This article provides excellent background to the current persecution of the Church by the Ortega regime
The Nicaraguan Episcopal Conference (NEC) was a stone in the boot of the Ortega Murillo dictatorship
La Prensa, Sept 14, 2024
Between 2009 and 2018, with a divided opposition and a complacent business sector, the NEC warned that an authoritarian regime loomed over Nicaragua and tried to stop it, but it calls fell on deaf ears.
Daniel Ortega won a second nonconsecutive mandate in the elections of November 2006. He had won with 37.99% of the votes, the lowest percentage that he had gotten in the four presidential campaigns in which he participated until then, and that after his victory in 1984, the rest had only been losses: 1990, 1996 and 2001.
Ortega only had won by two facts which he worked on for the 16 years when he was out of power: through a pact with the liberal strong man Arnoldo Alemán, which lowered the limit to win an election from 45% to 35%, and that same pact caused a division of the liberals who split into two nearly equal parts. One faction won 27.11% and the other 28.30%.
But his victory was limited. The constitution, reformed in 1995, did not allow him to ever run again, because not only was a consecutive reelection prohibited, but it also prohibited a candidacy of someone who had been president for two previous periods.
Ortega should have turned over the government in January 2012, but he had other plans, he wanted to be president until his last breath. In an interview he had declared that he hoped to live “at least” as long as his mother, who died in 2005 at the age of 97. With a divided opposition and a business sector which had obtained the promise of Ortega to allow them to do business as long as they did not get involved in politics, the Catholic Church, personalized in the bishops of the Nicaraguan Episcopal Conference (NEC), became the biggest stone in Ortega´s shoes. Even though he repeatedly tried to neutralize them as well.
2009-2010: “The unconstitutionality into which our institutions have fallen concerns us”
The close electoral victory of 2006 had given the Sandinista Front a bench of only 36 deputies out of a total of 92. The liberals had 54 votes and even though they were divided to death, they were not going to open the doors to continuous reelection.
Inspired in a resolution from the IV Chamber of the Supreme Court of Costa Rica, Ortega resorted to the Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court of Nicaragua alleging that the no-reelection policy violated his human rights. Nevertheless, Ortega did not have a majority in the Constitutional Chamber either, and the liberals refused to give him their vote. Setting aside formalities and legalities, on October 19, 2009 the Chamber, with the Magistrate Rafael Solís at the head, held a session at night in the absence of the liberals and with an illegally composed majority “approved” the appeal of Ortega.
On April 23, 2010 the NEC published a message “in light of the national reality” in which they expressed their concern over “the recent political events, aware of the seriousness of some acts of transgression to our Constitution and disregard for the institutionality of the country. We must be convinced that only respect for institutions and the Rule of Law can ensure for us a peaceful and democratic co-existence which would permanently ensure governance, public security and social progress,” the bishops said.
“The unconstitutionality and illegality in which have fallen some of our democratic institutions deeply concerns us, because we cannot forget that `an authentic democracy is only possible in a Constitutional State,´and that `a democracy without values easily turns into visible or covert totalitarianism, as our history shows´(Centesimus annus, 46). Institutions should not be instruments in the hands of those in power to transform their abuses and ambitions for power into legally justified forms and behaviors,” warned the NEC.
Ortega did not listen to the bishops, and that ruling of the Constitutional Chamber was ratified in the full court, controlled by Sandinism on September 30, 2010, leaving the path clear to run for reelection even though article 147expressly established that prohibition.
The “Full Court”, in addition, had been composed of magistrates whose periods had ended, and since the Sandinista Front did not have the votes in the Assembly to reelect them, Ortega, through another legal artifice, decided to “prolong” their terms indefinitely.
2011-2014: the reforms “favor the establishment and perpetuation of absolute power”
Ortega ended up elected in November 2011 in elections which the Electoral Observation Mission of the European Union described as “an opaque process”. All these unconstitutional acts led La Prensa to call Ortega “the unconstitutional president” every time that it referred to him during the 2012-17 period.
The vote counting had not allowed national and foreign electoral observers to confirm the results. The director of a national electoral observation entity, IPADE, Mauricio Zúniga, said a little bit after the elections, “It is impossible to audit that data since there does not exist an official source of the CSE (which offers) data by Voting Reception Boards, as article 129 of the Electoral Law requires.”
In their message of November 16, 2011, titled “Concerning the electoral results”, the Episcopal Conference pronounced, “The legitimacy of the electoral process and respect for the will of the people has been left completely in question. As believers we have a strong conviction that any dishonest action which undermines the sovereignty of the people, is not simply an ethically negative act, but something reproachable in the eyes of God, who expects civil authorities to be the first to `know justice´ (Micah 3:1) , in other words, the first to respect and apply the requirements of justice.”
Legalizing future elections
Ortega needed then to “legalize” his future reelections. In 2011 it had been ensured through vote counting under his control which had enough deputies to reform the Constitution and establish indefinite reelections. Ortega “won” with 62.46% of the votes and this resulted in 63 deputies for the Sandinista Front out of a total of 92.
After inaugurating his unconstitutional period in January 2012, Ortega was able to proceed to that reform. But it was not the only reform he was interested in. The “model of dialogue and consensus” with the business sector was working very well for him and he wanted to give it constitutional status. Businesspeople were happy. The opposition was more and more weakened by division. Only the NEC kept their finger on the wound.
In their message of November 22, 2013, the bishops said, “We think that the current proposal for reforms to the Constitution seen in its entirety is oriented to favor the establishment and perpetuation of an absolute power for the long term, exercised by a person or a party in a dynastic form or through a political and economic oligarchy.
We the Bishops of the Episcopal Conference of Nicaragua are not in agreement with this project of constitutional reforms. We believe that their approval will not bring any benefit to the nation.”
