Nicaragua News Service September 4-11, 1994 Vol. 2, No. 38 by Colleen Littlejohn Major news stories for the week: 1. Daniel Ortega to take up seat in National Assembly 2. Prices of basic goods continue to rise. 3. FACS donation still in port. 4. Special police forces called to reinforce security in Managua 5. Nicaragua in territorial dispute with Costa Rica ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 1. Daniel Ortega to take up seat in National Assembly As a result of a decision of the Sandinista Assembly, Daniel Ortega, Secretary General of the FSLN, will this week assume his position as member of the National Assembly but it is too soon to tell if he will be considered head of the Assembly's FSLN block of delegates. By Nicaraguan law, losing Presidential candidates who received at least 1% of the vote have a seat in the 90 member National Assembly. As a result of the 1990 election, the Assembly has 92 members since Ortega and Moises Hassan of the Revolutionary Unity Movement both received over 1%. Sergio Ramirez, who was the FSLN Vice-Presidential candidate in 1990 has been Ortega's alternate in the Assembly since 1990, and head of the Sandinista Bench. He will leave his position and that of head of the Sandinista delegation, a position in which he had been reconfirmed even after he lost election to the National Directorate at the FSLN Extraordinary Congress in May of this year. This latest crisis in the FSLN is said by many to be the worst since the Frente split into three tendencies in the mid-1970s. It was brought about by the decision of the FSLN National Assembly Bench, in alliance with former UNO parties, to introduce in the Assembly a Constitutional reform proposal. The decision to introduce the law had been approved days before in a meeting between the National Directorate of the FSLN and the FSLN legislative members. The Sandinista Assembly, however, in a meeting last weekend decided to order the Sandinista Bench not to introduce the law until that body had had more time to study it. The 135 member Sandinista Assembly is the highest decision making body of the FSLN between party congresses. Dora Maria Tellez, who is a member of the Sandinista Assembly, the National Directorate and a member of the National Assembly, later stated that Bayardo Arce, Monica Baltedano and Rene Vivas torpedoed the previous decision of the National Directorate in that they did not work to convince the Sandinista Assembly of the need to immediately introduce the constitutional amendments. She later declared that the National Directorate was now divided as a decision making body and that that was very serious. Of the 39 FSLN National Assembly Members, 27 voted to defy the Sandinista Assembly decision. Of the 33 FSLN members present at the meeting, after a two hour debate, only five voted to obey the Sandinista Assembly mandate. The reform bill was presented to the National Assembly by a total of 40 Parliamentarians, including the 27 of the FSLN. As a result of this split among the FSLN's legislators, the Sandinista Assembly met again and ordered that Daniel Ortega replace Sergio Ramirez in the National Assembly. FSLN National Directorate Member Bayardo Arce, in an event at the Journalism school of the Central American University, expressed his fear that there is a possibility that the reforms of the Constitution will be dominated by the right wing, which would be a disaster for the country. He also stated that there were a lot of differences in the reforms given to the Sandinista Assembly to study and the version finally presented in the National Assembly. The two versions have not been published as yet. One day later, local newspapers announced a meeting of the "Movement to Renew Sandinismo" to be held at the Central American University. The meeting was called by four members of the FSLN National Directorate, Dora Maria Tellez, Henry Ruiz, Myrna Cunningham and Luis Carrion as well as by Sergio Ramirez. Approximately 600 people attended the meeting in which Ramirez first read a statement in which he accepted Daniel Ortega's right to his parliamentary seat but asserted that the FSLN block had the right to choose its own leader. It is thought that the FSLN block will name Dora Maria Tellez as legislative leader for the FSLN. Tellez has been the assistant leader of the Bench since 1990. Ramirez also warned that Carlos Fernando Chamorro would soon to removed as publisher of Barricada, the FSLN owned daily newspaper. Ramirez claimed that he would be removed for not overtly supporting what he called the "Ortega party line" as do Channel 4 TV, and the Radio stations Radio Ya and La Primerisima. National Directorate Member Luis Carrion stated, "They are asking for the head of Carlos Fernando because he hasn't let Barricada degenerate into a column of insults against fellow Sandinistas." Ramirez also claimed that his removal from the Assembly was due to the fact that Antonio Lacayo had been asking for his head, because he and most of the FSLN block in the Assembly have opposed the possibility of presidential re-election as well as the possibility that close family members of the president be elected to the nation's highest office. Both Ramirez and Lacayo have announced their desire to run for the Presidency. Lacayo, who is Minister of the Presidency and son-in-law to President Chamorro would see his chances for the presidency dwindle to nothing if the reforms are passed as now formulated. Lacayo has been accused by some of making a deal with Ortega to support a property bill in exchange for FSLN support removing the re-election and close family ties