The crying for the absence of their fathers or mothers, imprisoned in El Chipote, is continuous. Photographs, videos and audios, taken before the arrests, are the only means they have to remember them and feel close to them, because the regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo has curtailed their right to communicate for more than eight months. And other minors, also children of prisoners and political prisoners in La Esperanza or La Modelo or in cells of the country’s penitentiary systems, can visit them, but are subjected to “abusive” searches and after one or two visits they prefer not to return to prison. These are the stories of some of the minors, children of political prisoners, who cannot see their parents, whom the regime illegally condemns.
miguel mendoza, blogger and independent sports writer, was with his daughter for the last time on June 21, 2021, before being arrested at his home by a contingent of the National Police. That night, before they came for him and took him to El Chipote, he managed to say goodbye, without knowing it, to his seven-year-old daughter; he tucked her into her bed, hugged her, and they read a story together.
Margin Pozo, Mendoza’s wife, remembers that she and Miguel had decided that, if he was imprisoned, they would not tell the minor. However, three months after Mendoza’s confinement, she had to tell him what was happening.
“I decided to tell him because I saw the damage that the lie did to him. She believed that her father had abandoned her, that he did not love her, and she went into an anxiety crisis. She ate the little skins off her fingers, she got up every so often at night, she didn’t want to go to the bathroom alone because she said she was afraid, she cried a lot, she would throw tantrums for no reason, it was the anger and the pain of not being able to see her dad ”, Pozo recounted in an interview with CONFIDENTIAL.
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Now, the minor knows that her father is incarcerated and they go together to leave El Chipote with water, but on several occasions she has suffered crises for not being able to enter to see her father. “She tells me that she misses him, that she wants to see her face, that she wants to hug him, that she wants to tell him that she loves him, that she misses him, that she wants to play with him again,” he said. her. However, she won’t let him in to see it.
“I wish my mom would come back forever”
The daughter of the political rea Tamara Davila, a member of the Political Council of the Blue and White National Unity (UNAB) and a member of Unamos, is five years old and has also suffered for more than six months from not seeing his mother. The minor witnessed the capture on June 12, 2021, and since then she has asked about her whereabouts, when she will return and if she is alive or dead, according to independent media reports.
“My granddaughter has been taken away the right to be and hug her mother. They add up to 239 days, eight long months in which she has not been allowed a phone call, ”denounced Josefina Vijil, Dávila’s mother, in a tweet published this week.
In another publication, she reported that, after attending one of the few visits that Dávila has been allowed, she took her granddaughter to the sea to give her the messages her mother sent her, they cried together and the minor threw two shells into the sea, wishing that his mother “come back forever and that the covid-19 ends.”
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Why it takes so long? Why do not you call me?
The president of Unamos, Suyen Barahona, imprisoned in El Chipote since June 13, 2021, has also not seen her five-year-old son in all these months. The last time she held him in her arms was minutes before she was arrested.
“She gave him many kisses, hugs, told him that she loved him and went out into the street so that her son would not see when the policemen, who were breaking down the gates, took her away,” said César Dubois, Barahona’s husband.
“Sunshine”, as Suyen has called her son since he was born, is unaware that his mother is incarcerated. Her parents agreed that they would tell her that “she is working, helping many other people to have a better life, to be happier.”
However, Barahona’s absence is felt more strongly as the days go by. “Sunshine asks about her every day, there are days that she is sadder, that she cries for whatever reason, more downcast, and says that she misses her mom, why her mom doesn’t come, why has it taken so long,” Dubois details.
Suyen and “Sunshine” were very close. They played, read and fell asleep together. Now, Dubois tries to maintain those routines that the minor had with his mother, but, he says, “it is increasingly difficult” to justify the absence that has lasted for more than seven months.
“Daddy, we miss you so much”
The lawyer’s two- and four-year-old daughters Roger Reyesformerly the legal defender of fellow political prisoner Félix Maradiaga, also do not know that their father has been imprisoned in El Chipote for more than five months and they suffer because “it has taken a long time” to return from work.
Fernanda Guevara, Reyes’ wife, explains that as a family they decided not to tell them about the arrest and that, anticipating the kidnapping, he prepared a video where he tells them how much he loves them and that he is working.
