The proposal of the president of the Superior Council of Private Enterprise (Cosep), César Zamora, to “build bridges of communication, and understanding, and generosity… and knowing how to forgive”, confused even the members of the Board of Directors of that entity, who offered various interpretations of his words.
On Tuesday, June 21, unexpectedly, Zamora offered Noticias 12 what he himself called the first interview he offered to a media outlet since he took office, taking advantage of the occasion to report on the existence of a communication mechanism between the chambers affiliated with Cosep and the Government, with the “facilitation” of the Central American Bank for Economic Integration (CABEI).
Representatives of more than half a dozen chambers, hastened to clarify that, in the cases in which such communications did exist, it was only to make arrangements with government offices, but not to discuss political issues, while trying to understand why Zamora talks about forgiving, when justice has not even been done.
“César spoke of ‘forgiving,’ but forgiveness does not mean forgetting, and he never said that we had to forget,” said a member of the Board of Directors, who specified that “dialogue is an approach that cannot be ruled out. What happens is that he demonizes himself, because the regime is using him to buy time and ‘turn around’, but the Cosep proposes a responsible, honest dialogue, and in which the agreements are fulfilled. Dialogue should not be seen as capitulation or someone selling out,” he added.
That they apologize to the political prisoners
The president of a union entity that supports productive activity defined that “as a Christian, I have values and principles, and I have forgiven when I have received offenses, but it is not my place to forgive those who have imprisoned our leaders, friends, co-workers, businessmen that they have dedicated their lives to produce. If someone is going to forgive them, it would be those who are imprisoned, but first they must set them free, so that they have something to forgive.”
The businessman maintains that the political prisoners – those of Cosep, and by extension, all the others – are locked up “without having committed any crime. They don’t have to stay in jail convicted in unfair trials, and suffering the violation of their human rights. Instead of proposing forgiveness, Cosep should be asking for a fair framework of free competition, freedom, protection of human rights and institutions, as our statutes say, ”he demanded.
The manager of a chamber that provides services to companies, was sorry for “the role that César is playing, but I do not consider him to be so guilty: they have him trapped, because his bosses force him to do that, and he must do it, though I’m sure you remember that when Mike Healy called for freedom for political prisoners, they took him prisoner”, he referred.
Justice, if you don’t want more sanctions
An economist who provides services to a business chamber believes that Zamora is “trying to see if it creates bridges and positions Cosep with a conciliatory message that seeks negotiation. That is why he invokes the same message from different angles, including that of forgiveness, although I think he is not very aware of what that means, because transitional justice poses forgiveness through a process that includes non-repetition”.
By including the interests of the regime within that probable process, he pointed out that “the neuralgic thing is to seek a negotiation, and this has to be comprehensive, if they want the sanctions to be removed. In the end, I don’t think that call is going to have any impact. The dictatorship will remain the same, at least until the November ‘elections’“, forecast.
For his part, a professional who presided over a service sector chamber considers that one of the main objectives of Zamora’s message is “to create conditions for prisoners to be released, and perhaps to be willing to negotiate or dialogue , be a condition to relax its rigid position in the direction of freeing them”.
Another possibility is that César “perhaps feels pressured by his political kinship with José Adán Aguerri, former president of Cosep. Be that as it may, it is a complicated situation, ”she acknowledged.
For his part, Manuel Rubio, president of the Nicaraguan Chamber of Tobacco Growers, limited himself to responding that “I don’t want to comment on something I haven’t heard anything about, so I’m not even aware of it.”
