Nicaragua: Our urgent call to the youth
The founding discourses of the "AYB opposition forces" in the CN, they are disappointing. His regressive rhetoric, sheltered in an incorrigible religious fundamentalism, ultra nationalist, and with the typical "development" model of the anachronistic political caste, should alert us. His vision for Nicaragua only as an export breadbasket, with cheap labor, Few women in decision-making spaces and zero youth at the helm, cannot offer us anything new “after Ortega”. Remarkable are its similarities with the vices "of the old political culture", and their actions anticipate the continuity of the current model; whatis not the same, but it's the same.
National Coalition: dry paddling.
TheNational Coalition[1] signed its statutes and with it its claims. The core of its addresses represent the crudest part of Nicaraguan political toxicity, and brings together many of those centrally responsible for the systemic crisis we face today. One of the main contradictions of the CN is that it legitimized itself using Orteguismo tactics: demobilize organic resistance, and parasitize the popular organization to contain it and bureaucratize it.
Contrary to his speech, aim to sustain the current model and thethe status quo of the great powers, of Orteguismo without Ortega. Taking advantage of the social polarization in the way of its construction, they devastated the legitimate student-youth expressions, they displaced popular referents, relatives and direct victims of repression, exiles and political prisoners. The CN is made up mostly of those who directly collaborated to establish the current regime and co-governed the last decade with the dictatorship.: businessmen, fundamentalist hierarchs and corrupt politicians what a bargain!
We know that in all AYB organizations there are dozens of honest people committed to proposals for changes necessary for human development., cultural and social in Nicaragua. For you and the youth of Nicaragua these words. His good intentions are indisputable., but they already take more than 24 months doing the same with the hope of "influencing and changing things from within", and things only get worse. The false addresses try to tame the most combative forms of their struggle and legitimate protest., it's simple: It is not in the DNA of these structures and their leadership to promote democracy or real participation. They don't now and they won't later. We know that you are disenchanted with these dynamics, that their autonomy was confiscated and that they do not feel valued or represented in there; so it's time to recognize and face those contradictions, let's see:
No program and a thousand false promises
It is true that to confront the dictatorship the broadest political unity is required.. But, what is the unit we need? for what purpose? What is the CN program to remove Ortega? What does your “social contract” say?? Why don't they discuss it publicly before calling for a vote and before signing a coalition? Its representatives united around their own names and those of artificial organizations with the slogans "democracy and justice" emptied of content and meaning.. They act with treachery, they hide information and meet behind closed doors to divide up their seats and see who gets the most. The unity that the CN perjures is a trap at the service of the same as always.
The CN proposes unity with impunity, We demand unity on a political program at the service of the majorities. From Anticapitalist Alternative we reject the electoral plan with the dictator, but we believe that any electoral front must be not only anti-Ortega, but profoundly anti-establishment and revolutionary. It must articulate clear programmatic proposals that propose structural and substantive changes, not only against the dictatorship but also against the capitalist system, patriarchal and colonialist, whose violence crosses us, especially to the most oppressed and dispossessed sectors. That's why our program is anti-capitalist, ecosocialist, feminist, strongly internationalist, and we build an organization under a programmatic agreement with a socialist horizon. We want to conquer all our rights, not one less.
old political parties: the squaring of the circle
The truth is that we youth do know history, and a lot. Let's remember the examples of #OcupaINSS, #SOSIndioMaíz and #SOSNicaragua where, unanimously, We were the ones who shouted out from our protests and mobilizations the dinosaurs of the old party structures that we abhor, and at last we had ripped off those scabs. Today they want to impose on us that in the name of the unit is worth everything.
Now, reading the letter from the "youth-student sector" of UNAB, «The historical electoral abstentionism is due to not wanting more pacts between the economic power, the government of the day and the political parties to maintain the "status quo"; so we ask them why if they know this, This sector decides to support the stilt political parties and collaborators of the regime, and calls them to "leave behind all ideological differences, caudillo and authoritarian and put good will "? There is the squaring of the circle, it is impossible, incompatible with its Mesozoic laws.
