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((Morena Herrera – ContraPunto photo))

Morena Herrera charges FMLN has more interest in government positions than in social change

[Abridged translation of an article from ContraPunto of San Salvador for May 28. See original here and related articles here and here.]

by Gerardo Arbaiza

San Salvador – Morena Herrera, founder of the emblematic feminist organization Las Dignas and of the Colectiva Feminista para el Desarrollo Local, speaks with authority on the outlook for the social Left in El Salvador 20 years after the end of the armed conflict this small nation lived through from 1980 to 1992.

Herrera, who was also a guerrilla fighter, considers the feminist movement to have had a very hard struggle adapting at certain specific junctures due to the diverse opinions and the constant debate within the movement.

Herrera states that despite this diversity of opinions, an effort has been made to join together in a position of independence in the face of resolute adherence to the party. (more…)

((Daniel Ortega))

[Translation of an article from El Clarín of Chile for November 22. See original here and related articles here, here and here.]

Last November 6 Nicaragua and Guatemala both held presidential elections, but while the Nicaraguan elections have been subjected to a series of challenges, those in Guatemala seem to satisfy those who claim to be troubled about the reelection of President Daniel Ortega.

It is striking that nobody is troubled about the triumph of General Otto Pérez Molina, who had been a candidate several times without winning. He was probably helped this time by the judicial denial of permission for Sandra Torres, former wife of current president Álvaro Colom, to run. (more…)

Women demonstrate in Managua -- Confidencial photo

AI expresses concern over criminalization of therapeutic abortion, regrets Ortega’s refusal to meet with them

[Translation of an article from Confidencial of Managua for July 29 based on a dispatch from the Spanish news agency Efe. See original here and related article here.]

Managua – Amnesty International warned today in Nicaragua that sexual violence against women and girls is a “very serious problem” in the country and criticized the state’s response to such cases, which it characterized as “limited” and sometimes “disheartening.”

The Amnesty International mission, which on Friday concluded its five-day visit to Nicaragua without meeting with President Daniel Ortega, also expressed “grave concern” over the criminalization of therapeutic abortion. (more…)

[Translation of an article from Contrapunto of El Salvador for October 6. See original article here and related article here.]

By Carlos F. Chamorro

Managua – On the basis of the serious events that occurred in Ecuador last week, President Daniel Ortega has denounced a consipracy to stage a coup d’état against his government.

His claim provoked an immediate denial from the United States embassy in Managua and from spokesmen for the Episcopal Conference, but it would be fitting for Ortega to offer evidence to substantiate his denunciation. Only thus can we know if there is any truth to it or if it is yet another campaign to fabricate artificial enemies and keep his bases mobilized.

To date the only documented coup, for which there is abundant evidence, is the one the president of the republic himself has promoted against our country’s democratic institutions. It is clearly not a military coup like the one that took place in Honduras but is a coup orchestrated from above and is equally grave in its consequences. (more…)

[Abridged translation of an article from La Prensa of Managua, Nicaragua, for July 18. July 19 is the anniversary of the 1979 triumph of the Sandinista revolution that ousted the regime of dictator Anastasio Somoza. Dora María Téllez, a medical student at the time, played an important role in the uprising. In 1978, when she was 22, she was third in command of Sandinista forces that occupied the national palace in Managua, a pivotal event in the revolution.

After government by a revolutionary junta from 1979 until 1985, Sandinista leader Daniel Ortega was elected president. Hampered by a war waged by counter-revolutionaries, the contras, who were supported by the Reagan administration in Washington, Ortega nevertheless managed during his first five-year term to carry out some land reform measures and wealth redistribution. Ortega lost the next presidential election, however.

He was still a powerful figure in the Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional, though, and ambitious. He formed practical alliances with the government of President Arnoldo Alemán of the Partido Liberal Constitucionalista (PLC), an administration marked by serious corruption, which led eventually to a criminal trial and a 20-year prison sentence for Alemán, later reversed by the Supreme Court.

Ortega was elected president again in 2006. In the meantime, though, he and other FSLN leaders, tainted by association with the Alemán regime, came under serious criticism of corruption and caudillismo, undemocratic rule by strong men in powerful positions. The Movimiento de Renovación Sandinista (MRS – Movement for Sandinista Renewal) was formed by dedicated Sandinistas like Téllez to restore Sandinismo to the revolutionary principles with which it was formed.] (more…)