The confrontations continue, and with them the growing uncertainty of where it all will end. Comparisons with the Sandinista Revolution of the 70’s are inevitable, even with the figure of Daniel Ortega front and center as he was all those years ago. But this time, he finds himself on the other side of the fence, being characterized as this generation’s Somoza.
Is it the same? North Americans may struggle to understand the basis for the demonstrations and protests, given the relative lack of media coverage in the U.S. So I include here an interview by La Prensa newspaper with Enrieth Martinez, a member of the University Coalition who was present at the National Dialogue. Her perspective provides a more detailed look into what is driving the protest movement in Nicaragua and what might be expected from this period of confrontation and mutually exclusive demands by both sides.
Enrieth Martínez, University Coalition: “This is a Revolution”.
Enrieth Martínez, member of the University Coalition present in the National Dialogue. LA PRENSA / Manuel Esquivel.
She was at the table of the National Dialogue the only day that Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo were present, but before this, she was active at the civil protest on behalf of the Indio Maiz Natural Reserve and against the reforms made to social security. Her name is Enrieth Martínez, she is currently in her 5th year of Sociology, and despite the continuous massacre that has already taken the lives of a hundred people in Nicaragua, the young girl has hope.
“It is a conviction more than it is a certainty”, says Martinez. “There is hope for Nicaragua this year, because I feel we are working for it”
Martinez is co-founder of the University Coordinator for Democracy and Justice, and member of the University Coalition that has been present in the National Dialogue, she analyzes with Revista Domingo the demonstration of 2018, which she calls as a “revolution” with no absolute doubts.
What was the beginning of this so called “Nicaraguan Spring”, was it the fire at Indio Maiz, the beating of the elderly in Leon or the brutal repression that took place at Camino de Oriente?
I believe it was the explosion of social media. For example, I was not in Leon at the moment of the repression, but I felt indignation as I saw the way they attacked the young people that were protesting, the way they attacked the elderly, the way they attacked the feminists who were the ones that led the protests to the reforms to the social security system there. It was all of that together. It was the feeling of impotency. I believe that besides all these events as such, which were immensely violent, it is about the feeling of being attacked, of feeling vulnerable, powerless and at the same time feel the anger, the rage on a system that has always done this. But now there were too many things happening at the same time. And then you realize the spine-chilling reality that this Government does not care if it kills you. These were young people protesting and you knew they were doing it for a just cause, you cannot reform a law that affects all the country in a unilateral way without consulting. There was nothing wrong in what we were doing. But suddenly, they start attacking you, shooting you with rubber bullets, then with real bullets. They start killing you. Then you start seeing the images of murdered young people (chavalos). It was unbelievable, almost.
May ended with a massacre on Mother’s Day… Is this a Revolution?
Yes.
Can we use the word, revolution?
You should not be afraid to use these types of words. They were captured, kidnapped by this Sandinista Front for 10 years. I believe that these protests cry out for justice and democracy but are also reclaiming our history. We need to take it away from their hands and tell them that this history is not owned by the FSLN, it was the people that constructed it. This is a revolution in all senses. It is a revolution that intends to be civic. That tries to recover lost spaces, that tries to recover the historic memory, that tries to recover symbols. It is a revolution.
Is this revolution comparable with the one the overthrew Somoza´s dictatorship?
It is comparable in the way that both look for a process to democratize institutions, to return to a democracy with strong institutions, with zero “caudillismo”. This means it is trying, recovering many of the past slogans, because many of the demands and feelings are still here. These are demands that have never been accomplished.
Although the revolution from the seventies pursued the things you are saying, what came after 1979 did not necessarily guarantee strong institutions, nor a separation of powers, or ended the caudillismo, because in the 80s is when the figure of Daniel Ortega is born…
I cannot give such a direct answer. I believe that the Sandinista Revolution was a daughter of her own era. It was not a perfect revolution. I would never be willing to romanticize a historic and military process that was so tragic for the country. It had significant changes. The idea of the people. How that idea was positioned, the demand of the people, what they were asking for was accomplished through that revolution, and that is something that has had a profound impact in Nicaraguans. The idea of the People, that it is the people that must rule, this is something very important and we are trying to recover it, many of us are defending this, even with our own lives.
Do you not believe that there was a dictatorship during the 80s?