Finally, the document "together we are a volcano" concludes with a harmful statement and says: “No political party represents the new political culture of today… for this reason, we all need each other.” It isn't true! we don't need those dinosaurs, they only get in the way and slow us down. Let's build independent organization!
nothing-we will in the German pool
Brief historical review: At 2000 German and the dome of thePLC agreed with Ortega and the leadership of the FSLN to accommodate the presidential electoral floor to the 35%, which would allow Ortega to “return” to power; in exchange for impunity and parliamentary immunity for Alemán and his party, as well as a distribution of State powers based on bipartisanship, the most cynical corruption, and a crude nepotism that continues to this day. Based on the above, we confirm that the most inopportune actor to promote a democratic struggle is the Constitutionalist Liberal Party, owned by Arnoldo Aleman, former president accused and prosecuted for corruption, fraud, money laundering and illicit enrichment at the expense of the public treasury. From your current address, a few weeks ago they postponed the election of their directorships from 2020 until 2023!, as an affirmation that their undemocratic practices will only worsen.
The fight against corruption cannot wait for later if we want a new country, that is why we must denounce them now and demand accountability. Some in the CN play blind, but we don't forget! the PLC is not, nor can it be, reliable until Arnoldo Aleman, María Fernanda Flores and the rest of the party leadership be investigated, tried and sentenced for his crimes. From Anticapitalist Alternative we propose to fight to have an Independent Investigative Commission and clarify the corruption crimes of yesterday and today. Jail all the corrupt and with patrimonial responsibility, that is, they return what was stolen. We are committed to declaring imprescriptible their crimes against the peoples of Nicaragua.
Between Reverends and stilt walkers. this.
The Nicaraguan Democratic ForceFDN is thebarbecue supporter of the former “National Resistance” or “La Contra”. Its president Luis Fley anticipates a marked interference by US imperialism, and a neo-Somocista aura expressed in a stark “anti-Sandinismo”. Beyond that, they do not have a clear political program in relation to transitional justice processes., or investigation of the war crimes of the 80's, I mean, nothing to offer the post-Ortega transitional justice process.
Meanwhile, the Democratic Restoration Party PRD acts based on ideological postulates and biblical principles. About presidentthe priest Saturnino Cerrato participated as a presidential candidate for the Nicaraguan Liberal Alliance partyALN (of the banker Eduardo Montealegre) in 2016. saturnine, historical collaborator of the regime; and as part of the CN has put thebox 14 of the PRDat the service of the Civic Alliance to register for the elections and “compete” with the dictator. When he told La Prensa "that is our intention, come to power" was serious. It was verified this week with the "encirclement" of Edwin Carcache to the ranks of the PRD to serve as a wild card and media figure representing "youth". They are chameleons and skilled at deception. As if that were not enough, the evangelical leader proposes that the opposition unit also include alliances with groups of sexual diversity, the feminist and “pro-abortion” movements, but threat: “The irreconcilable differences we have with those organizations, we'll put them on the table another time, when Ortega is no longer in power", I mean, now we need them and then we discard them.
The same discourse of religious and nationalist providentialism was the protagonist of the recent signing of the statutes of the CN. Any change in the country involves respecting that the State does not have any type of religious intervention in the design and execution of public policies or government management, nor are there state subsidies to clerical and religious institutions.Church and state are separate affairs.
YATAMA: another pillar of the national colonialist model
The rights of indigenous and Afro-descendant peoples cannot be defended with the same ones who defend the advance of the agricultural frontier, timber traffic, industrial fishing, mega mining and other extractive and polluting industries. This collaborationist party of the colonialist regime andcentrist managua It is definitely not the representation of the interests and sentiments of the autonomous peoples in the Moskitia, and Nicaraguan Caribbean Coast.
Yatama from the 90 has practiced an adaptive politics of collaboration within the framework of the traditional party system of the "Mestiza Nicaragua", in the name of a supposed regional autonomy that never comes. This indigenous party allied itself with the UNO in the 90's, at 2006 with Ortega, and now with the National Coalition. Since then they have voted on a series of projects and concessions from the state apparatus, laws that result in displacement of ancestral communities and fauna species. His “development” plan justifies the predatory exploitation of the diversely rich territories in the Moskitia, for the extraction of raw materials or large-scale agricultural production.
