fundamental pillar to promote communication, exchange, tourism and trade between Nicaragua and the World.”

In that sense, he added that conceived as a 4F international airport, “Punta Huete will have the capacity to serve up to 3.5 million passengers annually, who will be able to arrive in the country on larger aircraft. «It will reduce the number of air connections between Nicaragua and Asia, Europe, Africa and Oceania, turning our country into an attractive destination for tourists from these continents”.

Mega project of the airport in Nicaragua, another milestone in cooperative relations with China

The signing of the agreement on the International Airport between Beijing and Managua was signed by the head of the Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure, General Oscar Mojica, and by the president of China CAMC Engineering Co., Ltd, Wang Bo. The representatives of both nations agreed that “the negotiation and signing of the construction contract for the Punta Huete Airport constitutes another milestone in the relations between China and Nicaragua, which are becoming stronger every day, under the care and direct attention of Comrade Xi. Jinping, President of the People’s Republic of China, Commander Daniel Ortega, President of the Republic of Nicaragua and Fellow Vice President Rosario Murillo.”

The vice president of Nicaragua, Rosario Murillo, confirmed that the consolidation of strategic cooperation agreements with the Asian nation is in process, among which a railway project, a railway, the restoration of an airport, development in the hydroelectric area and construction stood out. of roads.

You can read: 80.6% of Nicaraguans support President Daniel Ortega in Nicaragua

“Within the logic of the Forum we are going to sign a Memorandum for the studies, designs and construction of a Managua-Masaya-Granada Railway, we are also going to formulate the Managua-Corinto-Bluefields Railway Master Plan. We will sign a Cooperation Agreement for Road Projects, this is with the Chinese company CCCCI; The first, which is the Railway, is with the Chinese company, CCECC. And then we would have the expansion of the Guanacaste-Nandaime-Rivas and Rivas-Sapoa Highway”, described the vice president.

You may be interested in: Nicaraguans support Free Trade Agreement with China

In addition, the Nicaraguan leader confirmed that a “Framework Agreement for the Coastal Coastal Highway Project, Phase 2, is being developed with the Chinese state company, CSCEC. And the Memorandum for the Mojolka and Tumarín Hydroelectric Projects, with the Chinese state company Huadian Overseas Investment. Likewise, he stressed that the contract for the reconstruction, expansion and improvement of the Punta Huete “Panchito” International Airport was signed with the Chinese state company, CAMCE Ingenieros.

Women in Nicaragua: Power and Protagonism: Delegation Report-Back (January 2023)

Nicaragua & Sandinismo — Women in Nicaragua: Power and Protagonism: Delegation Report-Back (January 2023)

Women in Nicaragua: Power and Protagonism: Delegation Report-Back (January 2023)

Article 9 of 14

By Alliance for Global Justice

Originally published at https://afgj.org/delegation-report-back-women-in-nicaragua-power-and-protagonism-january-2023

Publication Date: January 20, 2023

 Register for our report-back webinar 

On January 7-16, 2023, 22 delegates from the United States and Canada ranging from the ages of 10 to 80 traveled to Nicaragua to investigate the conditions and the lives of Nicaraguan women on a delegation organized by the Jubilee House Community – Casa Benjamin Linder and Alliance for Global Justice. We had the opportunity to meet with a plethora of community organizers, workers, and public officials: from peasant feminist farmers to self-employed unionists; from urban community health workers to nurses and doctors; from battered women’s program directors to women leaders in the police, National Assembly, and Ministry of Women. We met with Nicaraguans from all walks of life and heard their stories of resilience and empowerment despite two hundred years of imperialist aggression and efforts to undermine their sovereignty. With the lowest crime rate in Central America, we found Nicaragua to be a safe, welcoming place that prioritizes the human rights and needs of its people.

We were inspired by the power and protagonism of Nicaraguans and particularly Nicaraguan women and their participation in their communities and governments. Over the past 16 years, the Sandinista government has promoted proactive, preventive, and community-based programs that prioritize the needs of women, children, and the marginalized. The World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report of 2022 ranks Nicaragua 7th worldwide for gender parity and first in women’s educational attainment, literacy, and women in parliament and cabinet positions. These accomplishments reflect the Sandinista government’s investment in its people, with 57% of its budget dedicated to health and education. Since 2007, when the Sandinistas were reelected, the wellbeing of the Nicaraguan people has improved significantly: infant mortality was reduced by 55% and maternal mortality by 66% by 2021. During the COVID-19 pandemic the country has never shut down, but has used public health and popular education methods to keep deaths to 37 per 1 million population (in the United States 3,260 of every 1 million residents have died). Today, around 90% of the population two years and older has received at least two doses of vaccine, the Nicaraguan economy has continued to grow, health and education services have not suffered, and the country has avoided incurring excessive debt like many of its neighbors.

The Sandinista government implements a rights-based framework for policy-making that provides the mechanisms for all people to actualize their human rights to water, housing, education, health, safety, and food. In 2007, under the U.S.-backed neoliberal government, 24% of youths had no schooling. By 2020, that had dropped to 4%. In 2006, one in four people were illiterate. Today, less than 3% of the population is illiterate. Nicaragua is now virtually food self-sufficient, growing practically everything needed to feed its population.

These strides in social indicators are also thanks to the Sandinista government’s community-based model of participation in civic life that empowers all sectors of society and leaves no one behind: often referred to as “el pueblo presidente” (meaning, “the people are president”). More than 600,000 land titles have been provided to peasants since 2007 (55% of them women), and about a third of the national territory has been legally deeded to 304 Indigenous and Afro-descendant communities. As a signatory to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Nicaragua has passed laws to guarantee women equal rights, free healthcare and education, and 50% political representation, requiring that half of candidates for elected office be women.

We saw with our own eyes Nicaragua’s significant investments in infrastructure that have notably improved the lives of its people and particularly women, notably:

State of the art hospitals and innovative women’s health programs;

Free education at the preschool, vocational, and postdoctoral levels;

Investment in quality roads and transportation, including the construction of a highway from the Pacific to the Caribbean coast (providing access to the capital for Indigenous and Afro-descendant populations), and the addition of electric vehicle charging stations as roads are paved and improved;

Electricity in almost all homes (over 98%);

Over 70% of electricity deriving from renewable sources (up from 26% in 2006); and

Free wifi in parks and expansion of fiber optic cable to remote areas.

Witnessing these achievements firsthand has brought to light why Nicaragua is the “threat of a good example.” Nicaragua’s leadership in adaptability, creativity, sustainability, and popular democracy proves that another world is possible: one freeing itself from the grip of global capitalist hegemony and predatory imperialism through the empowerment and promotion of the rights of all people. It’s for this reason that the United States and its corporate stakeholders continually seek to demonize Nicaragua and undermine its advancements.

The people we met encouraged us to ask our government to respect their country’s sovereignty and their right to a life of dignity, self-determination, and peace. As we approach the 200th Anniversary of the Monroe Doctrine, we strongly urge the Biden Administration and Congress to lift all sanctions imposed on the Nicaraguan people and government. And we urge our fellow North Americans to visit Nicaragua for themselves to enjoy her many beautiful tourist attractions and learn from the example of the Nicaraguan people.

Signed by:

-Rita “Jill” Clark-Gollub (translator and interpreter)
-Richard Gollub (Chief Financial Officer, retired)
-Natalia Schuurman (Program Coordinator, Alliance for Global Justice)
-Susan B. Lagos (Spanish and English teacher)
-Gloria Rodas (undergraduate researcher, UC Berkeley Latinx Research Center)
-Tammy Spengler (licensed clinical social worker)
-Dianne Blais (Secretary, Women’s International League of Peace and Freedom)
-Phoebe Thomas Sorgen (Berkeley Fellowship of Unitarian Universalists Board Trustee and Green Party U.S. Delegate to the Global Green Network)
-Ruby Morris (Sociology and Sustainability Studies student and President of Peace Action at SUNY – Geneseo)
-Ann Faust (MD, FACS, PhD, MBChB, IBCLC)
-Eleanor Perrine (Psychology and Women’s and Gender Studies student at University of Maryland, Baltimore County)
-Meredith Field (PhD, MSEd)
-Nina McGranahan (Environmental Science and Policy student at the University of Maryland – College Park)
-Rebecca Wilson (Federal Tax Attorney, retired)
-Maimuna Dada (Social Services Administrator, retired)
-Mukasa Ricks (Revolutionary Pan-Africanist and former organizer for the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, Black Panther Party and All-African People’s Revolutionary Party)
-Linda Helland (MPH, CPH, Climate Change and Health Equity Program Manager)
-Jennifer Sullivan (Treasurer, Women’s Caucus of the Green Party U.S.)
-Erica Caines (Co-Coordinator of Black Alliance for Peace – Haiti/Americas Team)
-Amy Davis (cybersecurity analyst)
-Becca Renk Foster (Jubilee House Community)
-Sensei Orla Mohally Renk (President of the Villa Soberana Chapter of the Federation of Secondary School Students, Nicaragua)

How the Sandinistas triumphed over yankee fascism once again

Nicaragua & Sandinismo — How the Sandinistas triumphed over yankee fascism once again

How the Sandinistas triumphed over yankee fascism once again

Article 10 of 14

By Yaretzi

Originally published at https://yaretzine.substack.com/p/how-the-sandinistas-triumphed-over?r=65qp38&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web

Publication Date: March 30, 2026

I’m going to try to divide this into an objective part, just narrating the known facts, and then a subjective part, where it’ll just be my opinion, if it wasn’t obvious before. But even so, I have to talk about my bias and background so you know who’s talking to you.

I was born and lived in Nicaragua until I was 18, when I went to study in Mexico. My family isn’t wealthy, neither on my mother’s nor father’s side—but I grew up going to American private school, so “middle class” wouldn’t be a very accurate description either, in my opinion.

I returned in the summer of 2018, right after the peak of the protests that left more than 300 dead, 1,500 injured, and 500 people detained. Witnessing the at times live streamed deaths through my phone, and the psychological effects these had on every Nicaraguan I know was heartbreaking, and it instilled in me a pessimism that was very difficult to overcome.

I grew up in a family that was staunchly anti-Sandinista and anti-Ortega, and mostly upper-middle class. But I also have aunts who were in the guerrillas. I think I started being sentient around age eight, because among my earliest memories are those elections in 2006. While we weren’t rich, those acquaintances, colleagues, even friends of my parents and aunts certainly were. Those surnames that are even pronounced with a certain intonation that denotes the level of multigenerational aristocratic wealth they represent. Their children, nephews, grandchildren, besties, my lifelong classmates. Many of the worst people I’ve ever met have been the Nicaraguan bourgeoisie. That’s saying something, because throughout my short life (and this isn’t a flex, it’s something I’m somewhat ashamed of) I’ve lived in close proximity to, and even been friendly with, Mexican, American, and Spanish bourgeois. I grew up with people who, for better or for worse, always talked about politics, and were always thinking about ways their country could be better. Or at least that’s what I wanted to think. And then I emigrated and became very familiar with the diasporas of various countries, categorically interventionist and contemptuous of their homeland.

Long story short, I’m a believer in the Sandinista Revolution of 1979, and I support the party that returned socialism to my country in 2007 after the illegitimate elections of 1990 and more than a decade of ruthless neoliberalism.

I support the revolution that continues to focus on improving the lives of those who need it most. I couldn’t care less about the opinions of those who have amassed so much wealth over so many generations in such a small country and economy. But if you’re not part of the bourgeoisie, and you’re still against Sandinismo and what it represents, I respect that. You’re the other target for this rant, secondary to wanting to educate foreigners who can’t even point to our country on a map. Perhaps the third most important demographic target, to be honest, because I would like to make a little money talking about Nicaragua, too. Just so you know, I’m independent; I’m not paid by the “Ortega Lobby”, Russia, or the Bolivarian Revolution. But if it’s true that I’d like donations, then why not use this little bit as a shameless plug?