I believe that it was a very complex process. I am not willing to categorize it as a thing only of a dictatorship. It was a different context. It was a cold war, it was economic crisis, it was the attacks from United States through the beginning of the Counter-Revolution, it was a geopolitical game. I am not saying there isn´t a geopolitical game today, but in the past it was very paralyzed. It was a period with authoritarian accents, popular accents, with an amalgam of things…The Sandinista Revolution was a daughter of her own history. And this one is ours, it has been catalogued as a civic revolution, and it is a daughter of its own history.
Do you think it will still be a civic revolution after the hundred deaths?
I think everyone fears this: that it stops being so. They, themselves fear this. The Government fears it. The day before May 29th, we were driving around in the car and we saw how they moved concrete blocks around the perimeter of El Carmen, they were building barricades.
Yes, quarry stones, barricades, “miguelitos” (spikes to punch vehicle tires) …..
I think it is not only because they fear the people or my generation that is a daughter of a revolution that due to internal and external reasons was not able to function. But it is also a fear of themselves. It is important to recognize that the people that are here today, have tried everything. We have even taken the risk to be in the National Dialogue where it is evident that the Government does not have the political will to dialogue. It is more than evident, that during the mixed commission of three and three, while dialoguing at the Episcopal Conference, at the same time they were attacking young people at the UNI (National University of Engineering). It is important to recognize that Civil Society as such, until today, has done all in their power to maintain this as a civic struggle. And I hope that, as I said, we are the children of the revolution, grandchildren as well. We do not want to repeat it because of the human cost. Because of the immense losses. However, I have talked with young people and I know that many of them feel that the pacific revolution, the revolution of protests, sometimes does not satisfy immediate demands. Sometimes it does not provide a response to the massacre that is happening on the part of the Government.
The wealthiest men in Nicaragua ask for anticipated elections, the Civic alliance that is present in the dialogue is also asking for a democratic exit, the Interamerican Court of Human Rights, has made it clear that we have suffered extrajudicial assassinations commanded by the State….Why doesn´t Daniel Ortega leave if everything is against him?
I think they feel that they have an “apparatus” that supports them. For 10 years, they have dynamited the Government apparatus, the State apparatus, in such a way that what is in power today is not an elected president, but a political party led by Daniel Ortega, Rosario Murillo and their family. This means that, during these 10 years he has destroyed all the Institutional apparatus and has imposed in its place a system that supports him as a person, and not as a figure of leadership, as a post, a role, but specifically, him as a person, as a member of a family. This figure that is Daniel Ortega, Rosario Murillo and their family, probably gives them the security that despite the killings, they have an apparatus that they feel supports them.
But who is part of this apparatus, its close officials participating in the Dialogue, the Police, the Mobs, the one and a half block of people that they can convoke to their events? Are they willing to rule just a few?
I think I can just speculate on this. It is hard to understand why these people prefer so many killings, but we can´t just see everything in black or white. If this process has done anything it has shown us how fragmented we were and how much we need to consolidate ourselves. They have been very good in all this time of managing crisises. That is why they have lasted so long. But I also feel this will also be unsustainable. The polarized discourse that they used to use for great gatherings is being diluted. They are making their own bases turn against them by the fact that they are using their own sons as cannon fodder to kill other young people. The people from the neighborhoods are the first affected, because neighborhoods are the most vulnerable areas and it is the barrios who they always aim at, thinking that with their miserable programs of social help and assistance they were buying the loyalty of the people. I think that to the extent that we can break that polarized discourse…Who is the people and who is not the people, who is with the Government and who isn’t with the Government, their system of exercising control will lose effect. And as this system of power, control and manipulation decreases, this can have a chance. The reason this has lasted so long is not because of their ability to convoke people, it is precisely the issue that there is control, manipulation of the National Police, the electoral and judicial system. It is an entire apparatus that, being independent, would ensure you that he could leave immediately, but because of their dependency on the executive they are the ones that make him stay.
How do you interpret the massacre of Mother’s Day? What was Ortega looking for with this?
To instill fear, absolutely. We saw this from the first protests, since the 19th. The police firing their shotguns against young people (chavalos). It is a process aiming to install a state of terror. It is through fear that you are able to reach another type of control over the people you can no longer manipulate. Transgress everything that is attempted to be built as a moral statue, any symbol that would represent hope.
Do you think people will be afraid to go out in a massive way again?
No. Would you be afraid of going out on a demonstration that is that massive?
