In Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega takes control of the presidential election

Guarded by around 30,000 soldiers and soldiers, the polling stations open Sunday, November 7 in Nicaragua for a ballot without surprise: President Daniel Ortega is guaranteed to be elected for the fourth time in a row, since all his serious rivals have been placed in detention.

“A farce”, “a sham”: Washington and the European Union do not have enough harsh words to condemn this election to which they deny all legitimacy.

Journalists from several international media have been denied access to the territory, and the government has refused the presence of independent observers.

The last remaining opposition daily in the country, La Prensa, was taken over in mid-August by the police and its director thrown in jail.

A week before the poll, Meta, the parent company of Facebook, announced that it had dismantled a thousand Facebook and Instagram accounts run by a Nicaraguan government “troll factory” to manipulate public opinion.

Decapitated, with its leaders in detention or in exile, the opposition is preparing demonstrations in Costa Rica, Miami or Madrid and has agreed on a single slogan for voters: “Sunday, stay at home. House”.

Nicaraguans are not mistaken: the five candidates registered to face the head of state are cronies, stooges compromised with power.

It is therefore the abstention rate that alone can give an idea of ​​the real adherence of Nicaraguans to the “ticket” formed by Daniel Ortega and his wife Rosario Murillo, vice-president since 2017.

Compared to Frank and Claire Underwood, the ruthless duo of the “House of Cards” series, or nicknamed “Lord and Lady Macbeth”, Daniel Ortega, soon 76, and his wife, 70, form a fusional couple ready to do anything to keep an absolute power that they wield with an iron fist.

According to a Cid-Gallup poll, if given the choice, 65% of 4.4 million registered voters would vote for an opposition candidate, compared to 19% for the incumbent president.

On the other hand, for the polling institute M&R, close to the government, Daniel Ortega and the 90 candidates for Parliament presented by the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN, in power) collect 70% of the voting intentions.

“There is no one to vote for. It’s in the pocket for Daniel (Ortega),” a 46-year-old woman told an AFP journalist. She asks for anonymity: “We cannot speak, otherwise we will put you in prison”.

Kneeling opposition

Three years after the repression which left more than 300 dead among the demonstrators who demanded in the spring of 2018 the resignation of Daniel Ortega, and six months before the election, the hunt for opponents has indeed opened: 39 political figures, men of business, farmers, students and journalists have been arrested since June. Among them, the seven potential candidates likely to pose a threat to the incumbent president.

Favorite of the opposition in the polls, Cristiana Chamorro, 67, daughter of ex-president Violeta Chamorro (1990-1997), was the first to be arrested, on June 2, and placed in house arrest.

Opponents are accused, pell-mell, of undermining national sovereignty, of supporting international sanctions against Nicaragua, of “treason to the motherland” or “money laundering”, under laws passed at the end of 2020 by the Parliament, acquired in power, just like the judiciary and the electoral tribunal.

>> To see on France24.com: Nicaragua, the revolution betrayed

Fear runs in the small Central American country of 6.5 million inhabitants, the poorest in the region and which has been plagued since the unrest of 2018 with inflation, unemployment and the coronavirus pandemic, whose magnitude is denied by power.

Since the protests of spring 2018, more than 100,000 Nicaraguans have taken the path of exile while 150 opponents are still behind bars, described by Daniel Ortega as “criminals” and “coup mongers” in the Washington pay.

Hero of the revolution, the former guerrilla Daniel Ortega is today accused by his opponents of acting in the same way as the dictator Anastasio Somoza whom he helped to overthrow in 1979.

For Nicaraguan analyst Elvira Cuadra, exile, the country’s isolation will affect international investment and funding, with social consequences and growing emigration.

Especially since, in addition to the new sanctions adopted by the United States and the European Union, relations have even become strained with historic allies such as Mexico and Argentina. Cuba, Venezuela and Russia remain as supporters of the government of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo.

With AFP