The vision of the CN aims to strengthen the predatory and ecocidal dynamics, based on a productivist “development” model of super-exploitation of ecosystems, for the economic accumulation of a few. This is confirmed by the participation of business chambers such as FAGANIC, UPANIC, AMCHAM, or COSEP, but also with the large slaughterhouses, the National Army, the settlers and even the evangelical churches that have invaded those protected territories by force.
Our proposal is clear to all the peoples of Nicaragua: Let's fight against the polluting extractivist development model, the government's criminal alliance with private companies (and transnational) and the surrender policies. Let's activate from the bases to guarantee our food sovereignty, the rights of nature and biodiversity, habitat protection, ecosystems and the peoples who inhabit and care for them ancestrally. The call for elections must therefore be; to one Free Constituent Assembly, Sovereign, Democratic and Plurinational.
peasant movement: The fight against the channel must continue!!
The Peasant Movement for the Defense of the Lake, land and sovereignty, was born from the fight against the project for the construction of the great Interoceanic Canal in Nicaragua in 2013. The project was a false promise by Daniel Ortega associated with the fictitious company HKND, of a Chinese businessman named Wan Jin. The catastrophic consequences that the "canal project" would have set a precedent for permanent peasant organization and mobilization from the 2013, with the completion of more than 100 marches and protests, to combat entreguist concession. This generated a great social empathy that, in the April process, positioned the peasant sectors together with the youth at the vanguard of an intersectoral struggle.
It's contradictory then, fight for the anti channel cause, in "alliance" with the same business institutions that unconditionally supported the canal project. Remember thatAMCHAM and COSEP They were also members of the Technical Advisory Committee, of the Commission for the Development Project of the Grand Interoceanic Canal of Nicaragua, with the aim of highlighting to the commission the interests of big capital, both national and international. It is obvious to us that the business sectors and the old political parties, in the National Coalition, They do not propose profound changes or the repeal of the canal law 840. Because, we call on the peasant youth to question the leaderships that claim to represent them, because we cannot play blind with their undemocratic and unconsulted actions.
From Anticapitalist Alternative we call to break with the vision of colonialist development in which impoverished peasant sectors and territories, They are dependent on large corporations and multinational agro-exporters and extractivists. For us and for you, if it contaminates and destroys it cannot be progress. Let's organize independent of these corporations and their local representatives, Ylet's fight for a democratic agrarian reform, where the land is distributed rationallyunder a bioethical model respecting the rights of nature and the peoples who work them, inhabit and protect ancestrally.
ACJD Civic Alliance / A B: from opportunism to bureaucracy.
The Civic Alliance emerged to contain the massive force of the April uprising. The policy of "dialogue" that they promoted together with the dictatorship and the high leadership of the Catholic Church, diverted the popular rebellion and saved Ortega's existence in 2018. Now they promote the National Coalition as the vehicle of the capitalists towards the presidential chair. We continue to denounce how your large companies never declared an indefinite strike or tax disobedience and that they continued to pay taxes to the regime; tax contributions that feed the repressive machinery and state terrorism. Civic Alliance, and the international community want to divert the accumulated social energy to the electoral field. They call us to rely on entrepreneurship as "democratic" political option to ultimately structurally nothing changes in our country.
And the UNAB is a little more of the same, in the line of development of the ACJD-CN. These organizations are similar in terms of their reasons for existing: be a “broad platform” to “represent” the demands of the population, but with a marked reformism based on state institutions. This is how they nurse the traditional political system, that the population sent to intensive care. Not for nothing in the birth signatures of the UNAB recognizes the ACJD as the only negotiating vehicle before any table that is installed with the dictatorship. We conclude that the leadership of these platforms is the biggest stick in the wheel of the fight against the dictatorship and this decadent political system..
And the Articulation of Social Movements?
