Nicaraguan presidential elections

After receiving emails from Kevin and Curt asking about the state of affairs in Nicaragua after their presidential elections, I decided to write a blog entry about my general impressions. The election took place November 5 and featured four major candidates. Historically, Nicaraguan political parties have been of two types, liberal and conservative. These are not to be confused with the political parties of the United States, however. Liberals in Latin American politics are essentially neo-liberals, following a tradition that dates back to 18th century enlightenment Europe and the laissez faire economics of Adam Smith. The conservatives represent a group which we no longer have in the United States, something that you might call royalist. It has a strong continuity with the ancien regime in Europe before the French Revolution. Another important issue in Latin America is the relationship between the church and state. Liberals have traditionally been anti-clerical, whereas the conservatives tend to use the church as a political instrument.

With this context in mind, let´s look at the current political situation in Nicaragua. The liberals are represented by two parties, the PLC and the ALN. The current president, Enrique Bolaños, is a member of the PLC. It, however, has been racked with corruption, and a new liberal party, the ALN, arose as an alternative. The ALN´s candidate, Eduardo Montealegre, was the finance minister of the past two PLC administrations, but due to internal strife, wasn´t allowed to run for the presidency in their party. Of all the candiates, he has received the greatest support from the United States government for this election.

The other two major parties the FSLN and the MRS. Both of them are Sandinistas, the group that overthrew the Somoza dictatorship in 1979 and ruled Nicaragua for the next decade. Because of their socialist tendencies, the United States funded the Contra War to depose them. Daniel Ortega was the president during this tumultuous period, but he gave up power in 1990 when he lost a democratic election. Since then, he has run for the presidency in each subsequent election, and he has lost each time. He is a determined man.

Having lost the last three elections, Ortega tried a new tactic this time. He ran on a platform ‘reconciliation and peace,’ and he mended rifts with his former enemies, the Contras. In fact, he chose Jaime Morales, the former leader of the Contras, to be his running mate! Ortega also smoothed things over with another major political power, the Catholic Church, with whom he had serious friction in the 1980´s. Clearly, a lot has changed since the Sandinistas have been out of power. They have become a lot more moderate, and a lot more willing to work with opposition to find acceptable compromises, thus maintaining peace during a turbulent period.

But like the liberals, the Sandinistas were not fully united either. There are many Sandinistas who do not like Daniel Ortega, and they are upset that he continues to run for president every election, rather than stepping aside and letting others take charge. Thus they formed another Sandinista party, the MRS, and chose as their candidate the beloved former mayor of Managua, a man named Herty. Unfortunately, he suffered a heart attack and died this summer, effectively ending their chances of gaining the presidency.

In the weeks before the election, the favorites were the ALN´s Montealegre and the FSLN´s Ortega, but neither had a decisive advantage. When the elections took place, everyone waited with baited breath for the outcome. To keep things calm, the sale of alcohol was prohibited and the discos were closed. Lots of election officials were present, including those from the United States and Europe, to insure that no one would manipulate the outcome.

Everyone voted on Sunday, November 5, but the results would not be official until Tuesday. On Sunday night, it was clear that Ortega had surged to an early lead, and the Sandinistas started partying like it was 1979. I woke up at 5am on Monday to some explosions that sounded like gunshots. I poked my head out the window to see if all hell had broken loose, but what I found was the neighborhood kids shooting fireworks and waving Sandanista flags. Nevertheless, the election was far from decided.

On Tuesday, I traveled to my new home of Matagalpa, where everyone was eagerly awaiting the official announcement. Knowing that I was in a Sandinista stronghold, I put on my Sandinista t-shirt with the expectation that it would generate some entertaining discussion. It wasn´t two minutes before a guy pulled me into a bar and started buying me drinks—‘A friend of the Frente is a friend of mine,’ he said. Then we watched on television as the results were announced. The winner was Daniel Ortega! The town went crazy, and my new friends and I jumped into a pickup truck to zoom around town in a spontaneous victory parade. It was surreal. I was watching history unfold before my eyes. The only event in my memory that I could compare this to was watching television coverage of the fall of the Berlin Wall of 1989. But being in Nicaragua in person made this moment much more vivid. Nicaragua has hope again! It brings tears to my eyes to reflect on this moment.

What can we expect from El Frente Sandinista in the next five years? Their general political philosophy is a social-democratic, mixed economy, probably most similar to that of Scandinavia. They aim to provide better social services for the poor and promise not to nationalize anyone´s private property or business. This comes at a good time, because every since the Sandinistas lost power in 1980, illiteracy has been climbing, health care has become deplorable, and chronic unemployment is decimating communities and families.

Can the Sandinistas follow through on their promises? We´ll have to wait and see. However, they already had a significant degree of success in the 1980´s, especially considering that the United States was doing everything possible, including violating International Law, to destroy them. Hopefully the U.S. has learned its lesson in Iraq and will not try to manipulate Nicaraguan politics this time around. Now if only there were a presidential candidate in the United States who ran on a platform of ‘reconciliation and peace’ in 2008, THAT would be someone I could vote for!