The administration of the dictator Daniel Ortega has already begun to drain the pockets of Nicaraguans through taxes to pay the debt with China, and in the last reform of the 2024 General Budget he took millions from social institutions and also used the “about tax collections” to pay Chinese companies loan advances that they have not even begun to disburse.
This December 18, in the official newspaper La Gaceta, Ortega published the Law that establishes the latest reform of the year to the General Budget of the Republic (PGR) for 2024 in which, in addition to snatching billions of córdobas from at least 20 social institutions, also uses tax revenues to allocate those funds to repressive institutions and make advance payments of more than 110 million to Chinese companies that have not disbursed a single loan nor have they started working.
According to monitoring carried out by independent media, Nicaragua has made loan commitments with Chinese state and private companies that are close to one billion dollars. Economists have warned that the State of Nicaragua is going into debt at such a rate that it is close to once again being considered a “highly indebted poor country.”
Among the projects that Ortega has committed to with financing from the Asian giant are the reconstruction, expansion and improvement of the Punta Huete International Airport, also known as “Panchito”, which was assigned without bidding of any kind to the Chinese state company CAMC Engineering, which would carry out the work at a cost of 491.5 million dollars.
Three photovoltaic energy generation projects also stand out, called ENESOLAR 1, 2 and 3, owned by the state-owned Empresa Nicaraguan de Acueductos y Alcantarillados (ENACAL), which signed three credit facility contracts with the company CCCC, from China, which will charge for those projects close to 250 million dollars.
The Ortega regime has also incurred debts for the purchase of buses, for which it has not given clear accounts. All loans from China, as explained by the Nicaraguan economist and former political prisoner Juan Sebastián Chamorro, are under leonine conditions for the Nicaraguan State.
Precisely because of these “usurious” conditions that China imposes on Nicaragua to grant financing, the State of Nicaragua must disburse in advance, in a single payment, 20% of each amount to be financed, and that is why Ortega designated those more than 110 million dollars to deliver to the Chinese without them having even started working on the projects.
Reforms to the PGR and advance payments to Chinese show priority of the dictatorship
For Juan Sebastián Chamorro, the PGR must be analyzed in light of three elements: 1) Where a good part of the public resources are being allocated. 2) What the resources of Nicaraguan taxpayers are invested in, what they spend on, what they spend on; It is an issue of accountability of tax collections and where they should go and 3) The priorities of the State.
“In this case, we already know that we are facing a dictatorship that does whatever it wants,” warns the economist, and therefore analyzes that, taking into account what the regime does with the PGR of 2024, it sheds light on its priorities for 2025.
«For example, there are indeed significant reductions in social spending, because it is basically not a priority for the State. It is true that important resources are dedicated but much more should be invested, and especially in primary and secondary education, where Nicaragua is very backward,” says Chamorro.
In this sense, he warns that among the priorities that can be identified in the budget management of the dictatorship are, in the field of construction, such as the gas project in Puerto Sandino, “which is to do energy business for the regime and its relatives.” , there it is telling you what the priorities are,” says the economist.
Another identifiable priority, says Chamorro, in 2024 and the following year, is the Army and the Police, “their repressive forces, the Ministry of the Interior, which reflects the fear of the dictatorship and the need to allocate resources for repression and maintain in power”.
And Chamorro concludes that another priority of the dictatorship now is the enormous debt with communist China.
“The indebtedness that this year represents for public finances in relation to China is enormous,” warns the analyst and maintains that the reform of the 2024 general budget approved this week allocates more than 110 million dollars in advance payments for Chinese loans.
“By analyzing this budget alone, one can conclude the following: that the priorities are not the poorest in Nicaragua, it is not social policy that is the priority for this regime, it is the repressive forces and the indebtedness to China,” summarized the expert in economy.
In a previous interview, the former politician had already warned that Nicaragua’s public external debt has grown rapidly under the dictator Ortega’s regime, to the point that it currently exceeds 10.5 billion dollars, and the payment service for that debt, If in 2011 it was 328 million dollars, by 2024, without including the debt with China, the payment rose to U$982 million. The new generations of Nicaraguans are, once again, enthralled by Ortega.