The contradictions are more evident now than in the 80s, when we were in a decade-long war. Where the primary contradiction were imperial aggressions that wiped out any quantitative change that the first independent proletarian organization in the country’s history could make. Edgar Chamorro was the leader of the death squads known as Contras during this US-led terror war. After they were mostly defeated, he switched sides and said this in an open letter to The New York Times:

“The Sandinistas, for all their faults, have made enormous advances in education, housing and health care, issues of vital importance to Nicaragua's poor majority. Unfortunately, the ''contras'' burn down schools, homes and health centers as fast as the Sandinistas build them.”

This is coming from a member of what is perhaps Nicaragua’s most prominent oligarchic family—from where 5 presidents have come, and who owned the 2 largest newspapers in the country’s history. You will see this last name mentioned multiple times throughout this document. Back then, it was hard to notice any contradictions within an insurgent administration outside of the war that bombed the crops they planted with chemical agents. All people could focus on was: our kids are still hungry, and they’re still dying fighting against an enemy that seems unbeatable.

“Dialectics holds that internal contradictions are inherent in all things and phenomena of nature, for they all have their negative and positive sides, a past and a future, something dying away and something developing; and that the struggle between these opposites, the struggle between the old and the new, between that which is dying away and that which is being born […] constitutes the internal content of the process of development, the internal content of the transformation of quantitative changes into qualitative changes.” (Stalin, “Dialectical and Historical Materialism”)

These contradictions are inevitable—and as Marxism shows us—fundamental for the resolution of complex issues and for qualitative progress. Mao Zedong, who led the Communists in China to win an imperial war of aggression against the fascist Japanese empire, argued that at times like these, the most glaring contradiction isn’t the class struggle.

“When imperialism launches a war of aggression against such a country, all its various classes, except for some traitors, can temporarily unite in a national war against imperialism. At such a time, the contradiction between imperialism and the country concerned becomes the principal contradiction, while all the contradictions among the various classes within the country (including what was the principal contradiction, between the feudal system and the great masses of the people) are temporarily relegated to a secondary and subordinate position.” (Mao, “On Contradiction”)¹

This is in fact what happened in Nicaragua. Contrary to popular belief, the FSLN alone did not win the war. The Sandinista National Liberation Front was made up of 3 factions that fought separately: the Maoist Tendencia GPP (”Guerra Popular Prolongada” or Prolonged People’s War), the Marxist-Leninist Tendencia Proletaria (”Proletarian Faction”), and the Left-wing nationalist Tendencia Tercerista (”Third Faction”).² On top of this, an alliance was eventually reached with even the liberal bourgeoisie of the country, headed by Pedro Joaquin Chamorro—the editor and owner of the largest newspaper in Nicaragua’s history La Prensa. His party, Unión Democrática Liberal (UDEL; Union for Democratic Liberation), and two other anti-Somoza liberal parties also joined this common front, as well as conservatives and the Nicaraguan Socialist Party.

After defeating Somoza’s National Guard and taking back the country, Nicaragua was administered by a “Junta of National Reconstruction” made up of several Sandinistas, but also some wealthy liberals like Violeta Chamorro. There’s that name again. Her husband, Pedro Joaquin mentioned earlier, was murdered by the Somoza regime, and she became a popular voice for the broad opposition. She resigned less than 2 years after, in 1980, because of the Junta’s signing of cooperation agreements with the Soviet Union, one of the few countries friendly to Nicaragua at the time. From that point on, La Prensa continued its conservative editorial line, constantly criticizing the Sandinistas and serving as a mouthpiece for US imperialism, advocating rapprochement with a government that was sanctioning us. In 1984, Nicaragua held its first free elections, which many international observers widely popularized them as free and fair, a success for democracy.³ The FSLN candidate Daniel Ortega won with 67% of the vote. Coincidentally, Violeta Chamorro would become the president in 1990, after a decade of US terrorism forced the democratically elected FSLN to concede to elections held under dubious conditions—to say the least.

Our situation was somewhat similar to Cuba during the “Special Period”. In fact, both were happening during the same historical context. The Soviet Union had been deposed, and neoliberalism was forced upon all socialist projects for over a decade. And yet the Sandinista Revolution returned through democratic means in 2006, when Daniel Ortega ran again as the candidate promising a return to prioritizing the proletariat. Since then, it Nicaragua has been under a process of reform and evolution toward socialism, despite its critics saying this reform was inadequate, far too slow, not really socialism. Moving away from the neoliberalism that allowed for the consolidation of an industrial capitalist class proved to be no small feat. A bourgeois class that for years tried and failed to get its lackeys in power through democratic means, but failed to get any support, felt its privileges threatened enough in 2018 to once again plunge the country into chaos to finally get what they wanted.

The loss of life in 2018 is horrific, the worst thing that has happened to our country since the US-backed terrorism of the Contras 40 years ago. And by pure coincidence I’m sure, it is US intervention that is once again to blame for the blood spilled in our land. It was a failed coup, nothing more and nothing less. There was no unifying ideology, nor any specific demands for reform beyond the abstract idea of ​​“democracy and freedom.” In other words, a color revolution planned and coordinated from Washington and Langley, then sold to the masses as a popular movement. The last hail Mary strategy of the National Endowment for Democracy and CIA subsidiaries when all else fails.⁴ But unlike other coup-like protests, they convinced very few to take up arms—because there was no plan for the aftermath that enticed working class opportunists, no ideal or material necessity to embolden the proletariat to fight for their lives. Much less did the material conditions exist for the people to want to overthrow the government. I will substantiate all of this with evidence, but it is an indisputable fact that the US and the Western media machine had a great deal to do with the world’s—and misinformed middle-class Nicaraguans’—perception of these protests and the government.

The most important aspect of this story is the heartbreaking loss of life. Families separated forever because of a false, opportunistic opposition. The loss of unity and revolutionary optimism in a significant portion of the population. There were very valid grievances behind the mobilization, fueled by years of extractivism and stagnation, but there were also actors seeking to exploit the situation to gain more power through a coup.

In 2017, an IMF report stated: “There are compelling arguments for raising the retirement age. Average life expectancy in Nicaragua is now 13 years higher than in 1990, while the retirement age has remained unchanged during that same period. Raising the retirement age can be an effective way to improve the sustainability of a defined-benefit pension system, as it increases the number of contributors and, at the same time, reduces the number of beneficiaries.” (IMF Country Report No. 17/174, Nicaragua Selected Issues).

On April 3, 2018, the Indio Maíz Biological Reserve was engulfed in flames. The government’s response didn’t come until two days later, despite several environmental activist groups and university students joining together to urge the government to act quickly, given the reserve’s importance to the Central American ecosystem. It is believed that this fire was not caused by natural causes, but rather an attempt to “purge” the area by an illegal foreign settler. The Nicaraguan army closed the area to the press, and the firefighting capabilities were clearly inadequate. The Nicaraguan government refused assistance from Costa Rican firefighters despite the seriousness of the situation and limited resources. Furthermore, Vice President Rosario Murillo downplayed the importance of the fire, angering activists. The president of Fundación del Río, a Nicaraguan NGO dedicated to the protection and restoration of tropical ecosystems in southeastern Nicaragua, said that the fire “is just one of the consequences stemming from the problems we have been facing.” denouncing the situation in the reserve: invasion by settlers, road construction, land trafficking, institutional absence, and lack of sanitation in indigenous territories.” The fire took 10 days to extinguish, thanks only to the massive participation of community members, environmental activists, and a donation of helicopters from the Mexican government.

The IMF warns the Nicaraguan government that there must be a reform of the social security system, the INSS, or the reserves will run out by 2019. “Raising the retirement age is a technical solution that we consider very good,” emphasized once again the head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) mission, Fernando Delgado.

In early April, the employers’ association, the Superior Council of Private Enterprise (COSEP), announced that it is in negotiations with the government for INSS reform.

The reforms were announced on April 16. They consisted of a 0.75% increase (from 6.25% to 7%) in the INSS contribution by workers and a 2% increase (from 19% to 21%) for employers. The company contribution would increase annually until reaching 22.5% in 2020. A 5% deduction from the total pension would also be necessary. The National Workers’ Front (FNT) and the National Union of Employees supported the reform, while COSEP rejected it.⁵

On April 18, the very valid anger of activists manifested itself in the streets of Managua under the pretext of the social security reform. The changes to this reform were relatively conservative compared to other tax reforms implemented by the IMF in Latin America. Since 2013, the IMF had wanted Nicaragua to raise the retirement age, a proposal rejected by the Nicaraguan government, not wanting to affect the elderly population. Instead, it preferred to marginally request more contributions from a sector of the population that already felt abandoned, hopeless for the future, and resentful—the upper-middle class. The bulk of these protests were made up of students who felt like the government wasn’t investing into private universities, environmental activists outraged at the loss of life in the Indio Maiz Reserve, and other activist groups like the feminist movement who felt their demands had been ignored. The demonstrations were peaceful, legal, and met with counter-demonstrations from supporters of the government. These initial protests appealed to regular working class Nicaraguans because of the inconsistencies between Sandinista rhetoric and the reality of income inequality, the extractive nature of the Interoceanic Canal project, and the neglected ecological crisis. The protests continued throughout the week, prompting more Sandinista Youth to mobilize in support of reforms.⁶

The protests spread to more private universities, such as the Polytechnic University of Nicaragua (UPOLI), and then to other departments, including León, Masaya, Granada, Boaco, Carazo, Estelí, and Rivas. What began as peaceful demonstrations at universities quickly escalated into clashes with Sandinista Youth and later riot police, who, according to the GIEI report, “used disproportionate and indiscriminate force against individuals participating in the protests. For this purpose, various types of weapons were used, including firearms and, in particular, weapons of war, which were employed directly against people […] in three types of scenarios, all linked to protest actions: a) marches or demonstrations in public spaces, b) university occupations, and c) roadblocks or barricades.” What this report downplays is the number of non-improvised weapons available to the opposition. Mortars, although improvised, were extremely effective and deadly weapons that justified the state’s use of force. The use of these weapons, as the GIEI details in its report and as you will see throughout this document, was to seize or destroy public buildings, to fortify firing positions, to terrorize those living in the area, and to strangle the state by paralyzing commerce and transit.⁷

Civilians were killed in crossfire between police and other armed opposition protesters, who intentionally attacked police barracks ordered to stay inside in order to resist the provocation. Cobblestone barricades were erected in the streets. Main areas of certain neighborhoods in different cities were targeted to block traffic and establish firing positions against the police, harassing, extorting pedestrians, and even robbing the local population. Government buildings and police stations were set on fire, acts that opposition groups claimed were self-inflicted. Opposition members were regularly documented using Molotov cocktails, mortars, and firearms.

The protests quickly became anything but peaceful. All of this occurred within hours of the INSS reform, the supposed trigger for the political crisis, which consisted of a 0.75% increase in employee contributions, a 3% increase for employers, and a 5% reduction in the retirement age without raising it. It is worth remembering what the initial excuse was for all this violence: an electoral reform that in any other country in the region would be cause for celebration.

It is also worth explicitly naming the conspirators in the bourgeois private media, which has decades of interventionist biased reporting. One of the largest private media outlets was Confidencial, privately owned by Carlos Fernando Chamorro, son of Violeta Chamorro and brother of 2021 presidential candidate Cristiana Chamorro. This was a digital media company, so they felt like they could get away with less journalistic integrity. They were and still are a giant polluter of information regarding Nicaragua online, constantly churning out mass produced fake news with the most alarmist and war-mongering attitude. The Chamorro family also owns La Prensa, the most popular newspaper in the country, with a clear center-right and arguably hyper-conservative slant, as well as the second most popular newspaper in the country El Nuevo Diario, even more hawkish tabloid-like in its “reporting”. A newer propagandistic media network that calls itself journalism is 100% Noticias. They were perhaps the most blatantly complicit with US imperialism, constantly making up numbers and running defense for violent opposition groups. They might as well be called 100% Gusanos, directly financed by the USAID through millions of dollars of donations to the Fundacion Chamorro. This isn’t a conspiracy theory, it is openly accessible information. The payrolls of American empire happily put on display for all to see.⁸ The owner, Miguel Mora, had this to say before the protests of April 2018:

“What I see happening in the US is a Noriega-style operation, like the one in Panama (in 1989). They go in, arrest that family [Ortega-Murillo], take them away, and the army doesn’t get involved. In two days, 24 hours, this is all over, if it were that kind of US intervention. So, what I see is that instead of the US providing weapons, or doing what they did with the Contras, they’ll come in and carry out a Noriega-style operation. That’s a scenario that can’t be ruled out.”⁹

By April 20, there were already more than 12 dead and 50 wounded. Municipal halls in large towns had been burned, as well as the homes of alleged government supporters and historical sites of the Sandinista revolution. The student movement rejected responsibility for all of these attacks and accused paramilitary shock groups of doing it to themselves to legitimize their cause. The government censored the press and mobilized its Citizen Power and Sandinista Youth militants to protect the state.

