|
|
|
News
 Home
Page
National News
Latin
America
Sections
Special
Reports
Travel/Tourism
Real
Estate
Business
Health
The
Internet
Letters
Opinion
Columnists
Leisure
EroTica
Entertainment
The
Take!
Learn
Spanish
Photos
Editorial
Letters
Opinion
Columnists
Public
Forum
Who We Are
About
Us
Contact Us
Advertise
with us
Subscribe
to our
Newsletter
Links
Page
|
 |
|
<
Back
Send this Page To a Friend |
Struggle For the Future of
Nicaragua
By Salvador Stadthagen
In the past 14 years Nicaragua
has managed to recapture the
attention of the international
media on only a handful of
occasions, and never with the
same intensity as it did during
the conflict-ridden 1980s. There
are, however, plenty of good
reasons for the world to start
watching again.
An epic battle against
corruption is being fought in
Nicaragua, and its outcome will
prove decisive for the
democratic future of our small
Central American country. The
strongmen, or caudillos, who
realize that more transparent
and accountable institutions are
not in their best interest, seem
willing to subvert the
constitutional order and even to
overthrow a democratically
elected president so they can
keep things going their way.
Some familiar characters are the
leading actors of this story.
One of them is Daniel Ortega,
the strongman of the Sandinista
party, who blatantly mismanaged
the country into poverty during
the decade he held power. Ortega
is so obsessed with an eventual
return to office that in the
year 2000 he negotiated a
political agreement that secured
control over most of the
judiciary for his party in
exchange for a constitutional
reform guaranteeing an automatic
congressional seat and immunity
for then-President Arnoldo
Aleman after the end of his
mandate.
With the agreement of Ortega,
Aleman, who had already packed
the National Assembly with
relatives, was allowed to fill
the key positions at the
prosecutor's and comptroller's
offices with his allies.
Ortega's people took what was
left. The caudillos are used to
dealing with Nicaragua and its
state institutions as if they
were theirs. They rewrote the
constitution to make sure things
would stay that way.
With the overwhelming support of
the Nicaraguan people, newly
elected President Enrique
Bolaños set out to change
things. The corruption of former
president Aleman, who has been
included on Transparency
International's list of the most
corrupt heads of state of the
past 25 years, was thoroughly
investigated. After a fierce
battle that forced Bolaños to
split with the leadership of his
party, which was loyal to Aleman,
the latter was deprived of his
immunity and became the first
president in the history of
Latin America to be convicted
and sent to jail because of
corruption.
Strict new laws were written and
important efforts to reform
state institutions were
undertaken. Nicaragua quickly
became a reference point in the
international fight against
corruption. We were deemed
eligible for funding under the
Millennium Challenge Account,
the U.S. foreign aid program
that sets standards for
transparency, accountability and
good economic policies as a
condition for assistance. And
the Group of Eight
industrialized countries chose
the Bolaños government to enter
into a special partnership for
transparency.
But while Bolaños's reformist
agenda is certainly in accord
with the demands of the
Nicaraguan people and the
expectations of the
international community, it has
also made the caudillos truly
anxious. So they are using their
control over state institutions
to try to blackmail Bolaños and
force him to relinquish his
anti-corruption campaign. Aleman
wants to exchange his prison
confinement for house arrest as
a first step toward an amnesty.
Ortega wants to maintain his
grip on the judiciary and soil
Bolaños's image -- a key to
advancing his own political
ambitions.
The latest events -- notably a
mind-boggling and legally
unfounded resolution of the
comptroller's office demanding
the impeachment of the current
president -- seem to suggest
that the caudillos may be
willing to use all the power in
their hands to secure their
interests. The people's will and
the democratic institutions of
Nicaragua are the least of their
concerns.
This is a defining moment for
Nicaraguan democracy and for the
hopes of more accountable and
transparent governments
throughout the region. Once
again, the support of the
international community may be
the key. The caudillos just
might not dare if the world is
really watching.
The
writer is Nicaragua's ambassador
to the United States.
Nicaragua, US discuss possible
increase in military aid
Nicaragua and the
United States have discussed a
possible increase in military
aid from Washington to Managua
in the coming years, the
Nicaraguan Defense Ministry said
Saturday.
The issue was addressed Friday
at a meeting between Nicaraguan
Defense Minister Jose Guerra and
US Defense Secretary Donald
Rumsfeld, who arrived in Managua
Friday for a one-day visit, the
defense ministry said in a
communique.
