Father Edwing Román reacted against the judicial process that Monsignor Rolando Álvarez is facing, accused by the Nicaraguan justice for the alleged crimes of conspiracy to undermine national integrity and propagation of false news to the detriment of the State and Nicaraguan society.
Through his Twitter account, the ex-parish priest of the San Miguel Arcángel church in Masaya branded the accusations against the bishop of the Diocese of Matagalpa as false accusations.
Related news: Father Edwing Román calls Karen Chavarría, Monsignor Álvarez’s executioner, a “puppet”
The religious’s reactions arise after the initial hearing held behind closed doors on January 10 against Monsignor Álvarez. The Ortega judge Gloria Maria Saavedra Corralesof the Tenth Criminal Court District of Managua, referred the prelate to oral and public trial.
“The false accusations mounted against him will not be able to affect him because he has the guts to face adverse situations,” said the priest Román, one of the religious voices critical of the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo.
The priest affirmed that Álvarez “has the grace and strength because the Holy Spirit has anointed him, has made him bishop of the Church and he is focused on God and his mission.”
On several occasions, the exiled priest in the United States has demanded the release of Bishop Álvarez, who has been kidnapped for more than five months and is currently officially reduced to house arrest.
Monsignor Álvarez, one of the most critical voices of the dictatorship
Monsignor Rolando Álvarez is one of the most critical voices against the dictatorship of Ortega and Murillo, the binomial that controls the strings of power in Nicaragua, a country mired in a sociopolitical, economic and human rights crisis since 2018. In that year, the The regime ordered the social protests calling for the dictator’s resignation to be put down with blood and fire.
Related news: Ortega judge takes Monsignor Álvarez to trial and keeps him under arrest
After more than four months in captivity, on December 13, 2021, the dictatorship presented Monsignor Rolando Álvarez in the Managua courts. The photographs disseminated by the propaganda media showed the priest in a blue guayabera and without his bishop’s cassock; his face looked haggard.
The lawyer, human rights defender and author of the report «Nicaragua: A Persecuted Church?»Martha Patricia Molina, considers that the judicial process against Bishop Rolando Álvarez presents a series of irregularities that reveal the arbitrariness of the State.