Among the most violent crimes during this period were those committed against Ángel Gahona, a journalist shot and killed while broadcasting the protests live on Facebook, and the six members (including two babies) of the Velásquez family who were murdered in an arson attack on their home by members of the fascist opposition.

The Nicaraguan National Human Rights Commission (CENIDH), along with other non-governmental organizations and international media outlets, immediately denounced these atrocities as perpetrated by the National Police and paramilitary groups. This was despite the fact that it had been so short a time that it was practically impossible for any authority, including CENIDH itself, to adequately investigate the events. Many witnesses and acquaintances of the victims of these horrific acts of senseless violence have unequivocally stated that their stories were distorted.

The National Police conducted a transparent investigation into cases like that of Ángel Gahona, in which the perpetrators were found and imprisoned: two men with criminal records who were participating in opposition demonstrations in Bluefields. These men were pointing a mortar at the police officers surrounding Ángel Gahona. One of the officers was seriously wounded in the attack, but Gahona was struck by the majority of the projectile and died instantly. At the time, with no evidence other than the journalist’s report and accounts from anonymous sources, private media outlets such as La Prensa, Confidencial, and 100% Noticias immediately denounced the murder as a government attack on press freedom. The reports from the IACHR and the GIEI did the same, even though they had ample time to review the numerous police investigations with audiovisual documents obtained afterward, which serve as evidence of a violent conspiracy within the movements considered peaceful by the CENIDH and the GIEI.¹⁰¹¹

On April 22, Ortega announced the revocation of the social security reform. The following day, COSEP requested that students be included in the national dialogue announced by the government and that the Episcopal Conference act as mediator. On April 24, business leaders of the peasant movement published a statement in support of the anti-government protesters and called for a general strike. Despite the reforms that started all of this not existing after 4 days of unrest, the wealthy leader of the peasant movement, Francisca Ramírez, called for President Ortega’s resignation.

On April 25, the UPOLI and the April 19th University Movement (MU19A) was created. It would serve as the spokesperson for the dialogue with the government. It is worth noting that this MU19A is an agglomeration of a few students from various universities that had been directly funded by the National Endowment for Democracy (NED). “To promote democratic values ​​and youth participation in Nicaragua, forums will be organized in schools and universities to raise students’ awareness of democratic values ​​and human rights. A network of youth leaders will encourage more active participation of young people in the defense of democracy. In addition, a magazine and social media will facilitate debate on issues affecting youth and democratic activism.”

That same year, the NED funded a project entitled “Strengthening the Strategic Capacity of Civil Society to Defend Democracy.” The NED website does not reveal the name of the organization that received the grant. However, according to the project description, the funds were allocated to:

“Strengthening the capacity of Nicaraguan pro-democracy activists to forge a common civil society strategy in defense of democracy. Periodic publications will be produced addressing the state of democracy and the human rights situation in Nicaragua. A group of civil society organizations and social movements will convene a series of forums to discuss their content and identify advocacy actions.”

This US government agency invested millions over the years in “initiatives to promote democracy,” which were really workshops on how to stage a color revolution. They used other words, such as “peaceful protests for democratization,” but the objective was the same: to overthrow a government using the symbolism of the colors of the nation, democracy, justice, and the rule of law—in order to achieve a return to the neoliberal status quo.¹²¹³

At a press conference, the MU19A presented its demands to the government, which included the release of detainees, the expungement of criminal records, and the prosecution of those responsible for the deaths—including President Ortega. This supposedly organic and spontaneous opposition movement, led by private sector leaders and using students, farmers, and religious figures as the face of the opposition, was already demanding regime change in less than a week. They were demanding not a change to the system, not reforms that would benefit these groups, but a change of leadership in an unconstitutional manner.

In the days following the revocation of the reforms, the government made a series of concessions. On April 23 and 24, authorities released approximately 200 detainees, some of whom reported being tortured. On April 26, Assistant Prosecutor Inés Miranda announced that the Public Prosecutor’s Office would launch a formal investigation into the deaths, injuries, robberies, and damage to public and private property during the protests. On April 27, the head of Nicaragua’s National Police, Aminta Granera, resigned, fulfilling one of the initial demands of the university protests. On April 29, the National Assembly approved the creation of a “Truth Commission” to investigate the deaths. This only triggered further violent protests by students and “peasants,” a movement that proved to be less a union of agricultural workers and more a group of poor criminals recruited by right-wing businesspeople and politicians. Now, one of the main demands of the protests is the entry of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) into the country, due to a lack of confidence in an investigation process that had barely been announced.

The directors and owners of the most influential private media outlets, including Radio Darío, La Prensa, Radio Corporación, Confidencial, and 100% Noticias—all of whom had been the megaphone for opposition for decades now—condemned the “massacre,” censorship, and repression by the Nicaraguan government. The Apostolic Network of Nicaragua, which brings together some 1,500 evangelical churches in the country, joined in calling for the resignation of President Daniel Ortega and Vice President Rosario Murillo.¹⁴

On May 10, the Nicaraguan government ceded authority to bishops to initiate dialogue. First Lady and Vice President Rosario Murillo indicated that the government was prepared to participate in the dialogue whenever the bishops deemed it appropriate.

On May 14, the government agreed to allow foreign investigators from the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) to enter the country. By then, there were already intense clashes in at least eight departments in northern, central, and pacific Nicaragua. The departments where the largest clashes were recorded were Chinandega, Matagalpa, Jinotega, and Estelí in the north of the country, as well as Granada, León, Carazo, Managua, Masaya, and Rivas on the pacific coast. Many of these clashes lasted more than 24 hours, and multiple barricades on key highways paralyzed the country’s traffic and commerce.

On May 18, the IACHR issued a statement: “We call on the State of Nicaragua to immediately cease the repression of the protests. The Commission also calls on the State to guarantee the independence and operation of the media in the country.” The national dialogue continued, demanding the resignation of Ortega and his wife and the Nicaraguan government, and calling for a “return to normalcy,” even though the country was paralyzed by the opposition. The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) issued a preliminary report on its investigations into the protests in Nicaragua. The IACHR made 15 recommendations to the Nicaraguan state, including a call for early elections, which would violate the constitution. These recommendations were welcomed by the opposition at the national dialogue table: “The national dialogue endorses the recommendations of the IACHR’s preliminary report.” The OAS, a corrupt body and accomplice of the US in multiple coups, is the one that ends up expressing the demands of the Nicaraguan opposition.

Minister Denis Moncada, the government’s representative in the dialogue, rejected the proposals of the civil, business, and student sectors, declaring: “It is an agenda that, when viewed in its concentrated form, leads us to only one point: the design of a roadmap for a coup.” The Episcopal Conference indefinitely suspended the national dialogue. The student and business movement began discussing a law that would allow for early elections, prohibit presidential reelection, and replace the Supreme Electoral Council (CSE).

On May 28, a group of students took control of the National University of Engineering (UNI), adding to the situation at the National Autonomous University of Nicaragua (UNAN-Managua) and the Polytechnic University (UPOLI), where protesters had already occupied the buildings. According to these groups, the occupation was to demand transparency and dialogue, but the reality is that the opposition planned and carried out its criminal activities from these centers. And they truly were criminals, as exemplified by the cases of Sixto Henry Vera and Marcos Pomares, victims of some of the most cruel and violent opposition criminals operating from the occupied universities. 15 These “peaceful protesters” committed robberies, kidnappings, and extortions almost daily to finance the terrorism they disguised as activism. Students from the occupied UPOLI planned and carried out the kidnapping, torture, and murder of those they believed to be Sandinista sympathizers. There were several cases like this, but you won’t find them in any report by any international human rights organization.

The only exception is the OHCHR report entitled “Human Rights Violations and Abuses in the Context of the Protests in Nicaragua,” published in August 2018. Although it is a brief section at the end of the report, with a serious lack of investigation into the violations committed by the anti-government opposition, including an omission of the case I just told you about, it stands out for its honesty in a couple of instances, such as:

“The anger and frustration generated by the government’s response, and the extreme polarization of the population, triggered outbreaks of violence that went beyond the crisis. This motivated episodes of violence between different groups, reprisals, settling of scores, and attacks against members of the Sandinista Party, government officials, and members of the security forces (particularly the National Police), as well as against public buildings and private property. The levels of brutality in some of these episodes, which included burning, amputation, and desecration of corpses, illustrate the serious degeneration of the crisis. Moreover, the roadblocks gave rise to an increase in criminal practices, such as kidnapping, harassment, robbery, and the collection of illegal tolls.” (OHCHR Report, August 2018). 16

Hours after the takeover of the UNI, Sandinista militants arrived to attack the new occupants of the campus, which led to brief clashes involving mortar fire. This event was broadcast live by media outlets, which promoted the idea that these militants were Cuban, Venezuelan, or Lebanese paramilitaries—with zero evidence or any basis in reality. Much better to suggest that instead of the reality that thousands of Sandinista Youth and pro-government activists were signing up to become part of a voluntary paramilitary force, like all socialist countries have. In fact, this citizens’ militia covered their faces with masks to protect themselves from very common reprisals from fascist groups. In Nicaragua, for as long as I can remember, the colors red and black have been viewed with disgust by people who consider themselves “wealthy”, or “educated”. Being proudly Sandinista is seen as something “for the poor,” something “tacky”—if you supported the government it is because you are “lower class”. Using the red and black antifascist flag, or even more so, going to Sandinista demonstrations, is seen as something only the poorest and least educated do. But during this failed coup, The Nicaraguan flag was used as the symbol of an opposition that had fabricated a persecution. The movement tried to rebrand itself “La Azul y Blanco”, “the blue and white” in 2021. An opposition that had invented a Nicaragua where the blue and white flag had been replaced by the vulgar, tasteless red and black flag.

What this student movement were seeking wasn’t a free election, but a forced election in which their observers would be loyal to the empire—just as in 1990. A forced election where the middle class and bourgeoisie could get back some of the power lost through a dictatorship of the proletariat. ‘Color revolutions’ is the name given to a “series of political mobilizations carried out against leaders considered by the West to be authoritarian, whom they accuse of exercising dictatorial practices or rigging elections. In these movements, the protesters often adopt a specific color as a symbol, which gives the mobilization its name.”¹⁷

That same day, thanks to media coverage that portrayed the students as heroes, a rumor spread that some Sandinista militants had hidden in the Radio Ya facilities. As a form of “protest,” the station was attacked and set on fire. In the early morning of May 28, two state institutions in the city of Masaya were also set ablaze by opposition protesters: the Public Prosecutor’s Office and the Attorney General’s Office. The MU19A claimed that “government-affiliated shock troops” were responsible.