The platform moreprogressive in 2018 and that articulated part of the most combative sectors of April, was the Articulation of Social Movements. The AMS was sworn in to accompany and strengthen social mobilization throughout the country, but today their leaderships have yielded to the factual powers of the oligarchy, mixed with the worst of Creole political opportunism. In this logic, the AMS went from promoting marches and roadblocks as a form of legitimate community resistance, in the face of brutal repression, to sit at the table of those who negotiated with our executioners and murderers. In a few months, the AMS changed its proposal for a Democratization Route with a Constituent Assembly whose starting point was the departure of Ortega-Murillo; Now they have come to support the plan imposed by the historical collaborators of the regime who today want to "remove" him from power through "free elections".. Reforms without structural changes, not serve, do not last, recede.
The AMS supports the call to the "student sector" of the ACJD, the University Coordinator for Democracy and Justice, Cudj, and expressions of young people from UNAB to join a signatory block of the electoral statutes of the CN, to hold political office without political programs. not less, that members of the AMS occupy various positions in the Political Council of UNAB; It is also not minor that no answers have been given to the inspection demands to their addresses. We tell the student and youth groups: ¡No companies! You cannot expect different results by always doing the same thing.
We want to discuss with you, with the youth, about the false directions that support the idea of a capitalism (or in our case, the traditional political system) more human, inclusive, respectful of nature and native peoples. We hold thatcapitalism has no possible reform and the global socio-sanitary crisis of COVID-19 reflects the decline in which it finds itself. The youth want to change everything, and it is the false directions that defend these ideas of reforms that drag their colleagues by methods contrary to their discourses. Let's resume our combativity for the organization, independent with autonomy, creating an articulated collaboration under ademocratic centralism. our calling to the youth and combative sectors of these platforms, such as AMS and UNAB, is thatbreak with your directions, let us encourage ourselves to build a political tool willing to fight consistently for all our rights, and not one less.
Only the people save the people, and from Anticapitalist AlternativeWe propose to build ourselves on the logic of self-financing. If anything characterized the avant-garde student and territorial expressions born in April, was a tireless discourse on autonomy. We claim it, economic autonomy is essential to preserve political autonomy. The rialsthey must come out of our bag, we should self-financeso that nobody feels master of our movements. Never give up our fighting banners to any opportunist.
Fellow feminists and dissidents: In 1 vote of confidence in the CN
Companions in the CN, we appreciate your efforts, their contributions and their struggles in those spaces, we recognize your ability, his claw and his good intentions; but we also recognize that the fight against patriarchy is not enough in the patriarchal vision of the NC, you have to get out of there. From #AnticapitalistasNic we have no confidence that the CN is going to fight against sexist violence, femicide or sexual abuse. They will never talk about the right to decide over our own bodies, or to save our lives. They are not going to shout #NiñasNoMadres either. The feminization of poverty is going to intensify, in factories and companies, They will continue to cut our wages and benefits. In the countryside and communities, we will continue condemned to misery and the lack of quality basic and public services. Nor do we believe that they initiate and seek the path of justice for Yelka Ramirez, Vilma Trujillo, Carla Rostran, Yesbelin Maria Espinoza, Rayneia Lima and so many thousands of women whose femicides have remained in the most complete impunity.
The support of the Catholic hierarchy was essential for the return to power of Daniel Ortega in 2007, and then for his rapprochement with big businessmen. The alliance between Ortega and the Catholic curia through Cardinal Miguel Obando y Bravo, sentenced countless women and girls to death or prison by criminalizing therapeutic abortion in 2006. Since then, state subsidies have been maintained for both the Catholic and Evangelical churches., who maintains a strong support for the regime through important pastors and reverends. Let us remember the obstacles and curses that they imposed on the law 779. companions, it is easy to anticipate that there is no, there will be no changes or demands for us with this coalition of national shame.
we don't forget. We also fight for sexual rights, reproductive and identity, ignoring any institution that intends to govern us under obsolete religious fundamentalisms. youth in the world, especially in the middle east and latin america we are fighting for all our rights, and neither is negotiable. Women and dissidents have been telling us since the 70's"Right now let's not talk about it, there will be time later, Let's take out the dictator first, Unity is first". The directorates of the CN are incapable of recognizing that this model is itself misogynistic, violent and operating on the basis of patriarchal oppression and capitalist exploitation. They can't recognize it, because they are part of the structural problem. Are the 3 legs that shaped and sustain the current political model: Dictatorship-Church-Capital. It is up to us to continue fighting for our feminist and dissident emancipation.
