At the end of 2022, the regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo had canceled the legal status of 3,182 non-governmental organizations (NGOs), with the aim of “dismantling Nicaraguan society and causing the destruction of the social fabric with the aim of concentrating and strengthen its dictatorship, monopolize international cooperation and use it to continue repressing,” denounced the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights (Cenidh) in its annual report.
According to the agency, last year the dictatorship’s attacks on freedom of association in Nicaragua “reached their maximum level of aggressiveness.” The closure of NGOs, considers Cenidh, constitutes a “crime” because “it disrupts the individual level, since the direct victims of these perverse actions are the people who benefited from the support of the destroyed NGOs.”
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“The regime persisted in repressing through different methods to reduce civic space; cancellations of legal entities, hindering the registration of organizations, implementation of regulations that restricted international cooperation, limiting and/or hindering development, transparency and democracy activities,” the document from the human rights organization states.
In its eagerness to demolish freedom of association, the administration of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo ordered the National Assembly —controlled by the ruling party— to approve a series of laws that restrict that right and many others. These legal instruments were criticized by international and local organizations.
The regime created Law 1040, Law for the Regulation of Foreign Agents; Law 1042, the Special Law on Cybercrimes; Law 1055, Law for the Defense of People’s Rights to Independence, Sovereignty and Self-determination for Peace and Law 1115, General Law for the Regulation and Control of Non-Profit Organizations.
«The outlook for Civil Society Organizations envisions that the brutal repression will continue, the Ortega Murillo regime will not stop canceling them en masse; it will not restore legal status or return usurped assets, “warns Cenidh.
Added to the closure of the NGOs is the confiscation of their movable and immovable property, which months after the cancellations are seized by the dictatorship’s Police and distributed among the Ortega institutions.