The reforms were approved in the first legislature on December 10, 2013.
Ortega seeks to neutralize the bishops
In light of the pressure of the bishops over the constitutional reforms, Ortega took advantage of the visit that December of the Cardinal Primate of America, Nicolás López Rodríguez, on the occasion of the celebration of the centenary of the ecclesiastical province of Nicaragua, to propose a dialogue to the bishops.
At the end of the lunch offered by Ortega, he stood up and on his own initiative directed some “very brief” words, leaving the promise that “it could be the beginning of some new encounters…and that he is open to dialogue,” the auxiliary bishop of Managua, Mons. Silvio Báez told La Prensa on December 5, 2013.
The invitation to dialogue generated concern over the fact that Ortega was progressing in control over the country and that he intended maybe to control the bishops as well. The former liberal deputy, José Pallais ,warned on that occasion that “Ortega only opens spaces for dialogue when he sees himself compelled by the reality and by the depth of the crisis,” thus it was difficult for him to believe that he was changing.
Báez at that time said that “he wanted to believe the president”, and stated that the bishops are not enemies of the Government, nor political opposition nor even adversaries, but that their criticisms are to improve the procedures and decisions which are made in the country.
Auxiliary Bishop of Managua, Mons. Silvio Báez
The meeting in the Nunciature on May 21, 2014
The bishops took the invitation to dialogue very seriously. They analyzed and weighed the opportunities and threats of that encounter, and in March 2014 decided to accept, but two more months passed before they sat down face to face. On May 21, in the office of the Apostolic Nunciature in Managua, the Bishops of the Episcopal Conference met with Ortega and Murillo. They handed them a 15 page letter where they proposed the points of interest in the dialogue which was beginning.
In the document they addressed topics from the family to their concerns about the Vicariate of Bluefields at that time, passing through their concern about the abuses of human rights, evangelization and government policies, and institutionality.
Concerning this last point they said, “Starting with the election results of 2011 the concentration of power, governmental corruption, State-Party confusion, subjection of the branches of government to the will of the Executive, disregard for the law, lack of legal security, influence peddling, political intolerance, control over nearly all the municipal governments in the country, to the most recent constitutional reforms, have exacerbated in a highly alarming way the current situation of the country and its future.”
Two “inacceptable” proposals: open dialogue with the opposition and “giving your word of honor” to hold free elections
“In light of the current political and institutional situation, with the best of intentions we want to make two concrete proposals, which we are sure that our people will receive with hope and joy.”
“The first is holding a `Great National Dialogue´ in which all the sectors of the country would participate. We Bishops already proposed in our letter of April 23, 2010 a path of `transparent and trustworthy dialogues´ between the Government, opposition parties and civil society, which would lead to an understanding between the different sectors of society and would crystalize into an authentic democratic consensus and a new social pact which would ensure political, judicial, social and economic stability to the country and deal with the great problems of the population.”
“We respectfully exhort you, Mr. President, that you open yourself to dialogue with all the sectors of the nation, that you would welcome other opinions and that, even you might begin showing your good will in this sense, beginning to offer periodically press conferences without discrimination against non-official media.”
“The second proposal which we as the Episcopal Conference make to the Government, notwithstanding the fact that the members of the Supreme Electoral Council (CSE) have been named or reelected, is to begin a profound political reform of the entire electoral system of the country.”
With total respect we ask that you offer your word of honor to ensure in 2016 for Nicaragua a presidential electoral process absolutely transparent and honest, with new and honorable members leading the CSE, in which there is no type of doubt about the popular will; with a system of citizen identity cards independent of the CSE itself which would ensure that each Nicaraguan would have their identity card before the elections; and with an open unrestricted electoral process for national and international observers.”
The intent to neutralize the bishops had failed. The bishops never received a response from Ortega.
Ortega continued in the process of concentration of power and was reelected in 2016, now practically without an opposition because he had eliminated it through his control of the Supreme Electoral Council and the Supreme Court. The preferred mechanism up to that time was canceling the legal status of the organizations where the true opposition would gather. The elections of 2016 had an abstention rate of over 60%, the population had lost trust in the process, which was described as a farse.
The 2018 uprising
Just as the former deputy Pallais had predicted, Ortega sought dialogue when “he saw himself compelled by the reality and by the depth of the crisis” of the social uprising of April 2018, which began with protests against the draconian reforms to the Social Security system, but because of the violent response of the regime, were extended throughout the entire country, whose highways were blocked by 60% and the principal cities were taken by the protestors.
After years of silence, Ortega called again on the Episcopal Conference. This time it was not the NEC who proposed the dialogue, but Ortega, who even though he was violently repressing the protestors, could not regain control. The NEC agreed to mediate between the dictator and an amorphous mass of protestors who quickly organized under the umbrella of the Civic Alliance for Justice and Democracy.
The dialogue began on May 16th, one month after the start of the protests, but the repression continued and soon it was left clear that Ortega was only gaining time. On June 7th the NEC presented Ortega with an agenda for dialogue “to democratize” the country, with a view to do away with the violence. Basically, the bishops took up again the points which they have been pointing out for years.
In a brief press release the bishops explained, “We have given you the proposal which gathers the feelings of many sectors of Nicaraguan society and expresses the desires of the immense majority of the country. We await your written response as soon as possible.”
Ortega responded accusing the Episcopal Conference of trying to carry out a coup and intensified the repression. Since then, the repression has not ended, Nicaraguans have lost all their liberties, nearly 800,000 have abandoned the country, and the regime has banished more than 150 priests, including three bishops, 25% of the total amount of clergy in the country.
So far the intention of Ortega to remain in power until his last breath seems an achievable objective.