On May 30, 2018, the Mothers’ Day March was held, convened a month earlier to honor the mothers who had lost their children in the opposition protests. Upon reaching the traffic lights near the UCA (Central American University), part of the opposition march turned north, deviating from the original route and entering University Avenue, near the National University of Engineering (UNI), one of the opposition’s strongholds in Managua. The demonstration was attacked with gunfire from the nearby National Stadium by snipers armed with Dragunov rifles and AK-47 assault rifles, the main evidence of these being police forces that the opposition pointed to. According to the government, the incidents in various parts of the country left 199 wounded and 15 dead: 7 in the march in Managua, 3 in Chinandega, 4 in Estelí, and 1 in Masaya. According to opposition groups, there were 19 deaths across all protests across the country. Mother’s Day, a holiday that is almost sacred or religious for us, was the day of the largest opposition demonstration in its history, with up to 500,000 people reported by the government, convened by the mothers of the university students who died in the protests. No one expected the government to repress the march, despite having done so in other cases previously. And the government maintains to this day that it did not. This event, although extremely shocking for the Nicaraguan population, was not a “massacre” where the police opened fire on a crowd of 500,000 people. It was not a systematic attempt to eliminate the opposition, as the private media alleged.

The following day, a group of protesters attacked the delegate of the Local System of Comprehensive Health Care (SILAIS) in Masaya, intercepting his car and setting it on fire. In Masaya, the population began to surround the police station with barricades, while protesters threatened them with megaphones. An armed group attacked National Police facilities in the department of Masaya with military-grade firearms and mortars, killing a police officer with a gunshot wound to the head. The opposition is beginning to appear more prepared, more armed, and more violent.

Later, a group of people burned down the facilities of the state-run Radio Nicaragua. The government blamed “an organized criminal group paid by the right wing” operating within the UNAN-Managua campus. According to El Nuevo Diario, some residents of the area claimed that the perpetrators were “unknown individuals,” leading these private media outlets to spread further conspiracy theories about “Cuban paramilitaries” and foreigners who were allegedly setting fire to government buildings and nonsensically murdering police officers and pro-government activists just to blame the opposition.

On June 11, the National Police began operations in Managua to clear the roadblocks, resulting in violent clashes. Several officers were shot, and one was killed. An opposition group attacked the Santiago Regional Hospital, kidnapping three people and killing two retired Sandinista military officers. That same afternoon, COSEP announced a national strike to begin on Thursday, June 14. The country had already been experiencing a severely deteriorated economic situation for two months due to the roadblocks that had paralyzed commerce and transit. A national strike was called by the Superior Council of Private Enterprise, the Nicaraguan Foundation for Economic and Social Development, the Union of Agricultural Producers of Nicaragua, the Federation of Livestock Associations of Nicaragua, and other groups belonging to the recently created Civic Alliance for Justice and Democracy. The strike was rejected by the Conimipyme association of small and medium-sized businesses and the Sandinista Workers’ Federation—organizations comprised mostly of the working class, not business owners or industry leaders.

The next day, dialogue resumed, and a six-point agreement was reached. In short, all parties agreed to end the violence, grant access to international investigative bodies, and dismantle the roadblocks that had halted the flow of goods and normal life in the country for two months. On June 16, the National Dialogue Table created the Verification and Security Commission with three members appointed by the government and three from the Civic Alliance. The government agreed to the creation of this body to verify the investigations of the Truth Commission.

That same night, six people, including two children, were killed in an arson attack on a house in the Carlos Marx neighborhood of District VI in Managua. One of the capital’s most emblematic working-class neighborhoods, it had been targeted by the coup forces, who erected a barricade. The neighborhood was occupied by criminals who charged a fee to pass through the roadblock and harassed residents daily in an area that was clearly not sympathetic to the opposition. One of the victims began a Facebook Live broadcast as the fire started, showing a crowd of people surrounding the house. In the video, she expresses feeling threatened and terrified by the opposition and their roadblock. Residents who managed to escape the fire reported being shot at as they fled, and were immediately contacted and “rescued” by members of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR). The family recalls having their cell phones confiscated and being hidden “for their own safety,” since, according to human rights experts, the police were responsible for the fire. They were told they could not speak about what had happened, nor leave the house where they were being held, and that they would have to leave the country. In statements made a few hours after the tragedy, they indicated that the fire was started by police and paramilitaries. In statements on social media shortly afterward, they clarified that they had no evidence of this and had only repeated what the IACHR had told them to say in order to be evacuated from the country. This is one of the most notorious and repugnant cases of complicity between international organizations and private media outlets in the crimes of the coup plotters. It is a shame how little this case has been investigated and how poorly it is remembered by supposed Nicaraguan “journalists.”

OAS Secretary General Luis Almagro called the arson a “crime against humanity”, blaming the government for it with zero evidence. Immediately after the fire, according to the National Police, a group of masked individuals attacked police officers and civilians working to remove barricades and burned two policemen alive. The next day, the house of the mother of José Ramón Sarria Morales, an FSLN deputy, was burned in the city of León. The National Assembly issued a statement calling the fire a “terrorist act” and announcing a formal complaint to international human rights organizations. On July 5, the United States government sanctioned high-ranking members of Daniel Ortega’s government for acts of harsh repression against the population. On November 27, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order declaring the crisis in Nicaragua a “threat to the national security” of the United States and authorizing the US State Department, through the Office of Foreign Assets Control, to sanction any Nicaraguan individual they alleged was corrupt or responsible for repression.

The IACHR report states that this wave of fascist violence left 325 dead, more than 2,000 wounded, and 550 detained and prosecuted. Meanwhile, the “Truth, Justice, and Peace Commission,” created by the government to investigate the events, concluded that 222 people lost their lives and 1,325 were wounded between April 18 and July 4. This represents a difference of 100 lives lost and almost 700 wounded. It could be extrapolated that the real figures lie somewhere between these two. Even so, the media and NGOs denounced this commission as completely illegitimate and biased because it is part of the Nicaraguan government. It is estimated that up to 800,000 Nicaraguans have emigrated since 2018 as a result of the economic crisis triggered by this wave of violence and the resulting economic instability after sanctions. Around 11% of a country of 6.8 million people.¹⁸

The ensuing media campaign was disastrous for the image of Nicaragua’s socialist administration on the international stage. Accidental deaths were reported as murders, some names even appeared repeated in official NGO reports. In private media and on social networks teeming with bots, ridiculously exaggerated numbers were presented, and people claimed that the regime had hidden the truth and that the death toll reached into the thousands. The situation with the protests in Iran in January 2026 felt like a very familiar déjà vu. People who believe this narrative are convinced that what happened in April 2018 is comparable to genocide. They tell you that the 7-10 people killed on May 30 by masked individuals in an area that was an opposition stronghold was a “massacre” committed by police death squads. You would think this means they really value life and peace. However, this is how right-wing pundits from 100% Noticias talked during the height of this repression:

“The second possibility is that people, in one of these marches we participate in, might say, well, let’s go to El Carmen, and even if there are 200, 300, 400 dead, we can work with that. And that’s another ‘hot exit.’ Because we don’t know what’s going to happen. I mean, maybe they’ll capture [Daniel Ortega] and hang him like they did with Mussolini. Or maybe they’ll manage to kill all of us, maybe 500, but we’ll manage…”¹⁹

Speaking on national television from the violent and criminal barricades, about 500 people dying to take the El Carmen palace and assassinate the president, as a sacrifice that would be worthwhile. A sacrifice that they, from their privileged position as capitalists financed by Washington, were more than willing to make. When their lives aren’t at stake, and they know their job opportunities await them as “oppressed heroes” in the US, they are happy to step over the bodies of 500 of their less fortunate compatriots just for a chance to become part of the new, traitorous government.

On December 20, 2018, Trump signed the Nica Act, a law intended to sanction the Nicaraguan government for human rights violations and corruption. This law had been actively sought by numerous businesspeople and opposition leaders with connections in the US government. It prohibits the Nicaraguan government from accessing international loans like any other country.

By the time of the 2021 elections, the leaders of this failed coup had been arrested. This includes the owners of major media outlets and accomplices like Confidencial and 100% Noticias, the two most prominent Chamorro oligarchs, as well as almost all the right-wing presidential candidates who led and financed criminal and terrorist actions, such as Medardo Mairena and Felix Maradiaga. Their mansions, land, assets, and businesses were expropriated by the State after investigations revealed money laundering by these elites to finance their terrorism, as well as for their primary roles coordinating the coup. The universities they had seized, such as UPOLI, were also expropriated and are now free, offering new unprecedented courses, such as Mandarin language learning.

222 of these coup-plotting capitalist elites were stripped of their citizenship and deported to the US and Spain after considerable pressure from those governments. There, they continue their coup-plotting activities, enriching themselves with their status as “refugee heroes exiled from a dictatorship,” and invited to participate in the imperialist media circus of the UN and its corrupt and elitist NGOs.

“The numerous direct victims of opposition violence are outraged that the supposedly ‘peaceful’ Nicaraguan opposition is now being praised by corporate media and international organizations. Influential organizations like Amnesty International, which ignored the opposition’s crimes, are now protesting that more than 200 of the perpetrators have been deported to the US, even though this was done with Washington’s explicit agreement. Sadly, many on the left in the US and Europe swallow this propaganda and defend former Sandinistas like Dora María Téllez, who were recruited by the US to organize and finance terrorism in Masaya and other cities.”²⁰

The biggest problem with the current Sandinista government isn’t the “lack of democracy,” but rather the compromise it was forced to make with the country’s bourgeois class to prevent them from holding the country hostage. After the 2018 negotiations, the government realized that domestic capital is a much stronger threat than even the US and its IMF. Since then, there has been no compromise with this bourgeois class. It is a direct threat, and it has been treated as such: a threat with which one cannot reason, dialogue, or much less coexist in the same way as before. As has been seen throughout Latin America in the last five years, the electoral coup is the US’s preferred strategy. It is easier to support a class of capitalists and let them sort out among themselves who forms the new government than to dedicate resources to a violent coup and those who manage the aftermath. When this capitalist class loses its grip on political and electoral power—that is, when it can no longer buy votes or control the electoral infrastructure—it resorts to less peaceful means.

The proven complicity between the coup plotters who were setting up roadblocks, the private media, the national capitalist class, and international organizations is undeniable. Their connections and coordination with Washington are proudly documented by American institutions. To question the existence of this collusion, or to downplay it in any way, reveals any Nicaraguan to be one of two things: either ignorant or a traitor. A frustrated capitalist, a self-hating fascist. Or someone who doesn’t understand the recent history of our country, forged in the fires of Yankee imperialism, which etched resistance and the desire for sovereignty into our blood and collective memory.

“In our country, not a single innocent candidate is detained, NOT ONE. Not a single innocent person is being prosecuted, NOT ONE. Those who are being prosecuted are foreign agents, fully identified on the payrolls of foreign governments, who, using the structures of private institutions, brought in millions of dollars to destroy, kill, bankrupt the economy, and subvert the constitutional order.”²¹

That said, the Sandinista government since 2007 has achieved many things that neoliberal administrations could not. It is my opinion that the Sandinista government has managed to focus on the well-being of the people who need it most, on the ideological restoration of the Front with a strong emphasis on anti-imperialism and historical materialism, as well as on trying to resolve the contradictions we inherited from the neoliberal period that prevented the country from recovering from the war. Nicaragua can achieve all this, and more; but only together, only from within, not divided, and certainly not under the guidance of a declining fascist empire that seeks to turn the entire continent into colonies.

In the second phase of the Revolution, improved diplomatic relations with allied countries (Venezuela, Cuba, Bolivia, China, and Russia) have been crucial for the development of Nicaraguan infrastructure. Hospitals, schools, ambulances, photovoltaic plants, highways, bridges, seaports, and airports are all a direct result of these improved diplomatic relations and the investment they brought. Despite the US and Europe historically having zero interest in helping us build infrastructure that would make us less dependent, Nicaragua has built things up we previously would have thought impossible. The increase in public spending and improvements to the previously privatized healthcare system, as well as energy security (thanks predominantly to renewable energy from China) and food security (80% of which is locally produced), which has been prioritized, are very important advances. Public policies such as the creation of the Citizen Power Councils and their importance in developing the National Human Development Plan—a collection of strategies and policies to reduce poverty and improve the quality of life in the country—are noteworthy compared to other Latin American countries due to the democratic participation they represent. The dedication to building and improving affordable housing is also remarkable, given its complete absence in previous governments. Over 150,000 new homes have been built and allocated to working class families at extremely low prices and interest rates since 2007.22

These achievements are very positive and worth defending, even in the current environment. However, all these achievements are the result of the work of thousands of people, not just one. Civil government officials, doctors, construction workers, organizers, administrators, environmentalists, farmers, civil activists, diplomats—all committed to the dream of the Sandinista Revolution. One can criticize the contradictions between this dream and reality, the vast material gaps that have disillusioned some former militants who used to be loyal to the cause; but to erase these results, to label socialism in Nicaragua a failure, and instead pray to the free market with the yearning to become another happy colony facilitating the United States’ fascist global war—is the very definition of a traitor.

