The Ortega-Murillo regime, through the Ministry of Energy and Mines (MEM), handed over to the Chinese mining company Xinjiang Xinxin Mining Industry Company Limited a new concession for mineral exploitation for 25 years in the north of the country, according to ministerial agreement 037, published on September 2 in the official newspaper La Gaceta.
The mining giant will work on the new 483-hectare mining concession through its subsidiary Nicaragua Xinxin Linze Mining Groupowned by Chinese businessman Edward Xiang Liu.
Related news: Ortega grants the Chinese company Nicaragua Xinxin Minera Group another 483 hectares for mining exploitation
«Given to the company Nicaragua Xinxin Linze Mining Group a mining concession for the exploitation of metallic and non-metallic minerals in the lot called Río Dorado Sur,” says the resolution of the Ministry of Energy and Mines.
The land, which consists of 483 hectares, is located in the municipality of San Juan del Limay, in the department of Estelí, approximately 180 km north of Managua.
Initially, the company had requested a mining concession for 600 hectares, which would also affect the municipality of Achuapa, in León. However, according to ministerial agreement 037 of the Ministry of Energy and Mines, the company expressed its interest in reducing it to 483 hectares.
Dictator Daniel Ortega ordered six colonels to be promoted to the rank of brigadier general, who will now form part of the elite of generals who have shown unconditional loyalty to Sandinismo and the presidential couple of Nicaragua.
The vice-dictator and government spokesperson, Rosario Murillo, read out Presidential Agreement 157, which orders the conferral of the rank of brigadier general upon: Leonel Antonio Fonseca Mendoza, Vinicio Felix Chavarria Chavez, Marvin Antonio Paniagua Morales, Alvaro Francisco Rivas Castillo, Francisco Noel Jarquin Lopez and Marco Antonio Salas Cruz.
During the military ceremony, 23 officers were also promoted to the rank of colonel and one to captain. Before these promotions, no significant number of colonels and generals are known to have retired, so, at least until the retirement of generals is known, there will be 27 high-ranking officers with that rank.
During the promotion ceremony, the Army general and commander in chief of the military corps, Julio César Avilés Castillo, who has been in office for 15 years and who is accused of having completely eliminated the process of military professionalization, once again reminded his subordinates that the Army “is Sandinista” in an attitude that his critics describe as “kneeling before dictators, to show them absolute loyalty.”
Before dealing the final blow to public officials of the State with a massive sweep under the excuse of a “reorganization and promotion of efficiency,” the Ortega-Murillo regime had already subjected its workers to humiliation, ridicule and, most recently, persecution.
The regime has been slowly wearing them down, “burning” them out and discarding them in a long process of internal purges. The actions of subjugation and exploitation of state workers are varied: first they were forced to do what in Nicaragua they call “rotondear” (rotunda), which is to hold sit-ins in the capital’s roundabouts to show their support for the regime; later, they were forced to go to opposition marches and counter-marches.
In the worst cases, he made a good number of them complicit in his crimes, armed them and ordered them to kill, repress and betray friends, neighbors and even relatives, who in 2018 took to the streets to demand the end of the dictatorship. In exchange for all this, they could keep their jobs in state offices.
But the regime showed them no mercy and when the time came to run roughshod over them as it is doing now, it did so without hesitation. First they took away their salary bonuses and since then, all their rights have been in decline, until this month, when the regime ordered mass layoffs.
