The young people who led the protests against President Daniel Ortega for some failed social security reforms in 2018, look with despair at the municipal elections on Sunday, November 6, where the authorities of at least 153 municipalities of the country are supposed to be chosen. country.
According to what they say, it will be “one more farce” and a “replica” of the 2021 electoral process, where President Ortega won a new term of five more years in about elections marked as “false” by the international community.
José Alberto Montoya, a young writer and political activist exiled in Costa Rica, assures that the elections are not a guarantee of change “and only represent an attempt by Daniel Ortega to legitimize himself before the international community”, something that he considers “awkward because everyone already He knows what Daniel Ortega is and the dimensions to which his dictatorial system reaches.”
The Ortega government has arrested several young critics of his administration, such as Lesther Alemán, Max Jeréz, and Samantha Jironthe latter is the youngest political prisoner and her arrest occurred after giving an interview to a media outlet in a hotel in Managua.
For this reason, several have decided to leave the country to protect themselves and continue doing activism, emphasizes Juan Diego Barberena, 26, who is part of the Political Council of the Blue and White National Unity (Unab), one of the main blocks of country opposition.
According to Barberena, the municipal elections do not represent hope for the youth or for the majority of the Nicaraguan people because, in his opinion, they are flawed elections, there is a de facto state of exception imposed on the streets and there are no political rights in full validity.
“There is no capacity for the people’s right to vote to decide and that they can pretend to change democratically, or choose, in any case, their authorities democratically,” Barberena questions.
He explains that in the event that the ruling Sandinista Front party does not obtain a certain mayoralty, some time later they take it. military manual as has happened with the mayors that were in the hands of the extinct opposition bloc Citizens for Freedom.
Hopelessness is seen in migration
And the despair in democratic processes is reflected in migration. According to the magazine Confidentialdirected by journalist Carlos Fernando Chamorro, more than 58% of Nicaraguans, mostly young, are willing to leave the country in search of better opportunities.
The United States Customs and Border Protection (CBP) registered a record arrest of 164,600 Nicaraguans on the southern border.
According to Barberena, from the Blue and White Unit, the permanence of Ortega and his wife Rosario Murillo, in power, “marked both by the 2021 elections and by the municipal elections this Sunday, will increase the migration of Nicaraguan youth. because it is not necessary to see both dissociated electoral processes”.
“These elections are the consummation of the totalitarian power of Daniel Ortega in all the municipalities of the country and that is going to increase repression, surveillance, hopelessness and unemployment and this will consequently generate greater migration of Nicaraguans,” he indicates.
Meanwhile, Montoya adds that mass migration “is what Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo represent in power” since their return in 2007.
“Employment rates will continue to fall to the ground, what Doña Rosario Murillo calls ‘creative economy’ is only the precariousness of the work of Nicaraguans. That’s what’s happening. People are migrating because there are basic needs and the main need is to feed themselves and their loved ones.”
The municipal elections will be held this Sunday. The Supreme Electoral Council, noted for its affinity with Ortega, has said that the process will be carried out in a “free and transparent” manner.
However, the opposition called for demonstrations this Sunday in several countries, such as Costa Rica and the United States.
The vice president of Nicaragua, Rosario Murillo, last week urged citizens to vote in the municipal elections on Sunday. “This November 6 we meet to continue building the future of all, the Nicaragua that we want, the Nicaragua that we dream of,” said Murillo.
Connect with the Voice of America! Subscribe to our channel Youtube and turn on notifications, or follow us on social media: Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