I may have been born into privilege, and I find myself outside the country precisely because of it, but that’s why I see the need to continue building a country that benefits those who have less, not those who complain while having everything. Because of my own privileged position compared to the average Nicaraguan, I am disgusted by the hypocrisy of wishing for bombs or sanctions to fall on a country where I am not forced to live, using as supposed moral justification the deaths of people in a movement that the average Nicaraguan did not want to fight for. I understand that Nicaragua needs a working-class dictatorship, not a bourgeois puppet democracy that wants to roll back all the achievements of the Revolution. And if not that, I at least understand that asking the United States to destroy our economy while I live in the privilege of the empire, is the most blatant hypocrisy.

I used to want to take to the streets when this was happening and I was abroad and felt useless. But now, with the calmness of hindsight, I see how empty this “cause” was. There was no ideology here, no greater objective other than to create chaos to force the removal of a legitimate government. And in its place, establish the kind of “democracy” the US seeks in color revolutions. That democracy that brought us puppets of imperialism who stole the people’s future along with foreign capital while cutting public spending. The protagonists of the National Dialogue were the leading businessmen of industry and the Catholic Church. The student and peasant movement had valid grievances, but no idea of ​​what should come next, besides free elections with international observers—which Nicaragua has already held and through which it unequivocally demonstrated its preference for the FSLN.

What happened here was an attempt at a color revolution. This ranged from training the university movement in forms of violent protest to demand a return to neoliberal governance through the mobilization and financing of armed groups to cause harm and terror among the civilian population while blaming it on the government, to the cover-up and whitewashing by opposition journalists and non-governmental organizations.

Utilizing the genuine grievances of a segment of the population that perceived itself as disadvantaged, and aligning them with the most powerful and US-connected capitalists in the country, this movement was openly in contact with officials like John Bolton, Ted Cruz, and Marco Rubio. It sought to achieve what the Americans have wanted since 1990: a more subservient, weakened, and dependent Nicaragua. No president will resign due to peaceful protests, but this is what the students and peasants were told they had to do. At the same time, the opposition repeatedly resorted to violence, against police officers as well as civilians, as in the cases of Ángel Gahona, the Sandinista Youth members who were tortured and murdered, the innocent people who were detained, assaulted, or worse at the “peaceful” roadblocks, the fires in the Carlos Marx neighborhood, and the dozens of people who died in the crossfire between paramilitaries and insurgents.²³

But the coup failed miserably. The fascist criminals were eliminated or imprisoned, and the right-wing ideological and financial leaders were exiled to the US and Spain. The universities that served as strongholds for criminal groups were nationalized and are now tuition-free, and the assets and property of the right-wing elites were expropriated and put to use for the benefit of the country.

The loss of life is catastrophic, and saddest of all, avoidable. The number of families forever changed is a tragedy, as is the damage inflicted on the psyche of Nicaraguan society and the country’s economy. Worst of all, all of this was for nothing. All of this death for a vague and abstract future with which the Americans have brainwashed many across the continent. A mirage that will never arrive, and only promises what the US government has always sought: control and dependence comparable to a colony, while wealth is concentrated in the hands of a privileged class with connections to Washington. A pluralistic democracy to represent all kinds of political beliefs. So that even the fascists who want the United States to take our food and medicine, like they did to Cuba and Venezuela, have the power to create laws and govern. All this for growth under the terms of the World Bank, dependence on IMF loans and investments that amount to crumbs and come with conditions that reduce public spending and line the pockets of American businessmen. All of this for a new executive, legislative, judicial, and electoral branch, loyal to the interests of the United States without regard for those of its own people. For a little golden star from the United Nations and the Republicans that says: These are the good guys, they let us do whatever we want.

But what if it’s not necessary to sacrifice our lives for an idea of ​​democracy that has never worked, not even in the “developed world”?

What if I told you that you don't have to be a bootlicker to appreciate and want to defend our Revolution? To want to defend our sovereignty? To recognize the achievements that have been attained thanks to it? The freedom that our first truly independent nation-building project represents. The fact that they haven't been able to subdue us since Somoza, and still can't, is something extremely powerful and hopeful. At a time when we are seeing the effects of US imperialism getting worse and worse, culminating in new Holocausts around the globe, how can we not be terrified knowing that we could be next? Knowing that in our own recent history, gringos also bombed hospitals and schools and blamed the rebels. And all they had to do was offer money and land to the very Nicaraguan traitors who are now going to Congress to beg Trump to punish the country because some bourgeois families in Nicaragua no longer feel in control.

How can we not be worried seeing that countries previously in a very similar situation to ours, like Ecuador, Bolivia, Honduras, Chile, and Argentina, have regressed? Decades of rights won by their leftist governments, thanks to electoral coups sponsored by the yankees? Are we blind to how El Salvador, Ecuador, Costa Rica, and Panama are now selling their countries to BlackRock and organized drug trafficking, opening military bases, and profiting from concentration camps in protected areas? Is that the future we want? Or do we want to defend our sovereignty and continue developing our own project within the possibilities we have? I think it's clear what the majority of Nicaraguans want. And if you're not part of that majority, ask yourself what led you to wish death upon your compatriots instead of upon a gringo who sees you as just another subhuman to exploit.

Dr. Gustavo Porras: Constitutional Reform Seeks To Strengthen Democracy, Peace and Stability in Nicaragua

Nicaragua & Sandinismo — Dr. Gustavo Porras: Constitutional Reform Seeks To Strengthen Democracy, Peace and Stability in Nicaragua

Dr. Gustavo Porras: Constitutional Reform Seeks To Strengthen Democracy, Peace and Stability in Nicaragua

Article 11 of 14

Orinoco Tribune

By Dr. Gustavo Porras

Originally published at https://orinocotribune.com/dr-gustavo-porras-constitutional-reform-seeks-to-strengthen-democracy-peace-and-stability-in-nicaragua/

Publication Date: July 31, 2026

Transcription of a meeting between Nicaraguan authorities and the diplomatic corps and accredited missions on the organization of Nicaragua’s sovereign electoral processes.

Nicaragua’s Foreign Ministry held a meeting with the foreign diplomatic corps on Monday. In the meeting, President of the National Assembly of Nicaragua, Dr. Gustavo Porras, clarified that the National Assembly is carrying out a constitutional reform process which aims to pass reforms on elections in early September, for the Mes de Patria. The Foreign Ministry reported “an amicable meeting and exchange between [Nicaraguan] authorities and the diplomatic corps and accredited missions on the organization of our sovereign electoral processes”. Below is a transcription of the meeting.

Introductory remarks by Compañero Valdrack Jaentschke, Co-Foreign Minister of Nicaragua
We appreciate your presence, we appreciate the response you have given to this meeting. It’s a long time since we have seen each other in this format. And I think it’s quite a useful format for us to share information.

Without further ado, Doctor Porras, I give you the floor.

Address by Dr. Gustavo Porras, President of the National Assembly:
Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone. Good afternoon to the Compañeras and Compañeros of the Government, to the Brothers and Sisters of the Government and to everyone present.

Thanking you for your participation, your presence which allows me to explain to you this task that we have set of a Constitutional Reform to guarantee our Principles of Democracy, Sovereignty and Self-Determination, and which allows us to guarantee the conditions to continue the fight against Poverty that we have undertaken.

We greet you all and I want to express to you, probably what is a reiterated, well-repeated, but absolutely indispensable matter. Because, based on the speech of Co-President Comandante Daniel Ortega, a number of interpretations were made such that it is important to clarify that we will comply with this approach faithfully and, moreover, in the best possible way.

I understand that a democracy is determined by respect for the laws and respect for existing legal procedures, and that the fundamental Law, the Law that determines the entire order of a country, in each of your countries, is the Constitution of the Republic. And that what the Constitution dictates is what all citizens should do.

In Comandante Daniel’s speech, there is a part that says: “But they can forget that, there will be no such elections here again, there will be no elections again for them to try and cheat their way to government, cheat their way to power in that way. And we are going to work, with the National Assembly and with the corresponding institutions, on the Law, because we have to make laws that put a wall, a barrier against the coup plotters, the sell-outs, such that no matter how much money the Yankees give them, they won’t prevail! They Won’t Prevail! They Won’t Be Able To!”.

With this mandate and also given our History, with the Spirit of our Principles and the Nicaraguan Sandinista Spirit, although as you can see we are from the different political parties here, but the Sandinista Spirit is gradually becoming the Nicaraguan Spirit. Because Sandino today is the expression, along with Darío, Nicaraguans’ strongest expression.

Such that in this way we will work on a Constitutional Reform in relation to which it should be clear that there will be elections. Because I’m clear that this is the concern. There are going to be elections. Indeed, as there are elections. Nicaraguans, with our Spirit of Sovereignty and Self-Determination, we are going to make elections of the Nicaraguan People, for the Nicaraguan People and in accordance with the reality and history of the Nicaraguan People. And we want to guarantee: There will be elections!

Naturally, as in all countries, probably in your countries too, there are certain conditions for those who participate in electoral processes, certain requirements for those who want to participate in electoral processes.

And in our country we are studying, we are looking at Constitutional Reforms which allow us to ensure free, democratic, transparent Elections, but ones with the conditions to guarantee stability, security and Peace, which are essential elements for combating Poverty.

Probably some of what I am going to read here is not alien to you, because probably in many countries it may well exist; but part of the Reform is to do with those who exercise or have exercised the direction, leadership, financing, direct or indirect participation, or any type of connection with the planning, preparation or execution of an attempted coup d’état or a consummated coup d’état and will not be able to be candidates for positions of popular election, nor will they be able to hold public office by electoral appointment nor the Presidency.

I do not know if there may be some country where someone will attempt a coup and afterwards… But even if there is not, it doesn’t matter.  Now, we do intend to establish in our Constitution that someone who has attacked Nicaragua’s revolutionary order and also those who commit or have committed acts that undermine Nicaragua’s Independence, Sovereignty and Self-Determination; who incite or promote foreign interference; who seek the political right to military intervention; or organize with financing from abroad; or propose, manage or support economic, commercial or financial blockades and sanctions against the State of Nicaragua, its Institutions and its Citizens. That’s very clear, that’s why I said to you, it’s probably not something unusual.

So the proposal we have or are going to have is to raise this to a Constitutional level. That is the proposal, to give it strength, to establish that Constitutional barrier so that someone cannot be a candidate for some office in Nicaragua, raising the banner of military intervention against us.  That cannot be, that is unacceptable.

So, in essence that’s it, and the leading Reform of these aspects, naturally, as in every country, is that anyone who violates the Constitution cannot stand, because how are you going to violate the Constitution of the Republic and stand as a candidate in the country?

So, I want to convey to you, in a considered way, that this is the objective of our Reform. Above all, it is to guarantee Democracy, it is to guarantee free elections, without foreign interference; it is to guarantee Elections where there is no external financing; it is to guarantee absolutely democratic elections for the Nicaraguan people.

As working diplomats you certainly know the history of our country very well. In our country there were, at one point, occupying troops who became the Supreme Electoral Council, and there were occupation troops whose officers were presidents of polling stations, back in the 1930s. We have to learn from that history. There were ambassadors to our country who went around doing political campaigning and delivering food packages, in an electoral campaign with a candidate by their side. We have to learn from that history. That is not a free election, that is not a free Democracy.

