The Mesoamerican Initiative of Women Human Rights Defenders (IM-Defenders) denounced that the persecution against organizations that work in defense of women’s rights in Nicaragua does not stop, because in September, the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega ordered the cancellation of the legal personality of 29 more feminist entities.
After the elimination of these organizations, IM-Defensoras counts 176 feminist organizations illegally stripped of their legal personality since 2018.
In a releasethe Mesoamerican entity pointed out that “these cancellations were carried out in four days (September 5, 12, 19 and 23) through the reform of Law 1115 of last August 24 that allows the Ministry of the Interior to snatch the legal status of the organizations without going through the National Assembly.
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He explained that among the canceled organizations is the Itzá Women’s Collective“an organization with a long and important history of work in defense of women’s rights, (…) with 33 years of work in defense of sexual and reproductive rights and providing support to survivors of sexist violence.”
It also indicated that in 2009 the group “managed to build a shelter for women who need comprehensive protection against the risk of femicide in the municipality of Somoto, Department of Madriz, which was operating at the time of the illegal cancellation of their legal status.”
“The forced closure of this shelter is one example, among many others, of the impacts of these cancellations on the rights of Nicaraguan womenwho are left in a situation of greater lack of protection and vulnerability in a country where femicides and sexist violence are the order of the day and where the government has dismantled some of the main public institutions that ensured the rights and protection of women and that had been the fruit of the historical struggles of the feminist movement”, maintained IM-Defenders.
The Mesoamerican organization denounced that “the cancellation of these organizations has been supported by arbitrary procedures by the responsible institutions, which have put up all kinds of obstacles or have directly refused to receive the administrative documentation required by law, despite presenting it in time and form”.
He also pointed out that after the illegalization of the entities, apart from dismantling the offices and requisitioning their assets, the Ortega regime criminalizes, harasses and attacks their members.
“We condemn this new arbitrary act of the neoliberal, corrupt, misogynistic and totalitarian government of Daniel Ortega against feminist organizations and against the rights of Nicaraguan women,” she stressed.