“When they ask about him, cry or go into a crisis because they haven’t seen him, I play the video he left for them, I show them videos where he is speaking, I show them photos and we pray for him, one moment each, so that he returns soon. ”, he recounts.
The eight-year-old daughter of political prisoner Félix Maradiaga, presidential candidate and member of UNAB, also suffers from not being able to see and hear her father. The minor had fluid communication with him, until he was arrested on June 8, 2021, accused of violating the “Sovereignty Law”.
Since 2020, Maradiaga has been physically estranged from his family – who is in the United States – due to the “de facto” immigration restriction imposed by the regime that ordered his passport to be withheld and refused to replace it.
The only consolation for the minor, according to her mother Bertha Valle, is a video in which her father tells her that he loves her, expresses how much he wants to see her again and how important she is in his life.
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They violate children’s rights
The relatives of the political prisoners of El Chipote affirm that they have requested, through several letters, contact between the minors and their parents. However, the police and judicial authorities do not give an answer.
Mendoza’s wife details that during the trial against her husband, in which the Ortega justice convicted him of the crimes of “conspiracy to undermine national integrity and spread false news”, the demand for communication between father and daughter was expressed before Judge Luden Martínez, but he did not rule on the matter.
“I have been in this place for 232 days, in a punishment cell, and I have not complained a single day, the only thing I ask is that they allow me to see my daughter, I have not seen her for almost 8 months,” he said. Mendoza in a few seconds that he was given to speak during the trial.
Suyen’s husband reports that during the visits he also brings drawings of the minor and asks that they be delivered to his mother, but they never authorize it.
Lawyer Wendy Flores, a human rights defender from the Nicaragua Nunca + collective, affirms that the restriction of visits by minors violates the right to personal and psychological integrity of children.
“All these restrictions on visits, contact, calls, have an impact on boys and girls who have a development, a growth and must have a bond with their fathers and mothers, in addition, they are harming that right, which it is protected by the Convention on the Rights of the Child, by the American Convention on Human Rights, and by the Nicaraguan Code for Children and Adolescents,” Flores lists.
Abusive searches during prison visits
The children of political prisoners who remain in the country’s penitentiary centers, although they have authorization to make visits, are also victims of the Ortega regime. Flores points out that there are “abusive” searches during visits from which minors are not exempt.
“Searches should never be invasive, not even for adults, human dignity or personal integrity should not be damaged or harmed. However, in Nicaragua, there is a practice that borders on the sexual abuse of adults, which makes them undress, do squats, they have put the metal detector strip on their private parts, and this, for example, should never be carried out on minors, because it can mean trauma to them and goes against international human rights principles and norms that protect children and adolescents,” he denounced.
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Relatives of political prisoner Bryan Alemán, incarcerated since August 2020 in the Jorge Navarro Penitentiary System, known as La Modelo, say that a year ago they decided that his two-year-old daughter and three nephews aged three, six and eleven, who before visited him in prison, they stopped attending because of the searches to which they were subjected.
“They check them as if they were adults, as if they were criminals. They remove the tails of the girls, they check their hair, they made them all open their mouths, take off their shoes, they touched their bodies over their clothes, they checked their bags, they took away their drawings if they had any, the smallest who used pamper they took it off, sometimes they asked them if they had something there (in their private parts), and everyone left almost crying because there was no privacy at all, “they denounced.
In another visit, one of the minors was also told that by wearing a skirt she “provoked the men” and they “threatened” to remove her from the visit.
“It is humiliating how they treat children, if they could offend them they did so and checked them as if they were criminals,” they reiterated.
Alemán’s two-year-old daughter suffers from not seeing her father. “She cries for him, she calls him when she cries, but she can’t keep taking him because of the psychological damage they are causing her with those checks,” her relatives justify.
They also denounce that the mistreatment for adults is worse during check-ups, since they are even forced to undress, they put the metal detector on their private parts and they throw away the food they carry.
Relatives of another prisoner of conscience, imprisoned in La Modelo for more than two years, also report that their children no longer want to visit him, due to the searches. “They cry and miss their dad a lot, but they don’t want to go visit him anymore because of how they touch them in those check-ups.” Meanwhile, the months of confinement continue to accumulate, and the imprisoned mothers and fathers cannot see or hug their children, nor give or receive any words of encouragement or encouragement.