Or the best example we have is that of the 1990 election, when Nicaraguans had, both figuratively and I would say literally, a gun to their head: “If the Sandinistas win the elections, the war will continue.” And the People are intelligent, and our People taught us that we had to look for Peace. And we understood that. And even with imposed outcome, Comandante Daniel handed over the government. Because we realized, because we understood that the most important thing was Peace.

I remember that Comandante Daniel said, “And we are going to return to government by way of elections,” as in fact we did in 2006-2007.

That is to say, in Nicaragua the political sectors, the Sandinista Front and the other political parties that accompany us in the Assembly, have learned to deal with democracy, but in a good way. And we have worked and struggled and made our way so as to develop this Model that is gradually becoming established, which is the model of the People President. It is a model of the People’s protagonism.

So, in order not to bore you with the story, the first conclusion or the first message is: Yes, there are going to be Elections! Yes, these are going to be Democratic elections! As elections under Sandinista Governments or being Sandinista Governments have always been, after all. Those elections could not have been more democratic, the one in 1990, the one in 2006-2007, absolutely democratic! And all the elections thereafter. And what we are looking for is how to ensure that they are increasingly clearer, more transparent, more democratic, and with fewer machinations from individuals, produced overnight, to confound Nicaragua’s democratic process. That’s the first thing we have to be clear about and which we want to convey to you.

And so there you are, in fact, I might have dared, although I did not actually do so, to read out all of the things that we are discussing right now… I did read some and perhaps my Compañeros and Compañeras might call me to account. But that’s the sense. These are the retaining walls. In other words, if someone here is not Nicaraguan or, moreover, is a traitor to our Patriotic Nation, is such a traitor to the Nation to participate in a Democratic Electoral Process in any Country? I think not. If someone violates the political Constitution of their country, or any of the things I have mentioned here, then they do not participate.

On the other hand, the Electoral Reform also touches on, because this must be guaranteed, that the Supreme Electoral Council is the entity that has the function, the attribution of executing these electoral elements. So, part of the Reform is, in an article relating to the powers of the Supreme Electoral Council, it will say that one of the powers has to do with denying legal personality in the case of political parties that want to present candidates that the Constitution does not allow; or in the case of canceling the candidacy of people who are within these various prohibitions that are established. Then the Supreme Council is to be empowered to do that.

There is another point that we are only just discussing within the Commission, this explanation to you is an explanation that was prepared before starting the Consultation Process that starts tomorrow and which is going to be a Process that is going to take us the whole month of August, because we have in our mind, our idea is to approve this in the month of the Patriotic Nation, at the beginning of the Month of the Patriotic Nation, which is the month of September. But we are going to carry out what I would say is a very extensive Consultation Process throughout the month.

And thus we are going to consider other aspects as well. For example, the aspects that have to do with duration. We have a certain duration for the elections, six years. Here we have to see if that can be modified or not, or if it should be modified. We think that it is necessary to establish a duration allowing us stability, security and Peace, because we have only one enemy, which is Poverty, and we have to guarantee electoral periods that allow us to develop work, efforts, projects, initiatives, in that fight against Poverty. But we still have no definite duration, in the sense that we are discussing.

Some countries have ten years, other Countries have seven. Quite a few countries have seven. Other countries have six years. There are other countries with five. Recently some countries went from five to six years. We had gone from five to six, in a Constitutional Reform last year. And there are countries that have four years, which often become eight. It’s like saying we want eight but let’s not make it eight, but make it four plus four. I mean, all of that exists.

We are going to discuss what is in Nicaragua’s interest. This is a discussion for Nicaraguans to see what is convenient for Nicaragua given our history, given our possibilities, given our projects, according to our vision, for the benefit of our People.

However, without a doubt, it is of great importance for us to have you here, because when diplomatic representation is established and when international organizations are established with their delegates and we are clear that there is friendship, and we respect all our friends who are respectful to us, then the least we can do is provide you with the information that we have defined at the moment.

Are there going to be elections? Yes. Are the elections going to have the kind of intention mandated by the President? Yes, that is to say, absolutely fair, necessary and nothing unusual. We are going to study the electoral periods and there are also some articles of the Constitution that we must modify for the operational part of decision making, such as what I explained to you about the Supreme Electoral Council or how there may be a need to change something, in the event that there was a change of duration, of the electoral period, meaning we have to change what exists at this moment.

That is it in essence, and rather, as we are all here, the members of the Special Constitutional Commission have already been presented to you, if there are any doubts, any concerns, we are at your disposal.

Thank you.

Meddling Through Mistranslation: US Interferes in Nicaragua’s Elections

Compañero Valdrack Jaentschke:
Thank you very much, Doctor, for that clear statement.

Indeed, it is important to emphasize that the members of the National Assembly present, as well as the members of the Board of Directors, are also members of the Special Advisory Commission on this issue. That is why we see members of different political movements, members of the different parties that make up this Special Commission.

We leave the microphone open to see who would like to comment, or ask questions, I think rather for question. Let’s limit it to questions. Thank you very much. Do just raise your hands, you have microphones to hand, do share them.

What clarity, Doctor, absolute clarity in your presentation. Not the slightest shadow of doubt in your presentation. The cameras have gone now.

Compañera of the Inter-American Development Bank.

Remarks by Mrs. Shirley Cañete Romero, Representative of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB)
First of all, thank you for this meeting. I think it is important for us to receive first-hand information from you, and that as Doctor Porras has well informed us, that you are going to start a consultation process and that process has several points.

So, maybe we should be grateful for the opportunity to have these meetings back-to-back and we can have such first-hand information rather than the information we end up reading in the media, so that we can clearly inform our respective agencies and embassies. So, thank you very much for all this information that you have just provided us and hopefully we can be part of this process, so that we can understand how Nicaragua’s elections are progressing.

We also do not know the date, but we understand that it may be, in that regard, towards next year. Thank you.

Compañero Valdrack:
Thank you, Representative.

Mr. Fernando Ponz, Ambassador of the European Union:
Well, good afternoon and once again, thank you for this amicable meeting. On behalf of the Member States of the European Union and myself, I would like to thank you very much for this presentation, which is in the spirit of dialogue and helps us to understand things better.

As part of the Reform that you have presented to us, I would like to take this opportunity you are giving us, and always with the utmost respect for the Nicaragua’s national Sovereignty, to ask you if you intend to organize some kind of independent observation of the upcoming elections. And, of course, I reiterate, this is from the most absolute respect in relation to this decision that belongs to you.

Once again, thank you for this friendly meeting. As our colleague said, it is a format that we hope will continue, we thank you, since it is a format that allows us to have a dialogue, increase transparency, get to know your points of view first-hand and all out of the utmost respect, a mutual respect. Thank you.

Compañero Valdrack Jaentschke:
Thank you, Ambassador Ponz.

We are going to ask two, three, four, five questions and then we can give the floor to Dr. Porras.

Anyone else?

Dr. Gustavo Porras:
Well, we must recognize the importance of these get togethers, of these spaces, it is up to us to inform you, as a point of reference and in the spirit of friendship Nicaraguans have with all those who respect us.

Right now we are working on what the Constitutional Reform will be, and I encourage you to convey the decision, the tranquility, the sovereign decision, the explanation, we might say, that in this country there are going to be elections as there have always been in recent years. Explaining a little the history of how they used to be and how we don’t want them to be again. And this is to communicate the concern that we have and the discussion that Nicaraguans are having, to carry out this process. And what we are doing are constitutional reforms that guarantee this. I’ve already read the other relevant part.

Now, our elections have always been observed, accompanied, we call it, because they really are accompanied, and they will continue to be so, because the elections here are absolutely democratic.

You can be sure that I thank Ambassador Ponz for his question, because it is a question that takes us further on, that is to say, that the discussion is no longer about whether or not there are elections, which was the discussion that existed up until now; now the question is whether or not there will be accompaniment. But we are now where we are, clear that we are in a process, we are listening, we have collected concerns and are paying attention to friendly requests for information. We will continue to inform you how this process is going and little by little the data will be more concrete, obviously, because right now we are just going to start the process. Do let’s communicate that.

And be assured that the Nicaragua’s People will support this process and will also accompany the elections of Nicaraguans, for Nicaraguans.

Compañero Valdrack Jaentschke:
Thank you very much, then, for having participated in this effort, and I think that Dr. Porras’ presentation has been crystal clear and absolutely informative. I’m not going to venture to repeat it, because it was clear and informative, and I think also that the two comments were of a very high quality, in the sense that they helped complete the snapshot; we hope that this will be the photograph that is transmitted of what Doctor Porras has said so forthrightly.

Nicaragua, a country, I’m going to repeat it, Doctor, a democratic country, with democratic elections, where we defend our process and our model and where there are going to continue to be elections. And as we have organized this process, we will continue organizing it, with quality, but fundamentally responding to our Nicaraguan People, to Nicaragua’s interests, to the defense of Nicaragua’s Model, the defense of Nicaragua’s Democracy of Peace and Well-being. I think the Doctor may well tell me off for paraphrasing him, but I think that’s clearly what the Doctor explained and what the purpose of this meeting has been.

If someone, after all this exchange, feels an urgent need to ask another question or make another comment, we will leave the next few seconds for them to decide… Since there are only smiles, then we are going to conclude this meeting, thanking you again for your presence, thanking you for your willingness to accompany this process, to be kept up to date, and also thanking you for transmitting this information as we have provided it to you. You know what we are doing now, we don’t need to explain more, and you also are communicators of this vital information.

Thank you very much. Good afternoon.

(Kawsachun News)

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Nicaragua’s Authentic Democracy Defends the Will of the People

Nicaragua & Sandinismo — Nicaragua’s Authentic Democracy Defends the Will of the People

Nicaragua’s Authentic Democracy Defends the Will of the People

Article 12 of 14

Orinoco Tribune

By Stephen Sefton

Originally published at https://orinocotribune.com/nicaraguas-authentic-democracy-defends-the-will-of-the-people/

Publication Date: July 27, 2026

By Stephen Sefton – Jul 23, 2026

Nicaragua is one of the only countries forthrightly defending its sovereignty and self-determination and is again coming under the attack of Washington and the news media it controls.

The US-centered Western techno totalitarian ruling elite is greatly intensifying their assault on democracy and freedom around the world seeking to recover and remake the West’s now vanishing monopoly control of international trade, technology and finance. Abandoning international law and destroying free and fair election processes at home and abroad have been central to that global assault. Western style democracies themselves are now more than ever militarized financial and digital shell games under governments progressively less and less responsive to their peoples’ needs.

Overall, the US elite driven global offensive aims to consolidate and extend control over vassal states around the world, militarizing them, while maintaining division among potential rival power structures such as BRICS and undermining powerful adversaries such as the Russian Federation and the People’s Republic of China. This same logic underlies and drives the different varieties of aggression by the US and allied ruling classes against any country resisting the West’s outright gangsterism. Integral to this global assault is relentless, ever more sophisticated psychological warfare.

This involves the most extensive concentrated control possible of news media and related information sources such as non-governmental organizations and universities. This concentration of power over information sources combines now with mass surveillance and manipulation of consciousness via powerful digital platforms controlled by giant, hugely wealthy multinational corporations. All of these information and mind control structures serve as essential support to Western economic and military aggression around the world. Among the most successful achievements of this psychological warfare is the way whole populations in Western and allied countries have come to accept as normal government policies which actually harm their countries’ political and economic interests.

Latin America and the Caribbean
In Latin America and the Caribbean, the US ruling elite’s war on democracy, which some experienced observers call Plan Condor 2.0, referring to the period of US supported dictatorships in the last century,  has used their vast psychological warfare resources to control, manipulate and intimidate voter opinion on a mass scale. Together with the influence of US allied local oligarchies over their countries’ judicial and electoral systems the combined effect eliminates any chance of free and fair elections. Last year’s national elections in Bolivia, Honduras and Ecuador, for example, were clearly vitiated both by abuses of the electoral process and by brazen US government interference, which also markedly affected the outcome of Argentina’s legislative elections that year.

