Guarded by about 30,000 soldiers, polling stations opened this Sunday (7) in Nicaragua for an unsurprising vote: President Daniel Ortega is guaranteed to be elected for the fourth consecutive time, as all his rivals have been sent to the prison.
Polling stations will close at 6:00 pm (21:00 GMT) and the first official results should be known around midnight (4:00 GMT on Monday), according to the Electoral Tribunal.
“A farce”: the United States and the European Union did not mince words to condemn this election which they deny any legitimacy.
Journalists from various international media, including CNN and the Washington Post, were barred from entering the territory, and the government refused independent observers.
Authorities, however, on Saturday accredited about 200 “electoral escorts” and hand-picked journalists, foreign “Sandinista militants,” according to Urnas Abiertas, an independent observatory.
The last remaining opposition newspaper in the country, La Prensa, was raided in mid-August by police and its director arrested.
A week before the vote, Meta, the parent company of Facebook, announced that it had dismantled 1,000 Facebook and Instagram accounts run by a Nicaraguan government “troll factory” to manipulate public opinion.
With its leaders detained or exiled, the opposition is preparing demonstrations in Costa Rica, Miami or Madrid with a single slogan for voters: “Sunday, stay at home”.
Nicaraguans have no doubts: the five candidates signed up to face the head of state are puppets committed to power.
Therefore, it will be the abstention rate that will give an idea of the real adhesion of Nicaraguans to the slate formed by Daniel Ortega and his wife Rosario Murillo, vice president since 2017.
Compared to Frank and Claire Underwood, the relentless “House of Cards” duo, Daniel Ortega, who will soon turn 76, and his wife, 70, are a couple ready to do anything to maintain absolute power.
According to a Cid-Gallup poll, given a choice, 65% of the 4.4 million registered voters would vote for an opposition candidate, compared with 19% for the incumbent president.
On the other hand, according to the M&R polling institute, which is close to the government, Daniel Ortega and the 90 candidates for Parliament presented by the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN, in power) have 70% of voting intentions.
“It’s not that it’s bad… it’s horrible: we can’t talk, or they’ll put you in prison. Why vote? Only the Sandinistas will vote”, denounces José, 78.
Marina Aguirre, 36, will vote: “We have free schools and hospitals. (Daniel Ortega) ensures that all children have toys every year”, he says.
Aura Lila, in Masaya, 35 km south of the capital, will stay at home, out of respect for her youngest son, who died at age 15 on the barricades in the spring of 2018.
– Hunting opponents –
Three years after the repression that left more than 300 dead among protesters who in 2018 demanded the resignation of Daniel Ortega, and six months before the elections, the hunt for opponents began: 39 political personalities, businessmen, farmers, students and journalists were arrested since June. Among them, the seven potential candidates who would likely pose a threat to the incumbent president.
An opposition favorite in the polls, Cristiana Chamorro, 67, daughter of former president Violeta Chamorro (1990-1997), was the first to be arrested on June 2 and placed under house arrest.
Opponents are accused of undermining national sovereignty, supporting international sanctions against Nicaragua, “betrayal of the motherland” or “money laundering”, according to laws passed in late 2020 by Parliament.
Fear dominates the small Central American country of 6.5 million inhabitants, the poorest in the region and which, since the 2018 protests, has suffered from inflation, unemployment and the coronavirus pandemic, whose magnitude is denied by power.
Since the 2018 protests, 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 “coupists” paid by Washington.
Hero of the revolution, former guerrilla Daniel Ortega is now accused by his opponents of acting in the same way as the dictator Anastasio Somoza he helped topple in 1979.
For Nicaraguan analyst Elvira Cuadra, in exile, the country’s isolation will affect international investments and financing, with social consequences and growing emigration.
Mainly because, in addition to the new sanctions adopted by the United States and the European Union, relations even with historic allies such as Mexico and Argentina have become strained.
Cuba, Venezuela and Russia continue to support the government of Ortega and Murillo.
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