POLITICS-NICARAGUA:
Sandinistas and Somocistas Are Now Pals
José Adán Silva

MANAGUA,  (IPS) - With the Nicaraguan elections due in November, the left-wing Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) has forged alliances with political forces that it has been fighting for decades. Observers and opponents are warning that the move could turn out to be counterproductive.

The FSLN presidential candidate, Daniel Ortega, launched his campaign on Aug. 26 in Managua, introducing his electoral allies for the Nov. 5 elections. Among them are leaders of the far-right minority Liberal Nationalist Party (PLN), founded by former dictator Anastasio Somoza.

Somoza's dictatorship began in 1937 and was continued by his sons Luis and Anastasio Somoza Debayle, until it was overthrown in 1979 by the Sandinista revolution after a bloody civil war.

Ortega's running-mate is Jaime Morales Carazo, who was chief negotiator for the "contras", a Washington-financed force that fought against the FSLN government in the 1980s.

Ortega served as president of Nicaragua from 1985 to 1990.

Before the triumph of the Sandinista revolution, he was a guerrilla commander in the FSLN, a political-military movement founded in 1961, inspired by General Augusto César Sandino (b.1895 - d.1934), who rebelled against political and military interference by the United States in the internal affairs of Nicaragua.

Sandino was killed by order of Somoza in 1934, and 27 years later the FSLN was born. Its main purpose, according to statutes still in force, was "the overthrow of the Somocista dictatorship by armed struggle."

Now, the alliance between the FSLN and its erstwhile political enemies, which is running in the elections under the slogan United Nicaragua Triumphs (Unida Nicaragua Triunfa), is being called into question by political sectors that oppose the PLN and the Sandinistas, and by political analysts who see the coalition as "counterproductive."

Former guerrilla commander Edén Pastora, who fought Somoza's army for two decades, and is the presidential candidate for the Alternative for Change (AC) party, said the alliance was a "moral sacrilege" for the Nicaraguan people.

"He (Ortega) says it's a matter of national reconciliation. Perhaps Ortega wants to be in everyone's good books in Nicaragua and would like to forget that the Somozas killed more than 50,000 people here, but in exchange for the presidency Ortega would even make a pact with Hitler if he were alive. Right now, Sandino and Somoza must be turning in their graves," Pastora said.

Former Sandinista guerrilla Dora María Téllez, a legislative candidate for the dissident Sandinista Renewal Movement (MRS), thought that Ortega's electoral strategy could have negative results.

"I don't see this as a political alliance, because the PLN is an empty shell, it's no longer the powerful party that the Somozas maintained. What I do see is that Ortega could end up losing with this reconciliation game," Téllez said.

"Nicaragua's war wounds are still very recent, and a great many people cannot forget that nearly 100,000 people died because of the war here," she remarked.

Leonel Téller, former PLN secretary and spokesperson for the rightwing Constitutional Liberal Party (PLC), led since 1988 by former president Arnoldo Alemán (1997-2001), said the agreement between the FSLN and Somoza's old party was a move to present "an electoral image, rather than a real alliance."

"The real leader of the PLN is Dr. Adán Bermúdez Urcuyo. He brought the whole party structure and the grassroots with him to make an alliance with the PLC. Those who signed up with Ortega are less important members who were annoyed because they weren't nominated to stand as legislators, and now they're going around saying that they're the PLN, but there are no more than 20 of them," Téller said.

According to political historian and analyst Aldo Díaz Lacayo, the fact that part of the PLN party structure has joined the FSLN could be counterproductive for the leftist party, losing it the votes of many people who suffered human rights violations during the Somoza dictatorship.

"Politically, the (PLN) support has no more weight than an image effect, but in electoral terms it could be counterproductive for a candidate to join forces with a party that in the historical memory of the Nicaraguan people remains identified as the organisation of the country's greatest human rights violator," Díaz said.

According to the historian, although most voters are relatively young and have no profound understanding of the magnitude of the civil war between Somoza's army and the Sandinista guerrillas, there are still "thousands of voters who cannot forget the torture, bombings, massacres and 'disappearances' perpetrated by Somoza's National Guard."

Unofficial estimates indicate that 75,000 people died in the civil war which ended in 1979. Another 50,000 could have died in the subsequent conflict between the Sandinista army and the "contras".

In spite of the reports of Somocista crimes, a poll published in March showed that many respondents thought that Anastasio Somoza Debayle's government was one of the best in history.

According to the survey by the local polling firm MyR Asociados, Violeta Barrios (1990-1996) was the best president the country has ever had, and Anastasio Somoza Debayle, overthrown in 1979 and assassinated in Paraguay in 1980, was ranked second.

Barrios was favoured by 27.9 percent of those interviewed, followed by Somoza Debayle with 24.5 percent. The worst rating was received by Ortega (1985-1990), who got black marks from 48.5 percent of those surveyed.

The alliance between the PLN and the FSLN was defended by Ortega and his campaign chief, his wife Rosario Murillo.

"The Liberal Nationalist Party and the FSLN have things in common -- the fact that our supporters are poor and humble people, and government programmes aimed at development and progress in Nicaragua, and at fighting poverty and lifting social security," Ortega said.

Constantino Velásquez, the PLN president, said that "we are sure that the Sandinista Front is the only true option to take Nicaragua forwardàwe cannot carry on with the politics of hatred and terror."

Ortega is leading the polls, and his alliance has gained the support of powerful institutions like the Catholic Church and a large number of trade unions and indigenous, business and small farmers organisations.