And where are the youth??
Historically, and with a worsening of the systemic crisis in 2018, who suffer the worst consequences of state terrorism, without a doubt we were the youth. Not only students and not only urban, but the youth of all Nicaragua. murdered, wounded, others kidnapped/disappeared, and the majority of survivors sentenced to prison, being +86 political prisoners who continue in jails, thousands of us were thrown into exile and uprooting, they stole almost everything, but we do not resign, We resist and fight to change everything. We are millions all over the planet.John Cerna, fellow student, Political prisoner from the Ortega prison denounces the collusion of the powers that be with the dictatorship. We tell you you are not alone: Freedom now for all political prisoners!
We denounce that there is not and cannot be true representation in an "opposition" that is also responsible for this crisis, and who is currently negotiating with the dictatorship, we are the youth, Inside and outside of the country, who should go for everything, build an independent alternative and recover the possibility of a future with full rights for all; no repressors, corrupt, nor exploiters. It's them or us. The moment is now.
Anticapitalist Youth: Rebels and Internationalists!
The April rebellion evidenced a forceful certainty in Nicaragua: We have plenty of strength to turn everything around. To society as a whole, and mainly to the youth it is urgent to change everything; we can't go on like this, It is a matter of life and death. Popular organization processes in permanent mobilization, self-convened and massive had that objective, recover the social right to decide. Now we are pushed into a reactionary political scenario, full of obstacles and continuity; but a decisive moment is also opening with opportunities to intervene positively and transform our realities.
The youths position ourselves, internationally, at the forefront of these struggles to demolish all systemic structures of racist oppression, patriarchal, colonialist and imperialist. The capitalist crisis is worldwide, and Nicaragua is no exception. The adjustment policies led us to a point of no return in the mobilizations and protests that are taking place today in the 5 continents, with epicenters in historically troubled regions such as Latin America and the Middle East, but even at the very heart of American capitalism.
In Nicaragua and the world our living conditions are increasingly precarious, the majority of public models of the educational system are deplorable and exclusive, even more so with forced virtuality, the systematic reduction of labor rights that continually submits the working class, women and popular sectors to structural violence, that rages against the new generations and the dissidents that take part in this fight. We are on the front line of combat against adjustment, oppression and capitalist exploitation, as well as against the violence of national governments, through their apparatuses of repression and social control.
In Nicaragua we have to go for everything. Ortega-Murillo is, are entrepreneurs 'opponents', It is the clergy, and international organizations. Definitely: It is the whole system and its gears. Nothing old represents us. Because, We invite you to militate for this project and activate independent, building political organization for the social revolution that is urgent, let's fight the worst of viruses; heskepticism of those who conform and the hesitations of those who resign themselves to the "lesser evil". We do not want to maintain or reform the same that brought us today. What does not work, away. Put up a political tool without personalismos, that transcends the electoral, and battle in all terrains.
It's time to rethink everything, without fear. These systemic changes require a political subject, asset, passionate, built with prior accumulation, and willing to fight for all our rights. that subject, is the independent organization, internationalist, that we are building inAnti-Capitalist Alternative. This is the strategy we raised for the youth of Nicaragua and Central America, together with the International Socialist League present in more than 25 countries in which 5 continents. we are, organizing from the bases to turn everything around. not utopian, it is necessary. summary!
Anti-Capitalist Alternative
To learn more about our proposal:
[1] electoral front, formed by:
- Civic Alliance for Justice and Democracy, ACJD
- Blue and White National Unity, A B
- Peasant Council for the defense of the land, the lake and sovereignty
- Yapti Tasba Masraka Nanih Aslatakanka, YATAMA
- Constitutional Liberal Party. PLC
- Nicaraguan Democratic Force, FDN
- Democratic Restoration Party, PRD
