Relatives of the victims murdered in the context of the 2018 protests, reiterated their demand for “justice without impunity” for the 355 people who died, according to the registry of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), as a result of the regime’s repression of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo in Nicaragua.
The demand was extended during the tribute “Footprints of the Rebellion”, held this Saturday in San José, Costa Rica. The group “Friends of the Mothers of April” organized the event in support of the joint action day, announced by relatives of the victims, in commemoration of the fourth anniversary of the massacre of May 30, 2018, in which 19 people They were killed in the midst of the violence unleashed by the regime.
Susana López, mother of the victim Gerald Vásquez; Sofía Mayorga, grandmother of the victim Noel Calderón and mother-in-law of Humberto Parrales; Azucena López, mother of Erick Jiménez López; and Martha Lira, mother of Ezequiel Mendoza, were some of the relatives who participated in the tribute.
Mayorga, a relative of two of the fatal victims of the 2018 protests, stated, when speaking during the tribute, that “they are not going to shut us up. We are going to continue fighting so that this Ortega Murillo regime comes out. We continue to demand and raise our voices to ask for justice without impunity.”
Martha Lira, mother of Ezequiel Mendoza, murdered on June 14, 2018, stressed during the event that “in times of impunity, remembering is doing justice.”
“In each activity we are going to pay tribute to our children, it is a way of resisting, of keeping the memory of our children alive. One of his words when he was assassinated was: ´I am M19. Do not forget me, so as a mother I am going to be present in each activity because it is a way of remembering, ”he pointed out.
In the tribute, more than 40 pairs of shoes were exhibited that represented the victims who can no longer walk as a result of the repression of the Ortega-Murillo regime. In addition, they showed photographs and lists with the names of the more than 300 people killed in the context of the social protests.
Other relatives of the people who died as a result of the Ortega repression joined the tribute via Zoom and reiterated their demand for justice without impunity.
Sara López, mother of the victim Cruz Alberto Obregón, recalled that her son was murdered on May 30, 2018 and that just on that date “he has nothing to celebrate”, but to denounce that “it has been four years without getting justice.”
“It is not a party, it is a date of national mourning for that blood that was shed that day of the 19 people that this dictator ordered to assassinate,” he said.
In addition, he stressed that as relatives they continue “resisting” and that the Ortega regime must know that “our children were that seed that will soon bear fruit and we mothers are not going to shut up until we have a free Nicaragua, in democracy, where there is no repression and we have justice.”
“Nicaragua is in mourning”
On May 16, the Mothers of April Association made a public call to declare “national mourning” andThis May 30, the date on which Mother’s Day is celebrated in Nicaragua and on which four years ago, the Daniel Ortega regime attacked the so-called “March of the Mothers.”
The AMA proposal was given in response to the initiative promoted by the head of the National Assembly, the Ortega deputy, Gustavo Porras, to declare Nicaraguan Mother’s Day a national holiday. On May 18, the machinery of deputies of the Sandinista Front approved the initiative.
“Given the declaration of May 30 as a national holiday, decreed by the dictatorship, let us declare May 30: Day of National Mourning,” the organization proposed through a statement published on its Twitter account.
Organizations of Nicaraguans who are exiled in Costa Rica and the United States have announced activities for this weekend, in support of the call for “national mourning” made by the relatives of the fatal victims of 2018.
