Prior to the fifth anniversary of the massive demonstration that was called “the mother of all marches” and which ended in the largest massacre against civilians known in Nicaragua in recent decades, the Mothers of April Association (AMA) and leaders of the opposition commemorated this date that filled the country with mourning.
On the afternoon of this Sunday, May 28, AMA requested an anniversary mass in memory of “our relatives who were victims of the state repression of May 2018.” The Catholic service took place in the Metropolitan Cathedral of San José, in Costa Rica. After the mass, the organization, together with opponents who live in the neighboring southern country, held a sit-in to commemorate and continue demanding justice for the more than 350 Nicaraguans murdered during the social protests five years ago.
Martha Liramother of Ezequiel Mendoza, one of the young men murdered by the dictatorship in 2018, reiterated that this coming May 30, Nicaraguan Mothers’ Day, “we have nothing to celebrate and as Mothers of April we always continue to demand justice, truth and non-repetition , because we as mothers do not want to repeat the history that has been repeated for decades ».
Related news: Mothers of April five years after the murders of their children: “Justice will be my last words”
“For decades, we mothers are the ones who have suffered, from the 1980s to 2018, we have suffered, we have been the ones who have borne the worst part, we have been the ones who have given blood for our country to live in democracy,” said Lira, who was forced into exile in Costa Rica due to the repressive escalation that the Ortega regime maintains against its opponents.
“Today we commemorate the fifth anniversary of our murdered children and we say present to each one of them, and we also say that mothers do not give up, we continue to fight seeking justice for our children. Mothers don’t give up, they demand justice,” he added.
Lira also pointed out that as mothers they do not lose hope of achieving the justice that they have demanded so much in these five years. “We always keep hope because sooner or later we will have justice for our children,” she said.
For his part, the political prisoner Ricardo Baltodano He stated that the Ortega Murillo regime “stained red” on May 30, 2018. “The beard of the Nicaraguan pastures, the dictatorship dyed it red, with blood, death, tears, pain,” he denounced.
“That crying and pain can never be forgotten, that crying and pain will be dignified, we all demand justice and reparation, we all demand no more impunity, we do not want dirt to be added to this grass -as we say- no, it cannot be like that, because we are already tired of the perpetrators returning home as if nothing had happened,” he added.
Regime wants to erase historical memory
Given the declaration of the Ortega and Murillo administration to decree a national holiday on May 30, Nicaraguan Mothers’ Day, Martha Lira assured that with this the regime what he wants is to erase everything that has happened in Nicaraguasince that same day for the Mothers of April is a day of mourning.
“We mothers will always remind (the dictatorship) of that date, because we will always be demanding justice,” she said.
The former political Yaritza Mairena He also maintained that what happened on May 30, 2018 “is a collective mourning for all Nicaraguans and although the dictatorship tries to erase this day, we will always remember it with great love for the people who were also killed and injured that day.”
“There have already been previous intentions of the Sandinista Front to erase the historical memory of adjust it to your wayIt is not the first time that they rewrite the history of Nicaragua to have only their own version, they did that in the 80s and they are trying to do it now, trying to erase the collective memory of the people in Nicaragua,” he highlighted.
“May 30 will always be a commemorative day precisely because of the depth of pain it caused, precisely on Mother’s Day, to see so many mothers crying for their children,” he added.