The US aid will be used in the
renovation and technological
modernization of the Nicaraguan
army, to cope with emerging
threats like terrorism, drug
trafficking, human-trafficking
and organized crime, the
communique said.
Nicaragua has received three
million US dollars worth of
military aid since the United
States resumed its military
assistance to the Central
American country in January
2002, according to the
communique.
The two defense ministers also
discussed the need to promote
and institutionalize bilateral
dialogue in the areas of
security and defense, in order
to strengthen regional
cooperation in the combat
against terrorism, drug
trafficking and organized crime.
Rumsfeld praised the efforts of
Nicaragua in terms of security
as "very positive," and called
on "the Central American
countries to be more interested
in keeping peace and stability
in the region," according to the
communique.
|
|
|
In the
market for a change? Click
here! |
|
Nicaragua tells US it will
destroy its antiaircraft
missiles
President Enrique
Bolaños told US Defense
Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld
yesterday that Nicaragua would
completely eliminate a stockpile
of hundreds of surface-to-air
missiles with no expectation of
compensation from the United
States.
Bolaños said the antiaircraft
missiles would be destroyed
within 18 months.
Nicaragua had 2,000 SA-7
missiles, which are portable
weapons of Soviet design, left
over from the Latin American
country's days as a client of
the Soviet Union. US officials
sought their destruction,
fearing they could make their
way into terrorist hands for use
against airliners or military
aircraft.
In May and July, Nicaragua
destroyed batches of more than
300 missiles each. Defense
officials said they expect to
have 1,000 destroyed by the end
of the year.
''We seek no compensation for
destroying the missiles,"
Bolaños said.
The missiles are worth tens of
thousands of dollars each.
Rumsfeld arrived yesterday in
Nicaragua during a trip through
Latin America.
The Nicaraguan Army had said it
wants to hold on to about 400 of
the missiles, which it argued
are needed to offset the
military capability of
neighboring Honduras. The two
countries, which have a history
of animosity, have become
embroiled in a border dispute in
recent years.
But US defense officials said
they believed Nicaragua intended
to eliminate its entire
stockpile.
Nicaragua had also previously
suggested it would eliminate all
its remaining SA-7s in exchange
for planes and radar modules
from the US military, totaling
about $80 million in aid.
The leftist Sandinista
government, which ruled
Nicaragua from 1979 to 1989
after the fall of an
authoritarian right-wing regime
supported by the United States,
obtained the missiles from the
Soviet Union to fight off
US-backed contra rebels.
Also yesterday, Rumsfeld thanked
Nicaragua for sending 115
soldiers to Iraq. They left last
February; Nicaragua said it
could no longer afford to keep
them there.
Journalist killed in Nicaragua
vote count fight
A
Nicaraguan journalist has been
shot and killed in a fight
between rival political factions
during vote counting in
municipal elections, local media
reports.
Maria Jose Bravo, 26, was a
correspondent for the La Prensa
daily.
She has been shot in the chest
at a vote count centre in the
north-eastern city of Juigalpa.
The shooting took place during a
fight between members of
President Enrique Bolaños'
Alliance for the Republic party
and the Constitutionalist
Liberal Party of former
president Arnoldo Aleman, who is
now serving a 20-year service
for corruption.
Radio stations say three people
have been arrested in her
killing.
The leftist opposition
Sandinista party, which fought a
civil war with US-backed rebels
when it ruled in the 1980s, made
strong gains in the weekend
elections by taking control of
almost all the major cities.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
INSIDE NICARAGUA
Sunday
14 November 2004
|
Today's Stories:
 Struggle
For the Future of Nicaragua
Nicaragua,
US discuss possible increase in
military aid
Nicaragua
tells US it will destroy its
antiaircraft missiles
Journalist
killed in Nicaragua vote count
fight
|
|
Nicaragua's Besieged President
An anti-corruption drive makes
Nicaragua's president popular
abroad, but powerless at home,
and opens the way for a ghost
from the past
Besides the natural disasters
and civil wars typical of
Central America, Nicaragua has
also been cursed with a
spectacularly corrupt succession
of leaders.
From Anastasio Somoza senior, of
whom Franklin Roosevelt
reputedly said that “he may be a
son of bitch, but he's our son
of a bitch”, to his eponymous
son, who pocketed most of the
foreign aid that arrived after
an earthquake flattened the
capital in 1972 - the city
centre is still largely
grassland - to Arnoldo
Alemán (pictured above), who was
sentenced last year to 20 years
in jail for corruption and
money-laundering, the country's
caudillos, or strongmen, have
contributed to making Nicaragua
the poorest country in the
isthmus.
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
