What if you had to live in a foreign country where the president who you choose as your
leader became so corrupted that manipulate the system to be reelected and take power
over the peoples rights? Many Latin American countries are facing this corruption with
presidents being in office for too many terms. They start coming across as good
candidates for the good of the people and then they become corrupted and greedy. The
people trust in these individuals to make the country a better place with more
opportunities.
Daniel Ortega, the president of Nicaragua, was first elected back in 1984 and re elected in
2007 for three term. Daniel Ortega the Sandinista leader and his brother Humberto
Ortega and Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional (FSLN), a political organization
from the left-wing, organized political support among students, workers, and peasants.
On July 1979, they defeated the National Guards and overthrew Anastasio Somoza
former president at the time. Somoza and his family controlled the national radio and
telegraph networks, the postal and immigration services, health services, the internal
revenue service, and the national railroads. They were living life to the fullest while the
people lived in poverty. Daniel Ortega became very liked after taking over because the
people thought he was a good man for helping to get rid of Somoza. Ortega became the
first Nicaraguan president in history to peacefully surrender power to an opposition
party (Morris). The man who gained the trust of so many Nicaraguans, started using his
power for corruption and maintaining poverty as well. Parties in the coalition were
stripped of their legal status by judges and electoral officials apparently controlled by
Ortega’s government. The people are feeling betrayed by the president Daniel Ortega and
his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, for ordering increase in the amount that the
employees and employers have to pay into the system while cutting benefits to elderly
pensioners by 5% (Morris). The next day thousands of people including university
students, pensioners, environmentalists, feminists, religious leader and many more filled
up the streets protesting for Daniel Ortega and his wife to resign as president. The state
shut down multiple television stations that were broadcasting live footage and ordered
the anti-riot police to fire rounds into the crowd of protestors while ordering them to
arrest students and attack universities in Managua the capital. The Nicaragua Center for
Human Rights reports approximately 60 death. Journalist Angel Gahona, was killed
streaming live footage of protestors in the Caribbean coastal city of Bluefields on
Facebook. There were much more report by the Red Cross who were wounded and
needed to be hospitalized. On the other hand, many others got incarcerated for looting
stores. According to Ortega, the people imprisoned in the disturbances will be brought to
trail. It isn’t easy for him to regain control of the streets especially because the people of
Nicaragua are tired of his bullshit and are desperate for change.
In Rome, Pope Francis called out for the violence to end and a peaceful resolution of
the conflict. According to Jose de Cordoba from The Wall Street Journal, a spokeswoman
from the State Department, Heather Nauert was not pleased with the “excessive force
used by the police and others against civilians.” The State Department called in a meeting
for the Nicaraguan government to restore all television coverage and allow a full
investigation of the deaths during the protests. The Ortega government has been
mishandling the social security system for years. They’ve used it as a piggy bank to
finance housing projects and medical clinics created by Ortega’s association. According
to Cordoba, the International Monetary Fund has send out a warning that the
Nicaragua’s social security system could run out of money by 2019. Many people work so
hard most of their lives so they could accumulate money in their social security so they
could have money to live on. This man is creating more poverty and crime. Most people
in Nicaragua are becoming desperate and their breaking into people’s houses and
businesses. As it is, Nicaragua remains one of the poorest countries in Latin America
(Watts). Daniel Ortega undermine the power and authority of the country’s institutions
and developed democracy seeking to form dictatorship like Anastasio Somoza (Cordoba).
Ortega benefited in recent years from regular deposits of well over half a billion dollars
in cash annually from oil-rich Venezuela. He divided the income between his own family,
the private business community organized through a chamber of commerce known as
COSEP that exercises broad influence on the local government, and distributed the rest
through social security programs to maintain order. The people of Nicaragua are
through with Daniel Ortega, they are hoping for change.
It is devistating seeing the country I was born at go through these horrible moments.
Besides it being the poorest country in Central America, its where God gave us the
privilage to be born at. Nicaragua is a beautiful country of volcanoes, lakes and beaches.
Taking from the elderly is not the soluation in my opinion. These people depend on their
pensions to survive. The people in Nicaragua have lived in poverty for many years for
this asshole and his wife to take more from the people is not right at all. They seem to be
enjoying their lives while Nicaraguans are struggling to make ends meet. There has to be
some kind of change in how our voices are heard so we are able to make changes if
needed. Its very sad how Daniel Ortega handled the protests. He had no right to kill all
those unarmed individual protesting for change. Can you imagine if you had to live in a
country like Nicaragua. Maybe if we had better leaders and government system, the
people wouldnt have to look elsewhere to go or even cross the border to seek better
opportunities for their families. Hopefully the U.S. could step in and help the people of
Nicaragua get rid the president and his wife so they could live in peace.
Works Cited
Blair, Laurence. “ More Than 350 Million Latin American Voters to Elect New Leaders in 2018.” The Guardian. 27 December 2017. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/dec/…/latin-america-elections-2018-corruption
Watts, Jonathan. “Nicaragua President Re-elected in Landslide Amid Claims of Rigged Vote.”
The Guardian. 7 November 2016. https://www.theguardian.com/…/nicaragua-president-daniel-ortega-reelected-landslide-vote-rigging
Morris, Courtney Desiree. “Unexpected Uprising: The Crisis of Democracy in Nicaragua.” NACLA. 14 May 2018.
https://nacla.org/news/2018/07/11/unexpected-uprising-crisis-democracy-nicaragua
De Cordoba, Jose. “Nicaragua Revokes Legislation That Increased Payroll Tax, Cut Pension Benefits.” The Wall Street Journal. 22 April 2018
https://www.wsj.com/…/nicaragua-revokes-legislation-that-increased-payroll-tax-cut-pension-benefits
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