The Ministry of Health (Minsa) already accumulates half a dozen buildings that were confiscated by the regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo from non-governmental organizations and the media, and were later handed over to this institution in an attempt to “legitimize” these confiscations. , prohibited by the Political Constitution of Nicaragua.
The last confiscation was carried out against some offices that belonged to the María Elena Cuadra Women’s Movement, and that on May 4, 2022 were donated to the Teletón-Nicaragua Foundation, later the Ministry of the Interior (Migob), controlled by the regime of Ortega, eliminate his legal status.
“In compliance with this legal provision, the association chose us and the donation of the three properties was made, the public deed of each one of them was already made, with the inventory of the three properties, and they have already reported to the Ministry of the Interior within its own liquidation process,” he told the press the president of the board of directors of Teletón, José Evenor Taboada.
Six weeks later, in the Managua building, located a few blocks from the National Assembly, the alleged Dra. Erlinda López Health Center, owned by the Minsa, is already under construction, according to a sign where the faces of Ortega stand out. and Rosario Murillo. Police presence had already been observed in the property, but it was not until June 13 that the confiscation was confirmed.
Teletón Nicaragua had explained that with the three donated buildings, located in Managua, Estelí and Juigalpa, the first two would be used as a patient rehabilitation center and the last would be a shelter for families from the interior of the country who attend the Teletón Center in the region. located in the departmental capital of Chontales.
The María Elena Cuadra Movement joined the extensive list of 669 non-governmental organizations that canceled their legal status on February 15. The Migob argued that the elimination was due to the fact that they did not present their financial statements “with a detailed breakdown” and because they had “boards of directors with expired deadlines.” And because they did not present the detail of the “previous donations, coming from abroad”, in accordance with the Foreign Agents Regulation Law.
However, Sandra Ramos, from the María Elena Cuadra Women’s Movement, pointed out that “it is completely untrue” that this body has failed to fulfill its obligations before the Migob and that its board of directors is headless. It was the Ministry of the Interior that refused to receive the documentation.
The other confiscations that were delivered to the Minsa
In 2021, the Ortega regime handed over five confiscated properties to the Minsa: the offices of the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights (Cenidh) and the CONFIDENTIAL, which were converted into supposed maternity homes; that of the Popol Na Municipal Promotion and Development Foundation (Popol Na Foundation), where they installed a health center; the Canal 100% Noticias building, which is now a supposed center for alcoholism and addictions, and the Institute for Democracy and Development (Ipade), converted into a center for the care of diabetic patients.
These buildings had been occupied by National Police officers since December 2018, when they were de facto occupied and confiscated by the Ortega regime. But it was not until January 2021 that an express remodeling was carried out to deliver them to the Minsa, because the day they were inaugurated, the lack of real conditions for the supposed care and provision of health services was observed in them, and they tried to make the facade with the reuse of furniture that previously belonged to 100% Noticias, CONFIDENTIAL and the other NGOs.
On March 23, 2021, a month after these Minsa buildings were inaugurated, CONFIDENTIAL revealed that the mother’s house installed in the property confiscated from this media outlet was empty and under police control.
“The officers look strange, as they are not used to receiving patients from health services. The riot police who warned about our visit, waved us towards the left side of the building, passing a small room. That’s where “the graduate” will attend us. The police do not lose sight of us, nor our telephones”, describes a journalistic chronicle of the visit made to the building.
The same situation was repeated when visiting the 100% Noticias building, where the riot police that “protect” the place have not left a day since Friday, December 21, 2018, when they took over the building and arrested the journalists Lucía Pineda Ubau and Miguel Mora, who is again a prisoner of conscience for the regime, after being arrested for the second time in June 2021. Only the Health Center, located in Popol Na, was used by the Minsa as a vaccination center against covid -19.
Last February, the Minsa celebrated in these same buildings the first anniversary of the inauguration of these spaces. “It has been a benefit of this Sandinista government,” Silais Managua highlighted on its Facebook page.
Minsa became a repressive arm
Since April 2018, the Ministry of Health has been used as another of the repressive political arms of the Daniel Ortega regime. In that year, he was accused of denying medical attention to gunshot wounds during the protests. One of the most remembered cases was that of Álvaro Conrado, the adolescent who was denied care at the Cruz Azul Hospital.
In that same year, the Minsa fired more than a hundred health workers who supported the protests and provided medical care to the wounded. In August 2018, Human Rights Watch reported that at least 135 doctors, nurses and other workers were fired in this context.
Two years later, in 2020, the public health authorities replicated the gesture with the arrival of the covid-19 pandemic by liquidating more than a dozen doctors who publicly spoke out for the delivery of personal protective equipment.
In June 2021, the Minsa intensified the pressure on the doctors and began a day of citations before the Directorate of Health Regulation and the Directorate of Legal Counsel of this institution, where it questioned them for their statements to the media about the pandemic, he recalled the Special Cybercrime Law (which supposedly penalizes false news, but is used as a “Gag Law”) and threatened some with taking away their medical licenses.
