The Nicaraguan dictator, Daniel Ortega, defended the results of the voting on Sunday, November 6, arguing that they showed that the majority of Nicaraguans “voted for peace and not for political parties,” and that is why, according to the dictator, his party, the Sandinista Front, was awarded 100% of the municipalities of Nicaragua.
“We can say that it is a historical fact that in these elections last Sunday, because for the first time in the history of our country, the people cast their vote thinking about the well-being of the family, and not thinking about political parties, as long as they are convinced that the political party to which they belonged had done nothing and there was no other way but to continue voting for the Sandinista Front,” Ortega assured.
“People are becoming aware, even those who have another political flag. In the 17 years (alluding to the democratic governments from 1990 to 2007) they had mayors everywhere, and what did they do? Nothing. Instead, these Sandinista mayors, since 2007, have continued to do more work,” he added.
The dictatorship of Ortega and Rosario Murillo was awarded all the mayorships of the 153 municipalities of Nicaragua, according to reports from the Supreme Electoral Council (CSE), controlled by Ortega operators. these votes they did not have the participation of true opposition politicians, nor any type of electoral observation.
This led to little citizen participation. The citizen observatory Urnas Abiertas indicated that during these #Municipales2022 voting, a 82.7% abstentionism. This level of abstention exceeds that observed in the “electoral farce” of 2021, which was 81.5%.
Analysts consulted by CONFIDENTIAL They explained that the regime showed that it is “progressing” towards the imposition of a single party system in Nicaragua, although this is not an issue that occurs “in fact”, since the Constitution and the laws would have to be reformed. In practice, Nicaraguans have been left “without political options”.
Ortega Obvious Repression During Voting Day
“For the first time in history that on an election day, there are no attacks, no stones, no beatings, no bullets, no injuries. No drop of blood was spilled”, boasted the dictator.
“These municipal elections clearly indicate to us that it is possible to win the peace, to ensure the peace. It was not bathed in blood, as the terrorists financed by the Yankee empire bathed Nicaragua in blood,” Ortega added, referring to the citizen protests of April 2018, repressed with blood and fire by the regime’s paramilitaries and the Police, violence that left more than 350 dead.
Open Ballot Boxes monitored 31 arrests of opponents during the voting weekend in operations by the regime’s Police in Carazo, Managua, Masaya, Río San Juan, Rivas and in the South Caribbean. In Bilwi there were attempts to protest against the imposition of the Sandinista mayor, which were repressed by the Police.
#UAAlert ? #Urgent We denounce the increase in political violence in the electoral context.
From November 1 to 7, we verified 31 arbitrary arrests in 7 departments and 19 municipalities, in collaboration with the @AzulyMonitoring pic.twitter.com/NxZOJlkIpQ
— Open Ballot Boxes (@Open Ballot Boxes) November 9, 2022
The director of Open Ballot Boxes, Olga Valle, said that some people who are not recognized as militants of the Sandinista Front, were harassed by electoral police who took photos of them when they arrived at their polling station, or prevented them from entering. “There are cases of people who, while inside the JRV, are singled out as “gates” and then expelled,” he assured.
In some municipalities in the north of the country, where sympathizers and members of other political parties were preparing to defend the vote, there was harassment by members of the FSLN, who threatened the population so that they would not go out to vote, as they could be arrested or their burned vehicles.
Photo: Confidential | Taken from 19 Digital.
Ortega alludes that Costa Rica is a “terrorist base”
“And that they made plans, sponsored by the Yankees, by the European governments, whose ambassadors conspire here with the terrorists, to give them financing to promote violence. Despite this, of the millions they were given in Costa Rica, which is a base they have there, they were unable to provoke acts of violence,” insisted Ortega.
Open Ballot Boxes said that their presence in at least 148 of the 153 municipalities in the country allowed them to verify that the “absolute pressure” from all state institutionsagainst public employees to force them to go to the voting centers, including their relatives of voting age.
The citizen monitoring body highlighted that it was a system of “absolute surveillance”, in which there were checkpoints outside the voting centers or in neighboring houses. Sometimes, carried out from an awning with chairs to monitor who came to vote, as a continuation of the threat scheme that was implemented in the days prior to November 6.
Ortega participated this Tuesday in an act in which he laid a floral offering at the mausoleum of the founder of the Sandinista Front, Carlos Fonseca Amador, for the 46th anniversary of his death, and then moved to the Alexis Argüello sports center, where he gave the closing speech of the Sandinista Youth Congress.
His first 40 minutes of speech was his usual historical journey in which he addressed the Spanish colonization, the battle of General Benjamín Zeledón, the rebellion of Augusto C. Sandino and the Somocista dictatorship.
Ortega: The United States is a Government of “bitches that give birth to dogs”
It was in this interval, that he described the United States Government as “bitches that give birth to dogs to bleed the world and humanity, and go about destroying peoples.” When he referred to the 2018 crisis, he pointed out that the bishops of the Catholic Church blessed the “terrorism that was experienced that year” and that some even felt they were the “owners of Nicaragua.”
He made a veiled threat to the country’s telecommunications companies, pointing out that they were privatized because it was a business that registered good profits and that the tax payments they made were not fair compared to the economic benefits they obtained. “That will have to be reviewed,” said the dictator.
At the end of his speech, Ortega questioned the role of the United Nations and precisely, its secretary general, Anthony Guterres (which Gutiérrez called on several occasions), because according to him, they are not firm in demanding that the great powers assume their responsibility to stop climate change, and particularly, in not pressuring the United States to lift the embargo against Cuba.
“There is no democracy in the United Nations, there is only the democracy imposed by the great powers,” Ortega said, alluding to the broad support for the vote in favor of ending the embargo on Cuba, ignoring the fact that in that same organization , a large majority of countries condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, and Nicaragua, in a great act of political servilityvoted against this resolution.
