The Nicaraguan Catholic Church is the most prestigious institution in the country. Its priests and bishops have been victims of virulent attacks from the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo. Assaults, jail, persecution, siege, desecration and even the burning of the venerated image of the Blood of Christ can be counted in the long list of attacks against the Church in the Central American nation.
The state repression against the Diocese of Matagalpa triggered the closure of at least six religious radio stations, the arrest of three citizens – according to the Blue and White Monitoring they have already been released – and two people were injured by the pellets of the shots executed. by the riot police forces during the desecration of the Infant Jesus of Prague chapel.
On the afternoon and evening of August 1, while Managua fervently welcomed the capital’s Patron Saint, the dictatorship’s Police were gestating one of the darkest episodes of state repression against the Church in Nicaragua: the regime, through the Institute of Telecommunications and Post Office (Telcor), ordered the frequency to be seized from the radios of the Diocese of Matagalpa from Bishop Rolando Álvarez, one of the priests most critical of the excesses of the dictatorial couple.
In total, there are eight radio stations closed by Telcor, according to unofficial information Article 66. The stations affected are Radio Hermanos, Radio Nuestra Señora de Lourdes, Radio Nuestra Señora de Fátima, Radio Alliens, Radio Monte Carmelo, and Radio San José, which operate in municipalities in northern Nicaragua.
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To this new blow to religious freedom must be added the closure of TV Merced of the same Diocese and Channel 51, the Catholic Channel of Nicaragua, owned by the Episcopal Conference of Nicaragua (CEN), a frequency that has already been usurped by the regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo.
But the persecution against the Church of Matagalpa did not stop there, the Police deployed a special forces operation to take over the Niño Jesús de Praga chapel, which is adjacent to the Divina Misericordia parish house, in Sébaco, and seize the station’s apparatus radio that works on the site, according to some parishes in the area and Father Uriel Vallejos, a priest who remains under police siege, denounced on social networks.
During the taking of the chapel, the Catholic faithful heeded the call of Father Uriel Vallejos to protect the temple and the equipment that the Police seized, just as they keep the religious facilities taken. The protest action of the Catholic parishioners was dispersed by the dictatorship with the use of force by its riot police, the use of tear gas and shots in the air.
The names of the detainees, who were released hours later, according to Blue and White Monitoring records, are: Cristóbal Urbina, Harvin Treminio and Dania María Salgado. It was learned that the only woman detained was beaten while she was held by agents of the Ortega-Murillo dictatorship.
Telcor’s arguments
The Diocese of Matagalpa, led by Bishop Rolando Álvarez, indicated through a statement that the director of Telcor, Nahima Janett Díaz Flores, sent a letter informing her of the closure of Radio Hermanos under the argument that since 30 January 2003 does not have the valid authorization title.
In this regard, the Diocese maintained that Bishop Álvarez personally presented the documentation to Telcor on June 7, 2016 in which he requested the current titles of Radio Hermanos and six other stations, whose letter was received “and was never answered.”
“We will continue to report and denounce any situation that, like this one, continues to violate freedom of expression and religion in Nicaragua. We reiterate our commitment to evangelization in our beloved Diocese of Matagalpa”, warns the Church, recalling that the “word of God is not chained”.
“If the director of Telcor (Nahima Díaz) wants to receive me, I will take all the documents that I presented to Telcor with the receipt and signature of that same day, if they are right, I myself will tell the people that it is correct that close our radio stations, but if they are not right, they must have the courage and courage to say that they were wrong or that they purposely want to close our media outlets,” Bishop Álvarez asserted energetically at an evening mass yesterday.
The persecution against the Church
In recent months, the Ortega dictatorship has launched a persecution against the Catholic Church and its main leaders. At the beginning of May, the Police had initiated a wave of siege against the priests, among them is Father Harving Padilla, parish priest of the San Juan Bautista church in Masaya, Father Uriel Vallejos, parish priest in Sébaco, Matagalpa, as well as Father Monsignor Rolando Álvarez, the latter had to take refuge in a Managua temple after several days of police persecution.
«I have never had problems recognizing my mistakes, and they know it, but I will not accept errors and injustices that they want to give us, when they are their accounts, they know it very well. They know that if I make mistakes I admit it, but in the meantime they accept their injustices, “he added.
Relations between the Sandinistas and the Nicaraguan Catholic Church have been marked by friction and mistrust in the last 43 years.
Ortega has branded as “terrorists” the Nicaraguan bishops who acted as mediators of a national dialogue with which a peaceful solution to the crisis that the country has been experiencing since April 2018 was sought. He has also described them as “coup plotters”, accused of be accomplices of internal forces and international groups that, in his opinion, act in Nicaragua to overthrow him.