This year, similar electoral abuses and interference facilitated the highly questionable electoral victories of pro-US candidates in Peru and Colombia, where the president elect even has dual Colombian and US citizenship. An important regional and international effect of these successful attacks on democracy in Latin America and the Caribbean is that regional integration forums like the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) are rendered ineffective by deliberate obstruction from US aligned governments. Similarly, the region’s vassal governments become more susceptible to US policies seeking to block China’s economic relations in the region, while also promoting the region’s diplomatic relations with the genocidal regime governing Israel.

Nicaragua rejects US electoral meddling
Right now in Latin America and the Caribbean, Brazil, Cuba, Mexico and Nicaragua are the main countries forthrightly defending their sovereignty and self-determination, fundamental concepts of the UN Charter and international law. This is the context of the current, highly contrived media and political furor over purposefully misreported remarks by Nicaraguan Co-President Daniel Ortega during last weekend’s celebration of the 47th anniversary of the triumph of the Sandinista People’s Revolution in 1979. Faithfully translated in context, Comandante Ortega addressed the issue of undue US influence in Nicaragua’s elections saying,  “…there will be no elections like that again here, no more elections via which they can cheat their way to government so as cheat their way to taking power.”

However, practically no mainstream or alternative media in Europe or the Americas truthfully reported the sense of Co-president Comandante Ortega’s remarks. In Western and allied media, Daniel Ortega’s declarations were reported as stating flatly that Nicaragua will no longer hold elections at all or else that future elections would include only government approved candidates. Currently, Nicaragua’s National Assembly and the country’s Supreme Electoral Council are preparing the relevant legislation strengthening the integrity of the country’s election process to present for review and approval by the National Assembly in early August.

In an interview with the Sputnik news agency, Dr. Gustavo Porras, National Assembly president, explained that the legislative and electoral authorities are working so as “to identify the principal elements and not leave even the tiniest opening which might permit dreadful manipulation by the imperialists and their servants… never again elections serving the imperialists or their underlings who are enemies of our country.” The misreporting of this episode is the most egregious recent example from a long history of malevolent false reporting on Nicaragua by Western and allied news media.

Implanting false beliefs and false memories
Conventional journalism around the world in general, but especially in the US and Europe, long ago abandoned conventional reporting standards to practice outright psychological warfare instead. No one employed in Western media reporting on foreign affairs now would keep their job if they tried genuinely to respect due diligence, cross checking facts and corroborating quotes, acknowledging their own viewpoint so as to offer as faithful a report as possible of any given issue. Practically no Western news outlet offers information on international affairs in a way that allows people to make up their own minds by mentioning contrary sources and interpretations.

Attempts to distribute or even access truthful foreign affairs reporting now face practically universal censorship in most Western and allied media. Internet search engine algorithms filter out reporting sources contradicting dominant western narratives and doctrines. Artificial intelligence is wide open to the mis- and dis-information falsely touted by Western media as good faith reporting. Examples of this reality abound in relation to NATO’s war against Russia in Ukraine, Israel’s genocide in Palestine or Iran’s courageous defense against US and allied aggression. For decades now, Western psychological warfare has planted false beliefs in the minds of a mass public who assimilate them as false memories, enabling the West’s sinister ruling elites to constantly dupe their countries’ populations into accepting policies that damage their own interests.

The main false belief inculcated among the peoples of the Americas and Europe has always been the falsehood that their governments seek to ensure freedom and democracy both at home and abroad. But the use of lawfare to exclude politicians as electoral candidates or of the abuse of government aligned media to stigmatize politicians and political parties is normal in Europe, as has long been the case in the Americas. Among the most prominent examples are those of Marine Le Pen in France or the AfD party in Germany or the brazen EU interference in the last elections in Moldova and in Rumania or more recently, in the US, repressive moves against candidates like the anti-zionist Republican Thomas Massie  or anti-zionist Democrats challenging the party’s old guard domination of selection processes.

Meddling Through Mistranslation: US Interferes in Nicaragua’s Elections

Outright political censorship and arbitrary politically motivated repression too are now the norm across Europe against anyone seeking to challenge government support for Ukraine or Israel. Brave reporters like German citizen Hüseyin Dogru or respected commentators like Swiss national Jacques Baud, among many others have been stripped of basic rights and have no legal remedy. That political repression is accompanied by systemic corruption. Political funding scandals are a fixture of French and German politics while, in the UK, the current orchestrated attack on Reform party leader Nigel Farage has highlighted the gross double standards prevailing in Britain over campaign financing.

In all Western countries the electoral rules permit funding one way or another by big business and wealthy donors blocking genuinely independent candidates and political parties from achieving electoral success. Less blatant but more sinister has been the growing use of data analysis and surveillance to target voters via social media so as as to influence their voting intentions. The mass harvesting and analysis by Cambridge Analytica of the data of tens of millions of Facebook users to try and influence both the 2016 Brexit referendum and the 2016 US presidential election is notorious. That abuse has become even more sinister and sophisticated since then with digital technology billionaires treating sovereign governments with open contempt as a tiresome anachronism, good only for fleecing.

As Abraham Istillarte the Venezuelan communicator has remarked, elections can be heavily and readily influenced by the capacity of algorithms to target individuals via “psychological microsegmentation seeking to make you feel in specific ways and along particular lines so that you come to believe specific things, so that you do indeed think in a particular way and act in a particular way.” Self-evidently, the fusion of corporate and political power in Europe and the Americas has created an ever more clearly fascist status quo fusing corporate and State power in which elections are bought, managed and controlled so as to offer the flimsiest legitimacy for antidemocratic policies dictated by the ruling elites against their peoples’ interests.

Sandinista youth participate in the celebration of the 47th anniversary of the triumph of the Sandinista Popular Revolution in Managua. (July 19, 2026)

Nicaragua’s authentic democracy
After twenty years in government, Nicaragua’s co-presidents enjoy well over 80% popular approval, with good reason. Nicaragua’s economy has grown at around 4% a year since 2022. Unemployment is around 3%. Inflation has held steady at between 5% and 7%. The country’s exports increase briskly from one semester to the next. The Central Bank holds record foreign exchange reserves. The country is self sufficient in food production. Education and health care are free, provided by the best equipped public health system in Central America and the region’s most innovative education system. The country has the best highways in the region and the best citizen security.

With Chinese help, the government is providing thousands of new houses a year for people on low incomes. Russian development cooperation has provided an advanced plant producing vaccines for use across the region and is developing a nuclear medicine center to provide state of the art cancer care. The country has harmonized its medicine protocols with India to facilitate the purchase of inexpensive medicines. The electricity supply now covers 99% of the country, with up to 80% generated from renewable energy sources. 95% of the country has access to drinking water. The percentage of people hoping to migrate abroad has dropped to 12%  from a high of 38% in 2021.

The government has achieved these enviable levels of political support thanks to the formidable results of its economic management and commitment to the well-being of all Nicaragua’s families but especially the majority on low incomes. For that reason, the government subsidizes the cost for households using less electricity, the fares for bus services and, since 2022, the prices of diesel, gasoline and liquid gas for cooking. The government also provides assistance to school students at the start of the year to purchase their school needs and ensures a free school meal every day for around 1.2 million school children.

Western governments and media constantly attack Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo because they are focused on the human development of all Nicaragua’s families via poverty reduction, provision of accessible, good quality health care and education, maintaining a strong economy and encouraging a strong sense of national unity and identity. Above all the country has recovered a stable equilibrium of peace and security with a highly respected national police and much trusted and admired armed forces. These are the reasons the US ruling elites and their allies detest Nicaragua. They cannot stand so much Truth and Light from a country devoted to and committed to its Christian, Socialist, Solidarity inspired authentic democracy focused on the human development needs and aspirations of its People.

A naturalized Nicaraguan citizen, Stephen Sefton is a writer and community worker based in Nicaragua since 1994. Besides coordinating the web outlet Tortilla con Sal since 2008, he has supported community education and health programs in and around Estelí, where he lives, since 1996.

(Kawsachun News)

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Nicaragua: A top 25 country for renewable energy!

Nicaragua & Sandinismo — Nicaragua: A top 25 country for renewable energy!

Nicaragua: A top 25 country for renewable energy!

Article 13 of 14

Alliance for Global Justice

By Nicanotes

Originally published at https://afgj.org/nicanotes-nicaragua-a-top-25-country-for-renewable-energy

Publication Date: March 26, 2026

NicaNotes

March 26, 2026

Nicaragua, a Top 25 Country for Renewable Energy!

[This article was first published by Explore Nicaragua in February 2026 and reprinted by NSCAG of the UK in March.]

Nicaragua ranks among the top 25 countries worldwide with roughly 70–80% of its power now generated from renewable sources.

Projects like the Amayo Wind Farm and others along the Pacific coast have harnessed consistent trade winds, making wind a top renewable source.

The first thing you notice when you drive over the border from Costa Rica into Nicaragua are the towering turbines spinning steadily against the Pacific horizon, their blades cutting through the strong coastal winds in the Rivas region. These iconic structures, part of the Amayo wind farm—one of Nicaragua’s pioneering renewable projects—are a striking welcome sign to a country that has undergone a remarkable transformation in its energy landscape.

Nicaragua, long reliant on imported fossil fuels for electricity, has aggressively shifted toward renewables over the past two decades. In the early 2000s, the nation depended heavily on oil-fired generation, but strategic policies, private investments, and abundant natural resources have driven a rapid increase in clean energy supply.

By 2025, the country had achieved impressive milestones, with renewable sources consistently powering a majority—and often exceeding 70-80%—of its electricity grid in recent years.

Key drivers of this growth include a diverse mix of technologies tailored to Nicaragua’s geography:

– Wind power stands out as one of the most significant contributors. Projects like Amayo (around 63 MW total capacity across phases) and others along the Pacific coast have harnessed consistent trade winds, making wind a top renewable source. Wind has historically accounted for 10-14% or more of generation in various years, with installed capacity around 186 MW in recent profiles.

– Geothermal energy, drawing from the country’s position along the Pacific Ring of Fire, provides reliable baseload power. Fields like Momotombo and San Jacinto-Tizate deliver steady output, contributing roughly 10-16% of electricity in recent data, with significant untapped potential estimated at over 1,500 MW.

– Hydroelectric sources, including small and medium plants, leverage Nicaragua’s abundant rivers. While large-scale hydro has grown modestly, maintenance and smaller installations have helped hydro supply around 10-13% of demand, supporting rural electrification efforts.

– Biomass, primarily from sugarcane bagasse burned at mills, adds another substantial share, often 13-19%, capitalizing on agricultural waste.

– Solar has seen accelerating growth, particularly in the last few years. With high solar irradiation (yielding around 2,300 kWh/kWp annually for utility-scale installations), projects like the recent 70 MW Enesolar-3 plant and others are expanding capacity rapidly. Solar’s share remains smaller but is poised for major increases, with plans to add hundreds of megawatts in the near term.

Recent reports highlight the momentum: In mid-2025, renewables accounted for about 73% of electricity generation, and by late 2025, the matrix exceeded 80% clean sources in some periods, thanks to hydroelectric maintenance and ongoing additions.Installed renewable capacity has climbed toward or beyond 1,000 MW in targets set for 2025, up from around 887 MW in 2020. This progress aligns with Nicaragua’s updated climate commitments, aiming for even higher renewable shares by 2030, and has positioned the country as a leader in Central America’s energy transition.

The benefits extend beyond environmental gains. Greater reliance on domestic renewables has reduced vulnerability to global oil price fluctuations, lowered generation costs in many cases, and expanded electricity access to over 98% of the population from much lower levels two decades ago.

It has also supported rural development through off-grid solar and small hydro solutions. Looking ahead, Nicaragua continues to prioritize renewables, with ambitious plans for more solar, wind, and geothermal expansion, plus emerging interests in areas like green hydrogen and energy storage. As those border turbines keep turning, they symbolize not just a scenic entry point, but a nation powering its future with increasingly clean, sustainable energy.