Some people complain that the big demonstrations often repeat the same locations: The Jean Paul Genie circle, Metrocentro, the UCA. What would you tell people who maybe have doubts about always going to the same places?
That they have the right to not have doubts. This is a process that is building itself along the way. These spaces are also symbolic, because of the crosses, because of all that has been put into it. But I would tell them to not be afraid of calling their own gatherings. Right now, it is so easy to do it , you just organize with other people, make an announcement, and you are ready. I am betting on this, on people taking the initiative to take new spaces and not always stay with the same ones.
On social media, Lesther Aleman’s interview to the New York Times has generated a debate on whether he is bringing back to life that “caudillismo” that sometime seems as if its tattooed in Nicaragua’s history…
It is very naive to think that living in a country with a vertical political culture, that is so machista, so racist, these kinds of things don’t decrease. We are people who have been socialized in these systems and through these processes. I saw a publication saying that this was a young man of only 20 years of age, that he is learning. And that is the truth. We are all learning. I believe that the most important aspect of the interview is to realize that those of us who are present here today are young people, we make mistakes, we have many hopes, we have many dreams. I believe that is something that is reflected in Lesther in that interview, the thing about feeling you are an empowered young man, of feeling you are a young man that can confront the world. And that is ok. And sometimes it is not so good because of an issue of vulnerability, for facing a Government that is willing to kill you. I think we would do ourselves a favor if we realized that there are no definite answers here. Nobody here is a figure built for this historical moment. This is a process of construction and reconstruction of ourselves, of what we want, of what we think. And this will be reflected in every triumph, but also in every mistake we make.
It has also been said that men are the ones who appear in public representing the university students. The image of Madelaine Caracas throwing out the names of the murdered student in Ortega’s face is unforgettable, but at least in what is visible it is the only moment you remember of a woman. Do women not have the leadership they deserve in this struggle?
I cannot speak out for others, because each one of them went through an internal process to elect their spokespersons. In the case of the University Coordinator we had a internal process that was democratic, and our spokesperson is Francisco. First, he knows himself to be a spokesperson not a representative. He knows his work is to verbalize our demands in the dialogue, which have been previously agreed in the Coordinator. And that is fine. We try to avoid verticality as much as possible. But it is important to recognize that we are all affected by the machista, sexists and racist issues. That is evident. I think it is important to try and not see things just as white and black. Or to jump and exclaim: “On my God, look, there is machismo!” I mean, obviously there is machismo everywhere. This State, this Government has been built upon that. Our society functions because it is machista, because it is racist and because it is capitalist. And it is class biased too. Micro-machista expressions and machista expressions are things you will see all the time. The important thing now is to be willing to reconstruct ourselves in this process. There are young women that are not showing their faces in the dialogue, but they are in their work groups making substantial contributions to the decision making, that are not the decisions of Victor Cuadras, they are not the decisions of Francisco Martinez; they are the decisions of a collective.
Personal Plane
Enrieth Martinez Palacios, 24 years of age, from Leon. She studies Sociology at the Central American University -UCA and won a research scholarship to which she dedicates time daily. She joined student protests since the Indio Maiz fire and the Social Security Reforms. “With April’s protests, more than being at the protests I got involved in a support network that worked on how to move food supplies. I was in the church of Santa Martha, I was in the Cathedral, delivering supplies to UPOLI”, she says.
A movie, she says she loves is “Moonrise Kingdom” (Wes Anderson, 2012) Her favorite book is “Never forget I love you” (2008) form French writer Delphine Bertholon.
People that support the Government made a video with a picture of Enrieth Martinez and audio where she supposedly denounces that the University students of the Coalition who are in the National Dialogue have a pact with the MRS to allow civil unions among same sex couples.
“It makes me laugh, that is not me, obviously. I am also not financed by the CIA or the MRS”, Martinez states. “It is campaign to discredit any kind of symbols that represent an alternative for organizing, and an alternative to this Government.”
A song she listens to in these times, because of the reality that Nicaragua is experiencing, is “La Maza” of Silvio Rodriguez.
She speaks Spanish and English.
These comments are not the ramblings of an anarchist or terrorist. They are the deliberate reflections of a young woman convinced of the rightness of her beliefs and representative of those who have come to believe that the government must undergo systemic change, in the same way that a young Sandinista leader named Daniel Ortega felt and spoke decades ago….