The Failure of the Negotiations in Nicaragua with Ortega

[Guest Indiana]

HAVANA TIMES – The negotiations between the Ortega-Murillo dictatorship and the Civic Alliance ended last Wednesday without any agreement on the two most important items on the national agenda, endorsed by hundreds of thousands of citizens during the April Rebellion: democratization and justice.

For the second time in just one year, President Daniel Ortega dug in his heels, relying on repression. He refused to accept an electoral and constitutional reform to convoke early elections to shorten his period of governing. He also stubbornly denied the petition for an independent investigation of the massacre of at least 327 persons, and that the perpetrators be brought to justice.

By torpedoing this latest attempt at a national dialogue with the goal of staying in power until after 2021, and thus guaranteeing impunity for crimes of lesser humanity, Ortega is provoking strong international condemnation that could accelerate the collapse of the economy and of his government.

When all is said and done, this could mean a new political and social dynamic, which will be nothing like the hoped for “soft landing,” and in which neither he nor anyone else will be able to control the conditions by which he exits from power.

According to the Central Bank, in 2018 the economy shrank by 3.8%. But without a political accord, economic projections for this year range from an 11 to a 20% shrinkage, with the loss of hundreds of thousands of jobs, a financial system on the verge of collapse, and the productive infrastructure for the agricultural cycle hanging by a thread for lack of financing.

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