Briefs

By Nan McCurdy

Nicaragua Reaffirms Commitment to Multilateralism at CELAC-Africa Forum

Nicaragua reaffirmed its commitment to the unity of the Global South and the promotion of a renewed multilateralism during the high-level forum between the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States (CELAC) and Africa, held in Colombia on March 21. The forum brought together delegations from 88 nations.

Nicaragua’s Deputy Foreign Minister Olimpia Ochoa emphasized that strengthening cooperation between the two regions is essential to advancing toward a more just, democratic, and multipolar international order, based on respect for international law, state sovereignty, and non-interference in the internal affairs of other nations. The Nicaraguan diplomat advocated for a renewed multilateralism that allows nations to coordinate efforts and defend their legitimate interests on the international stage, particularly in forums such as the United Nations. She noted that this approach also involves strengthening cooperation in strategic areas such as food security, sustainable agriculture, education, science, health, innovation, and fair trade, for the benefit of the peoples of Latin America, the Caribbean, and Africa. “We reject the persistence of mechanisms of external domination which, in their quest for hegemony, hinder the development of the free peoples of the world through unilateral coercive measures and other forms of pressure, seeking to perpetuate new forms of colonialism against dignified and sovereign peoples,” she stated. Ochoa said that Nicaragua affirms the demands for reparations for the crimes of colonialism and slavery.

Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva delivered a strong speech criticizing what he described as a new “colonial approach” by global powers toward developing nations. He criticized U.S. policies toward Cuba and Venezuela. He said that after historically taking resources like gold and diamonds, developed nations are now seeking to dominate critical minerals and rare earth deposits in Latin America, the Caribbean, and Africa. He noted, “They colonized us, then we fought for independence… and now they want to colonize us again.” He condemned the “removal” of leaders and the foreign interference in countries like Venezuela and Cuba. (Prensa Latina and La Jornada, 21 March 2026)

Economy Grew 4.9% in 2025

The Nicaraguan Central Bank this week released good economic news from the year 2025. Gross Domestic Product (GDP) grew by 4.9%; total exports reached a record US$8.9 billion; inflation remained low at 2.7%; international reserves reached US$8.3248 billion at year-end and reached US$9 billion in February 2026. Coffee established itself as one of the key pillars of exports in 2025, generating US$918.2 million with a volume of 3.3 million quintals, reflecting increases in value and volume compared to the previous cycle. This was driven by favorable international prices which averaged around US$272.50 per quintal in 2025. The price has remained high in 2026, exceeding US$300 per quintal in March. The head of the Central Bank noted that the agricultural sector as a whole posted extraordinary results: livestock exports reached US$975.1 million, with a real production growth of 8%, and sectors such as tobacco, sugar, dairy, beans, and peanuts also stood out. These results, under the National Plan for Production, Consumption, and Trade, made it possible to supply domestic markets and contribute decisively to economic growth, exceeding targets despite climate variability. Reyes emphasized that this agricultural performance has been fundamental in generating employment and benefiting thousands of rural, agro-industrial, and coffee-chain families with job stability while also supporting public welfare, and poverty reduction. (Informe Pastran, 23 March 2026)

Government to Continue to Subsidize Petroleum Products

The Nicaraguan government reaffirmed its commitment to maintaining subsidies for petroleum products including cooking gas, despite increased global volatility in oil prices. In an interview with TN8’s La Notificación program, the executive president of the Nicaraguan Energy Institute (INE), José Antonio Castañeda, explained that this measure, implemented since 2022, has now been in place for four years and reflects a political decision by the country’s leaders. “In 2022 there was a very significant oil price crisis and to prevent impacts on the economy and families the government decided to freeze prices,” Castañeda noted. He said that, while international prices rose weekly—surpassing US$120 per barrel in 2022 and approaching high levels again in 2026—in Nicaragua prices remained frozen for the benefit of the country’s families and the different economic sectors. This applies to both gasoline and diesel—used in private, public, and freight transportation—as well liquefied gas for domestic use. Castañeda emphasized the benefits of this policy, which allows for stable budget planning for families and businesses and provides peace of mind by eliminating the uncertainty of weekly price hikes. And it represents significant savings, as it prevents global price increases from being passed on to the public, increasing the cost of living and production. It positions Nicaragua with favorable prices in regional and international trade, despite not being an oil producer or having large refineries. “It allows us to assure families that their household budgets regarding fuel will not change, no matter what happens. For the economic sectors as well, because diesel is the fuel that moves cargo in the country,” he added. When asked directly whether the subsidy would continue despite the adverse global scenario—with the price per barrel exceeding $100 at the time of the interview—Castañeda replied in the affirmative: “Yes, the future is always difficult to predict, but our government remains committed to maintaining the subsidy, to shielding against those impacts because these are impacts on the Nicaraguan economy, on each family’s economy.” (Informe Pastran, 23 March 2026)

Ministry of the Interior Clarifies situation of Bayardo Arce

The National Penitentiary System of the Ministry of the Interior released a statement on March 23 saying that: “The Ministry, in response to a public request—apparently made in bad faith—from individuals identifying themselves as relatives of Mr. Bayardo Arce Castaño, is releasing these photographs of the visit made on March 20, 2026, to Mr. Arce Castaño by his brother, Gerardo Arce Castaño. Any other interpretation or publication reflects the obvious and irresponsible intent to discredit and undermine the National Penitentiary System of the Ministry of the Interior.” In January, a court in Managua found Bayardo Arce guilty of the crime of “money laundering in the form of defrauding the State.” According to the indictment, he orchestrated a “structured scheme” to accumulate “funds of illicit origin” amounting to nearly US$3 billion. See photos: https://radiolaprimerisima.com/2026/03/22/bayardo-arce-recibe-visita-de-su-hermano-informa-sistema-penitenciario/ (La Primerisima, 23 March 2026)

Some 2.7 Million Plants of Various Species Ready for Planting

The Ministry of the Environment and Natural Resources (MARENA) reported that, as part of the progress of the “Verde, Que Te Quiero Verde” [Green, I Love You Green] National Campaign, there are currently 193 forest nurseries, with a production of 2.7 million plants that include more than 30 native species, including forest, fruit, and ornamental trees. According to a press release, the knowledge of 1,261 participants has been enhanced through 36 training sessions on nursery establishment and management and 10,914 plants have been distributed to families and communities, promoting public participation. Likewise, at the Genetic Improvement Center and the Seed Bank, efforts continue to modernize the preparation of the growing environment and the sowing of more than 24,000 seeds in 45,000 seedling tubes, ensuring the quality of the plants that will be planted with the first rains of May. The objective of these activities is to strengthen forest cover. See photos: https://radiolaprimerisima.com/2026/03/24/se-han-producido-2-7-millones-de-plantas-de-distintas-especies/ (La Primerisima, 24 March 2026)

Canada Seeks to Strengthen Bilateral Relations

Ms. Ioanna María Sahas Martin presented her credentials as Canada’s ambassador to Nicaragua on March 24. The diplomat conveyed her greetings to Co-Presidents Daniel Ortega Saavedra and Rosario Murillo Zambrana, expressing her gratitude for the warm welcome and her desire to maintain dialogue in areas of mutual interest, strengthening bilateral relations in various sectors such as tourism, agriculture, mining, and others. She also highlighted the favorable conditions for Canadian investment in the country. During the meeting, Foreign Minister Valdrack Jaentschke welcomed her and conveyed the warm regards of the Nicaraguan authorities. He also reiterated the willingness to continue deepening the bonds of friendship and cooperation between Nicaragua and Canada and the interest in expanding trade and economic collaboration between the two countries. (La Primerisima, 24 March 2026)

Over 39,000 Patient Visits at the “Porfirio García” National Diabetes Center

From 2021 to date, the Porfirio García National Diabetes Center has provided 39,095 patient visits. At this facility, patients receive care in diabetology, internal medicine, nutrition, orthopedics, cardiology, psychiatry, and urology; ultrasounds and laboratory tests, among other studies, are performed. This allows the country to prevent complications and provide appropriate treatment for the disease. The Ministry of Health (MINSA) continues to strengthen the Family and Community Health Model, which ensures free, quality care for patients. The center is located at kilometer 9 on the Masaya Highway and ensures specialized care and timely follow-up for people with diabetes. (La Primerisima, 24 March 2026)

Nicaragua and China Break Ground on Landmark Solar Project to Power Water Access and Energy Sovereignty

Nicaragua & Sandinismo — Nicaragua and China Break Ground on Landmark Solar Project to Power Water Access and Energy Sovereignty

Nicaragua and China Break Ground on Landmark Solar Project to Power Water Access and Energy Sovereignty

Article 14 of 14

By MK

Originally published at https://www.telesurenglish.net/nicaragua-and-china-break-ground-on-landmark-solar-project-to-power-water-access-and-energy-sovereignty/

Publication Date: June 8, 2025

Nicaragua, with Chinese financing, launches its largest solar plant to date—powering water systems, cutting energy costs, and deepening South-South cooperation on infrastructure for social good.

It will be the country’s largest green power plant, powering the national water infrastructure and supporting the transition to renewable energy. Photo: @dw_espanol

June 8, 2025 Hour: 1:29 am

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Nicaragua has inaugurated construction on a major solar power plant in partnership with China, marking a strategic leap toward energy independence, climate resilience, and universal access to clean water. Funded by an $83 million investment from Beijing, the Enesolar-3 photovoltaic facility in Nindirí, Masaya, is set to supply renewable energy to the country’s water utility, ENACAL, directly benefiting nearly 4 million people across urban and rural communities.

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Led by the China Communications Construction Company (CCCC), the plant will have an installed capacity of 70 megawatts and is expected to generate 140,000 megawatt-hours annually—enough to cover around 40% of ENACAL’s electricity consumption. Officials say this will substantially reduce operational costs, improving the delivery of water and sanitation services throughout the country.

Framed as more than just an infrastructure project, Enesolar-3 is part of a broader initiative by the Sandinista government to expand renewable energy, reduce fossil fuel dependency, and ensure access to public utilities as a basic human right.

“This is our Sandinista Popular Revolution delivering works of progress, development, dignity, and peace for the Nicaraguan people—together with our brothers from the People’s Republic of China,” said Laureano Ortega Murillo, presidential advisor for investment and international cooperation, during the cornerstone ceremony.

Ortega underscored the political and ideological depth of the alliance, highlighting that diplomatic relations between Managua and Beijing were restored just over three years ago. Since then, both countries have developed what Ortega described as an “intense” and “extraordinarily fast-paced” collaboration across key sectors, driven by mutual political commitment and South-South solidarity.

“These are swift approvals, expedited by a shared will to support each other—politically, technically, and as true partners,” he added.

Joining the ceremony were Chinese Ambassador Chen Xi and Gan Xingqiu, president of the CCCC Energy Institute, who announced that the plant would feature the most advanced solar technology developed in China and connect to the national grid via a newly built 230-kilovolt substation. “This will be Nicaragua’s largest green solar power plant,” Gan said.

ENACAL president Erving Barreda emphasized that electricity represents the company’s single largest operating cost. He described the project as “a game-changer” in improving service delivery and advancing public access to water.

The Masaya facility is part of a national network of three solar power plants, with additional construction underway in León and Matagalpa. The projects form a cornerstone of what the government has called an “energy offensive for human development,” aiming to lift people out of poverty through sustainable infrastructure.

Residents of Nindirí, who have long struggled with intermittent access to basic services, expressed hope and gratitude. “I lived through the 1990s, when water pumps didn’t work and we had to hire carts and trucks just to bring water home. This is a dream come true,” said Coralia José Pavón, a local resident.

Energy and Mines Minister Salvador Mansell noted that the project reflects the government’s continued commitment to prioritizing people’s needs over market-driven models. Ambassador Chen Xi reaffirmed China’s support for Nicaragua’s development and praised the South-South partnership as one rooted in equality, sovereignty, and mutual respect.

As countries of the Global South seek alternatives to extractive development models, Nicaragua’s renewable energy drive stands as a bold example—where public ownership, international cooperation, and climate action converge in pursuit of human dignity and social justice.

Author: MK

Source: Sputnik, TeleSUR

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