The president of Brazil, the leftist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, has finally revealed what happened to the mediation in favor of the then politically imprisoned Catholic bishop Rolando Álvarez, and that is that the dictator Daniel Ortega never wanted to answer his phone calls, which is why now the Brazilian president also does not want to hear from his Nicaraguan ideological counterpart, who has become a dictator.
This Monday, July 22, during a meeting with foreign correspondents, with whom he discussed the issue of Nicaraguan Bishop Rolando Álvarez, who was imprisoned and sentenced to more than 26 years for fabricated crimes, President Lula revealed that the Nicaraguan tyrant has not answered his phone since June 2023, when it was made public that Pope Francis asked him to intercede on behalf of the religious leader imprisoned by the Nicaraguan dictatorship.
“He (Pope Francis) asked me to talk to Ortega about a bishop who was in prison,” Lula explained to journalists from international agencies and media.
“The fact is that Ortega did not answer the phone and did not want to talk to me. So, I never spoke to him again,” said the leader of the leftist Workers’ Party (PT) of Brazil.
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For the president of the largest economy in South America and one of the main members of the emerging economies grouped in the BRICS, it is regrettable that this is happening with “a guy who made a revolution like the one Ortega made to overthrow Somoza.”
Lula questioned the authenticity and revolutionary quality of Ortega and the so-called Sandinista revolution because, with the attitude of the Nicaraguan dictator, he now does not know if the popular anti-Somoza revolution of 1979, led by the Sandinistas, was in reality a revolution “because he wanted power or because he wanted to improve the lives of his people.”
Lula said he was in favor of “alternating power” in every country, as it is “the healthiest” option for democracy.
Ortega believes himself indispensable
This is not the first time that the Brazilian leftist leader has expressed harsh criticism of Ortega. In 2021, when referring to the political crisis in Nicaragua and the tyrannical attitude of his ideological colleague, he said that “when a leader gets it into his head that he is indispensable or irreplaceable, that is when the spirit of the dictator begins to be born,” in direct allusion to the dynastic intentions of Ortega and his family who believe themselves predestined to govern the country.
These strong criticisms come from the leader of the largest economy in South America and also the founding country of the club of nations with emerging economies known as BRICS, a political and economic forum that Ortega is pushing to join, in the hope of finding financing there to continue with his totalitarian project.