Have
Yourself a Sandinista Christmas...
By Tim Rogers / /Time.com
MANAGUA - Wearing a green field cap and
military dog tags, 12-year-old Victor
steadies a Soviet-made SAM-7 missile
launcher on his tiny shoulder, squinting
through the crosshairs at the children
screaming dizzily on the nearby Tilt-a-Whirl
ride. Even without the missile, the SAM-7
launcher is as tall as Victor and doesn't
weight much less. But he's having too much
fun to be burdened by the weapon's
cumbersome dimensions.
"That's the same type of SAM they used to
shoot down Eugene Hasenfus," a bystander
remarks, referring to the CIA contractor
pilot whose cargo plane was downed by
Sandinista soldiers in 1986, while making a
supply drop for "contra" insurgents. More
recently, the U.S. has tried to get
Nicaragua to destroy its remaining stockpile
of surface-to-air missiles, allegedly out of
fear they'll fall into terrorist hands. But
Nicaragua has insisted it will hold on to
its 400 SAM-7s for strategic defense
purposes — and amusement park photo ops.
After posing for the picture, Victor shrugs
the clunky SAM-7 off his shoulder with the
help of a Nicaraguan soldier, before
scampering off to check out some other
anti-aircraft artillery on display at the
Sandinista government's recently inaugurated
"Happy Children Amusement Park." At a nearby
military tent, dozens of other children and
adults merrily grab at a generous selection
of unloaded assault weapons of different
makes and calibers, and casually take aim at
passersby who move hurriedly toward other
park rides. Some of the teenagers
knowledgeably slide and lock the bolt
handles on their assault rifles with a
nimble familiarity that seems to belie the
innocence of their youthful looks. Despite
the presence of several soldiers, the
atmosphere in the tent is considerably laid
back — even when one of the more
rambunctious boys shoves a grenade launcher
into the back of an unsuspecting soldier and
yells "bang!"
At the other end of the fairground, beyond
the bumper cars, circus tents and spinning
tea cups, children line up outside
Nicaragua's first public ice-skating rink,
built inside a climate-controlled plastic
tent that defies the scorching 95 degree
heat outside. Wearing loosely laced
second-hand skates with dull blades and
inadequate ankle support, the excited
children — most of whom have never seen ice
outside of a drinking glass — giggle, flop
and crash their way across the Zamboni-starved
ice. (
For First Lady Rosario Murillo, the free
amusement park, funded entirely by the
presidential couple's mysterious private
finances, is part of the Sandinista
government's "vindication of children's
rights" following the "neoliberal nightmare"
of the previous three administrations.
"All children have the right to learn how to
skate on ice," Murillo gushed during the
inauguration of the park, which plans to
receive 1.6 million children over the next
month, before closing Jan. 3, 2010. "This
park is for the children, because they were
born to be happy."
Murillo said the government would like to
make the subsidized amusement park a
permanent attraction, but admitted it costs
"a lot of money," without mentioning a
figure. "Our commitment is one that is
Christian and one of solidarity, advancing
towards a future of socialism ... to install
the Kingdom of God on Earth," Murillo said.
Others, however, hope the Kingdom of God
will have less heavy artillery.
While no one objects to the smiles of the
mostly impoverished children and their
families who visit the Sandinista amusement
park, critics claim the Ortega government is
starting to provided circuses without the
bread. Children have a right to play and
have fun, but they also have a right to
sustainable development that includes
health, education and protection, says María
Jesús Gomez, head of the Nicaraguan
Federation of Non-Governmental Organizations
Working with Children and Adolescents (CODENI).
Gomez says the Happy Children theme park is
not a sustainable strategy to deal with
problems facing children in the hemisphere's
second-poorest country after Haiti.
"There is a national economic crisis, so the
government has to be clear about its public
policies and how it's using its resources,"
Gomez said, noting that the government has
already had to cut budget funding for
education and health. While the price tag on
the Happy Children Amusement Park remains
classified government information, the
Nicaraguan media has estimated that the ice
rink alone costs upwards of $2 million —
roughly the same amount the government spent
this year on it equally opaque program for
street children.
For others, such as Monica Zalaquett, whose
Center for the Prevention of Violence, has
been working tirelessly to educate at-risk
Managua youth about the dangers of guns and
create a "new image of masculinity," the
government's promotion of military weaponry
is mind-blowing, especially considering the
spike in gun-related deaths among teenagers
this year.
"Instead of having a festival of happy
children, they should have a festival of
safe children," Zalaquett said. "If you want
to make children happy, you have to make
them safe." For a lot of the boys at the
Sandinista theme park, however, happiness
this Christmas might be an arms cache from
Santa.
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