Why Nicaragua Won’t Be the
Next Honduras
By Marcela Sánchez, Poder360
With less than two years left in his
administration, former Honduran president
and Hugo Chavez acolyte Manuel Zelaya
attempted to extend his presidency beyond
the permissible four years. Zelaya and his
supporters believed they could outmaneuver
entrenched powers and cash in on his
presumed appeal among the poor and
disenfranchised with a popular referendum to
amend the constitution.
That referendum, however, was blocked by a
Honduran court. And when Zelaya attempted to
push on regardless of the ruling, his own
party teamed up with the Honduran military
and arrested him, forced him onto an
airplane and flew him out of the country.
Now with just two years left to his term,
Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega is
seeking to extend his incumbency by similar,
extra-legal means. Many inside and outside
Nicaragua are wary of his intentions and
fear that, just as Zelaya in Honduras, he
will only take Nicaragua further down an
autocratic path.
But while a presidential power grab and
tight relations with Chavez and his
Bolivarian revolution inspired a coup in
Honduras, Nicaragua is highly unlikely to
follow such lead.
This is due, in part, to Ortega's
incomparable savvy. Once overwhelmingly
popular, Ortega won the presidency in 2006
after much shady maneuvering that allowed
him to declare victory despite obtaining
only 38 percent of the vote.
Knowing he can no longer rely merely on the
people to continue his rule, last year
Ortega sought and received an end to the ban
on his reelection from the Nicaraguan
Supreme Court, largely dominated by the
Sandinistas. As way to thank the justices,
Ortega issued a decree in January that
extended their terms.
In the same decree, Ortega granted term
extensions to members of the electoral
tribunal that will oversee next year’s
presidential election. (That tribunal failed
to investigate allegations of fraud when the
Sandinistas nearly swept municipal elections
in 2008.)
Ortega too relies on thugs to squelch
discontent. When opposition lawmakers sought
to revert Ortega's decree last month,
pro-government demonstrators threw rocks and
fireworks at the building where the leaders
were meeting. Not surprisingly, Ortega did
nothing to stop his "supporters".
“Daniel is probably worse than Zelaya,” said
Geoff Thale with the Washington Office on
Latin America. But Thale, like all Nicaragua
experts, believes there is little risk that
Ortega will be overthrown.
The Nicaraguan leader is just too good at
controlling or buying support from important
sectors within Nicaragua. Unlike Zelaya,
Ortega has not antagonized business leaders,
for instance, and he respects their close
ties with the United States.
Moreover, while the Honduran military
quickly sided with those who wanted to expel
Zelaya, the Nicaraguan military is content
to remain an independent and apolitical
institution. Previous efforts to coax the
military out of its neutral posture have
been unsuccessful.
Despite increased dissatisfaction with his
rule, Ortega retains solid support from a
third of the population. As the highly
respected Nicaraguan journalist and analyst,
Carlos Fernando Chamorro, warned in an
interview, if Ortega were ousted, “this
country would go up in flames.”
Ortega's control over Nicaragua is not
complete, of course. This is most apparent
with the National Police, an institution
widely admired but recently questioned for
not arresting any of the pro-government
demonstrators after three days of violence.
According to Thale, Ortega is waiting for
its current and highly respected
commissioner, Aminta Granera, to make a
mistake and provide Ortega with an excuse to
replace her with someone more sympathetic to
his wishes -- and more tolerant of his
thugs.
Even under these circumstances, the
international community seems unlikely to
get in Ortega's way. At a minimum, said
Chamorro, the U.S., Europe and other Latin
American countries should demand that the
electoral tribunal be neutral and that
international observers be allowed to
monitor next year's election.
For now, only the International Monetary
Fund has shown some grit. In reaction to
Ortega's latest attempt to shore up support
among rank and file public employees,
including those in the military and police,
with a $22 a month bonus, the IMF announced
that it would suspend the evaluation of the
country’s economic plan. Without the
evaluation, the IMF cannot release $18
million in aid to Nicaragua and provide
crucial guarantees to international
investors.
It's worth noting the IMF's response was
based solely on economic grounds --
countries that receive aid must adhere to
strict austerity plans and inflationary
goals. While very modest, the $22 bonus was
a sufficient trigger for an international
financial response.
Meanwhile, no amount of meddling with
democracy has triggered – or is expected to
trigger -- a response. It seems when it
comes to politics in Nicaragua, everyone but
Ortega is impotent.
Read more:
http://www.poder360.com/article_detail.php?id_article=4251#ixzz0niZPbxSD
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