One hour before closing Vote Receiving Boards (JRV) in the general votes of November 7, 2021, the “mobilizers” of the ruling Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) they executed the order to “strengthen the vote”filling out ballots in favor of “Commander Daniel (Ortega) and the companion Rosario (Murillo)”.
“Mateo”, 35 years old, was one of those mobilizers who received the order. The man stated, in an interview with CONFIDENTIALwho voted five times at different voting centers in District I, in Managua.
“At the beginning we mobilized people, that is, from seven in the morning when they arrived at my house, we went to look for people at their homes and transferred them to the centers, but at around five in the afternoon the show began: they threw a new orientationThey told us that they would take us to a list of places where we had to reinforce the Sandinista vote,” said “Mateo.”
In November 2021, Ortega and Murillo were confirmed for a new consecutive presidential term with 75.92% of the votes, in elections run by a collapsed Supreme Electoral Council, without guarantees, transparency or electoral competitionwith seven presidential candidates who continue to be imprisoned, and who were not recognized by the majority of thethe democratic international community that described them as an “electoral farce”.
In Voting Centers “they already knew” about the fraud technique
In each of the five Voting Centers to which he was sent, “the Front’s district chief” indicated the Vote Receiving Board (JRV) to which he should go and told him: “Don’t tell, there you already know to which they go, they are going to give them the ballot, they fill it out where they already know, they put it in the ballot box and they leave”.
“When entering the Receiving Board one did not present anything, we were talking, we went alone, directly to get the ballot. There was no password, they had identified the group supervisor and that was enough, we could fill and fill, and with everything and the nerves I had to vote five times, once in each voting center they took me to, ”he detailed.
“Mateo” assures that his group from District I was transferred aboard six vans and a small truck, although in other districts of the capital “they moved more vans because more people were going”. He calculates that between ten and fifteen mobilizers were transported in each vehicle, who got off at each of the five voting centers to “fill out ballots.”
“I don’t know how much the others filled, but I only filled one at each Voting Center,” he commented. She made the votes without even presenting an identity card, although the members of the tables did make the pantomime of giving them the finger when “exercising the vote.”
“I gave them the same finger and they weren’t even scared to see that it was already stained. Another relative, who also acted as a mobilizer, even had a different finger stained at each Voting Center,” he recalled.
“I did it out of fear and necessity,” he says about voting for the FSLN
“Mateo” affirms that when he was summoned –a month before the voting– They “never” mentioned to him that he had to “fill out ballots”but, he appreciates that perhaps he did not find out because he did not attend the previous meetings that the Sandinista Front held with the mobilizers.
“Because of work I couldn’t go to the meetings they held, so I don’t know if they said it there, but for me it was an order at close range, because I didn’t know I was going to do that, for me I was going to move people, to ask to the people who went to vote and to offer transportation, well, I didn’t see that as illegal, but later they came out with that order and I couldn’t back down because they would think I was against them,” he explained.
He added that He agreed to participate as a mobilizer for the Sandinista Front out of “fear and necessity”since, at that time, he already had more than a year without getting a formal job and the party promised him a political endorsement that would open doors for him to work in state institutions.
“I was afraid to say no, because it was at my house that they came to ask me to join them, to support them. They know that I’m not an opponent, I’m not really from any party, because if I don’t work I don’t eat, but they know that part of my family is Sandinista, so they trusted me, offered me and told me about the guarantee, to others they offered 500 pesos, So, I said yes, I didn’t see anything wrong with going to offer transportation,” he said.
On October 17, 2021, CONFIDENTIAL posted a report in which he revealed that the Sandinista Front had initiated calls for mobilizers, especially guaranteeing “trusted” Sandinista sympathizers, people who had already participated as mobilizers, and state workers, that They had to “guarantee the Sandinista vote”.
The testimonies of the summoned mobilizers confirm that the Sandinista Front uses public resources, such as vehicles of institutions, delegations and mayors, to group and move their supporters.
They list those who “do not support the party”
In addition to the “point-blank” order to seal the ballot boxes, “Mateo” explains that the mobilizers’ job was to identify “families that do not support the party.”
They had to list each person who refused to go on the transportation they were offered and, above all, whoever did not show that they had actually exercised their right to vote.
“Those who were with us, in the vans, and those who didn’t want to go were targeted. Those who went were asked for their identity card number, name and address, and those who did not receive us, the people of the neighborhood gave us their names, we wrote down the address, and they were already crossed out as people who do not support the party,” he explained.
“Mateo” assures that, after November 2021, the party members complied with the delivery of the political endorsement, but regrets that “It didn’t work at all”, because he still can’t get a job. “I gave myself color doing something that is illegal, doing something from the start I didn’t know what I should do and that I ended up doing out of fear,” she reflects.
He highlighted that the members of the Sandinista Front of District I returned to look for the mobilizers, who participated in the November 2021 votes, so that They will “reinforce” the walks that were carried out by districts in Managua in commemoration of the day of the Sandinista Revolution, which is celebrated every July 19, but he says that “thank God they didn’t find me.”
Voting in 2021 was “false and illegitimate”
The regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo in the general elections of 2021 was re-elected without political competition for a fourth consecutive term. The Supreme Electoral Council (CSE) –aligned with Ortega interests– declared the Sandinista Front the winner with more than 75% of the votes.
The Citizen Observatory of Open Ballot Boxes, in a report disclosed on November 7, 2021, estimated that abstention during the general voting was 81.5%.
The document indicates that in the context of the elections there were 35 arrests ordered by Ortega, 25 of these registered one day before the voting, and more than 200 acts of violence in the different Voting Centers.
However, the hunt for the regime began six months before the voting process, with the imprisonment of human rights defenders, political activists, peasants, journalists, commentators, former diplomats and seven presidential hopefuls: Cristiana Chamorro, Arturo Cruz, Félix Maradiaga, Juan Sebastián Chamorro, Miguel Mora, Medardo Mairena and Noel Vidaurre.
National and international organizations, and officials from different governments in Latin America and Europe, rejected the elections organized by the Ortega-Murillo regime, classifying them as “false” and “illegitimate.”
On November 10, 2021, forty former foreign ministers from Latin America signed a letter expressing their “deep concern about what happened in the illegitimate electoral process,” which occurred on November 7 in Nicaragua.
The organization Human Rights Watch (HRW), in its annual report 2021released in January 2022, denounced that Nicaragua experienced general elections in 2021 without guarantees, with dozens of opposition leaders in jail, and with thousands of citizens fleeing into exile.
The Ortega-Murillo regime currently holds more than 190 people in detention for political reasons. National and international human rights defenders have urged the immediate release of these citizens, denouncing that in prison they are victims of torture and cruel treatment.
