The regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo confirmed that the rights to elect and be elected have been “cut off” in Nicaragua, after completing the assault against five opposition mayorsled by mayors from the Citizens for Freedom (CxL) party, elected by popular vote in the 2017 elections, say experts on municipal issues consulted by CONFIDENTIAL.
“The dispossession of the mayor’s offices means one more of the periods of crisis and arbitrariness against municipalism and its autonomy. The rights of citizens to elect their authorities that are going to govern them at the local level and participate in local decisions are curtailed,” said a specialist in municipal issues from the citizen organization Urnas Abiertas.
The mayor’s offices of San Sebastián de Yalí, El Cuá and Santa María de Pantasma, in Jinotega; Murra, in Nueva Segovia; and El Almendro, in Río San Juan, were attacked, on July 2 and 4, by the Ortega-Murillo regime Police, councilors from the Sandinista Front, paramilitaries and delegates from the Nicaraguan Institute for Municipal Development (Inifom).
Opposition mayors and deputy mayors were removed from their positions and councilors from the Sandinista Front were imposed in their place. The regime justified the dispossession by arguing that these mayors no longer had a political party.
In August 2021, the Ciudadanos por la Libertad party was left without legal status after the Supreme Electoral Council (CSE) ordered its ban prior to the general elections of November 2021, in which the Ortega party was re-elected without political competition to a fourth consecutive term.
Regime “confiscated” the will of Nicaraguans
The Nicaraguan Network for Democracy and Local Development (Local Network) condemned the dispossession of the opposition mayors and valued that the Ortega action is “a flagrant violation” and “seeks to dismantle the last remnants of municipal autonomy.”
“By seizing the government from the citizens of the municipalities of Santa María de Pantasma, Murra, San Sebastián de Yalí, El Cuá, and El Almendro, the will of almost 50,300 people has been confiscatedif to the electorate of these municipalities are added those of Mulukukú and Wiwilí, who had also had their respective governments taken from them in the last four years, due to the fact that they had not voted for the dictatorship,” the Network said through a release.
The organization explained that the cancellation of the legal status of a political party “prevents it from running for the next elections, but does not extinguish the mandate obtained by the elected authorities through that party, who are obliged to fulfill their period of government”:
“The loss of the legal personality of a party is not a cause for dismissal of the elected councilors under its flag. because it would be to apply the principle of retroactivity of the law that is strictly prohibited by the Political Constitution still in force in the country”, he remarked.
Illegalities in the spoils
The municipalist of Urnas Abiertas also pointed out that part of the illegalities in which the regime incurred when executing these dispossessions include: violation of the hierarchy of norms or the legal system; violation of due process since the legal grounds were not respected; and violation of the division of powers since even the Police and the Supreme Electoral Council are invading the powers of the municipalities.
He added that part of the social implications of this assault on the communes could be tangible in a “greater mistrust of local political authorities, not feeling that their rights to choose who or who will take actions to improve local living conditions are respected.” ; and in a “deconfiguration of the balance of local powers since, with these arbitrary actions, decision makers are imposed who are not accepted by the population.”
Open Ballot Boxes recalled, in the conjuncture bulletin “Coup to municipal autonomy: Arbitrary, illegal, illegitimate and unconstitutional assault on the mayors of the CxL party”, released this Monday, that the Law of Municipalities establishes that there are different causes for the termination of a municipal position, among these: by resignation, death, when sentenced by a final sentence to imprisonment or disqualification from holding office for a term equal to or greater than the rest of his term, unjustified abandonment of his duties for 60 continuous days, among others.
In this context, the citizen organization affirmed that the taking of the opposition mayors “is illegitimate and unconstitutional”, pointing out that “there is a breach in the constitutional procedure, since the corresponding Municipal Council is the one who should approve a resolution declaring that the mayor incurred in circumstances that led to the loss of their status.
Disposal is a message to the international community
The armed takeover of these five opposition mayors is also a political message that the Ortega-Murillo regime sends to the international community, valued a sociologist consulted by CONFIDENTIAL.
“It is more than clear that the model that the regime is executing is that of Cuba. We are in a single-party country, where civil society is reduced to its minimum expression, where every platform from an independent and dissident point of view has been dismantled, so this action against the mayors adds up as a message that is being sent to the international community, telling them that they are not giving in, but that they are tightening more and violating more the rights of Nicaraguans,” he said.
He added that another of the regime’s objectives is that “there is no other instance in the country in the framework of the creation and maintenance of a clientele”, concretizing it through the massive closure of NGOs and, now, with the dispossession of the mayor’s offices. opponents.
“They want all social benefits, all possibilities of distribution of aid, of wealth, to remain exclusively in the hands of the Sandinista Front. That is to say, they want that if the people are going to be on their knees and are going to have to beg for a piece of bread, they are going to have to beg for it, from the Sandinista Front,” he remarked.