prohibitions. He even once stated that he and his wife was considering a civil divorce to allow him to go after the Presidency. Dora Maria Tellez, at the UCA meeting, rejected that notion that the present crisis in the FSLN is a "fight among the top." She stated rather, that "it is a struggle to decide if Sandinismo will exist as a political factor of influence or if it will evolve into a ever more reduced sect with lessening influence in Nicaraguan society. This is the challenge that we face in the renovation of the FSLN." She complained that the Constitutional reforms are being looked upon as concessions and not as changes needed for the institutionalization of a true democracy in Nicaragua...where it will be the institutions that guarantee the participation of society and not the good will of whoever happens to be in power at the time." Henry Ruiz, who failed in his bid at the Extraordinary Congress to replace Ortega as Secretary General of the FSLN, declared himself publicly to be in favor of a movement that will renew the FSLN. "To the companeros of the Democratic Left of the FSLN, I say to you, don't be confused and misled by your own propaganda. Sandinismo does not have credibility in this moment - credibility is what is earned with the truth, in front of our people. The movements that are to exclude, what they are doing is sentencing the FSLN to a catastrophic defeat in 1996." Daniel Ortega, who just recently returned from Tripoli where he celebrated the 25th anniversary of the revolution in Libya, assumed a conciliatory tone when interviewed by the local media and stated that he was "confident that there would not be a division within the Sandinista block of the National Assembly" and that his principal role would be to bring together the block because, "I only recognize one block." He also stated that in the Assembly he would fight for a law to clear up the property question in Nicaragua given that "this is the topic that will guarantee stability in Nicaragua." It was Tomas Borge, also a member of the National Directorate, who took the hard line against what he claimed were "divisionists who have renounced Sandinismo even though they have not publicly confessed it." And, "there will be a FSLN block in the National Assembly even if its only 5, 8 or ten members, whatever." Borge also predicted that the FSLN will win the elections of 1996. He stated, "We may make alliances with some parties, but never with the Somocistas or with those that spilled the blood of Sandino or of all the heroes and martyrs." (Barricada 8/11) 2. Prices of basic goods continue to rise. Last week the price of chicken rose, following a pattern already seen with cooking oil, coffee and beef within the last few weeks. Salaries, however, in the state sector especially, have been frozen for the last three years. 3. FACS donation still in port. It is now evident that no insects or pests were found in the rice and designated by the European Economic Community (EEC) via the Sandino Foundation (FACS) for drought victims. The true face of the government came out last week when they proposed to the FACS that part of the donation be sold via the still existing governmental basic grains marketing organization, ENABAS, and that the rest be distributed by the Ministry of Social Welfare (MAS). Barricada accused the government of "extortion" in one of their weekly editorials. Edwin Zablah, Secretary General of the FACS, stated that the FACS could coordinate with the MAS in the distribution but that the government had to apply the same rules to all organizations that work in Nicaragua. Meanwhile, a European Union representative warned that the government's delay in allowing the donation to he distributed put the whole EEC food program for Nicaragua in danger and that another shipload of rice destined for Nicaragua had already been diverted to El Salvador because of the problems. (Barricada 9/9, 9/10) 4. Special police forces called to reinforce security in Managua 380 Nicaraguan police special forces, called the red berets, are being called out to try to control Managua's rising crime rate. However, only a few have actually seen street duty so far because of lack of car fuel and other supplies, which must be financed with donations from private businesses. About 140,000 cordobas ($20,000+) have been received so far. Managua alone needs a total of 152 police car patrols to effectively protect the city but as of last week, only 26 units were actually on the streets. 40% of all crime in Nicaraguan is committed in Managua. (Barricada 9/6, 9/9) 5. Nicaragua in territorial dispute with Costa Rica The Nicaraguan government tried to solve a series of territorial disputes last week with their northern and southern neighbors, Honduras and Costa Rica. In the north, a Nicaraguan cooperative of ex-military reclaimed the land that the Honduran government had claimed as its own. Honduras later accepted the case presented by the Nicaragua Ministry of Foreign Affairs. 16 Honduran families that had occupied the 80 manzanas of land will be compensated by their government. The Costa Ricans however, do not accept that a 2 square kilometer farm located near the border belongs to Nicaragua. 34 Costa Rican families occupy the territory which was found to be part of Nicaragua, according to a special border study done by experts from the two countries. According to Nicaragua Foreign Minister Ernest Leal, "there is nothing more to investigate." The vice-minister of Foreign Relations, Jose Pallias, expressed some concern that Costa Rica was using Nicaraguan territory to settle its landless peasants. (Barricada 9/6)