The dictatorship of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo used National Journalist’s Day to attack the men and women of the independent press who have reported on the reality that Nicaragua is experiencing.
The official statement accepts that his regime has declared more than 20 journalists “stateless.” Some were exiled to the United States and others were stripped of their Nicaraguan nationality through the Ortega courts of justice.
«On this day of Nicaraguan communicators, our embrace in the heat of combat, knowing that the farces and falsehoods of the stateless and their masters have not been able to, nor will they be able to, with the evident strengths of our words. Here the verb has become flesh and lives among us,” says the “congratulations” of the dictatorial couple on this day.
Related news: Ortega-Murillo has stripped at least 22 journalists of their nationality
According to a count by the organization Independent Journalists and Communicators of Nicaragua (PCIN), at least 22 journalists, critical of the Daniel Ortega regime, have been declared “traitors to the homeland” and stripped of their nationality.
The document, signed by Ortega and Murillo, on the occasion of National Journalist’s Day, the regime states that “the truth can be seen, touched, felt. Our communication is made of truths that can be seen, heard, felt, and touched. That’s why it’s forceful. That’s why it’s obvious. That is why it is firm and durable.”
Banishment and statelessness
Among the journalists who have become stateless are Carlos Fernando Chamorro, winner of the 38th Ortega y Gasset Journalism Awards and director of Confidencial and Esta Semana; Wilfredo Miranda, collaborator in Nicaragua for the Spanish newspaper El País and winner of the 2018 King of Spain Ibero-American Journalism Award.
Also the directors of digital media Lucía Pineda (100% News), Luis Galeano (Café con Voz), Jennifer Ortiz (Nicaragua Investiga), Patricia Orozco (Onda Local), Manuel Díaz (Bacanal Nica), Álvaro Navarro (Article 66), David Quintana (Ecological Bulletin), Aníbal Toruño (Radio Darío), Santiago Aburto (BTN News) and Jimmy Guevara (Criteria).
Related news: Voces del Sur denounces “absolute censorship” against the media in Nicaragua
Likewise, the communicators Sofía Montenegro, Silvia Nadide Gutiérrez and Camilo de Castro Belli, son of the poet Gioconda Belli, who also had their nationality withdrawn.
exile or jail
The year 2022 was grim for press freedom in Nicaragua. The journalists faced the “intensification of violence and threats” exerted by the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo, reveals the annual report of the Voces del Sur network, an organization that documents and denounces violations of journalistic practice in the region. .
The document also indicates that 93 journalists were forced to leave Nicaragua into exile due to constant threats of imprisonment and their physical integrity. With this new figure, there are now 178 press men and women who have left the country since April 2018 as a result of the socio-political crisis and the regime’s onslaught against the free press.
Organizations have pointed out that journalistic practice in Nicaragua is a “high-risk profession” and that, from the regime, a campaign is being maintained that seeks to silence journalists who with “courage and aplomb” continue to report and defeat the censorship imposed by the dictatorship.
In 2022, 31 media outlets were closed and two outlets were removed from the cable television grid, likewise eight news or opinion programs stopped broadcasting, most of them did not speak out to avoid retaliation from the regime.
Nicaragua has been going through a political and social crisis since April 2018, which worsened after the controversial general elections of November 7, 2021, in which Ortega was re-elected for a fifth term, fourth consecutive and second along with Murillo as vice president, with his main contenders in prison or in exile.
