Nicaragua celebrates 40 years of Sandinista triumph in Managua and former guerrillas denounce return to the past

On 19 July 1979, after several months of struggle, the Nicaraguan Guerrillas Sandinistas, so called in memory of the revolutionary Augusto César Sandino at the beginning of the century, they took the capital Managua. That day, the dictatorship of the Somoza clan who dominated Nicaraguan politics with an iron fist for more than four decades.

Monica Baltonado, one of the commanders who led the group of Sandinista guerrillas in Managua, remembers that day at RFI's microphone. Because the dictator Anastasio Somoza had left Managua, the guerrillas did not have "big fights but some skirmishes in the area, but we practically entered the main barracks and the Somoza's presidential house," remembers -he.

Baltonado recalls the ideals of the Sandinista revolution: "Apart from the fact that we wanted to get out of a dictatorship that was stealing the elections and that had implanted a capitalist model deeply concentrating wealth in the country, our ideals were no longer take out Somoza but turn Nicaragua into a democratic regime with social justice"

Sandinist ideals

"We wanted to eradicate the latifundio, we promised an agrarian and urban reform, to fight against prostitution and discrimination against women. socialist orientationbut at the same time claimed a mixed economy and political pluralism. We did not want a single party, "says the former guerrilla.

Monica Baltonado, who was regional affairs minister of the first Ortega government in the 1980s, became one of the critical voices of the Ortega regime that he accuses of having finished with the Sandinista ideals.

Complicity of the private sector

Under the chairmanship of Daniel Ortega, who has been running the country since 2007, Nicaragua appears to have returned in the 1970s. The Ortega regime controls all spheres of power, has severely suppressed opposition protests of last year and has granted concessions and tax benefits to large corporations.

"The private sector and major capitalist sectors of Nicaragua, including three families, including Carlos Pellas, are deeply guilty of what is happening in Nicaragua," he said in Paris. Bianca Jagger, defender of human rights through the foundation that bears his name.

"They made pacts with Daniel Ortega, they authorized Ortega will dismantle the institutions and change the Constitution to be presidential for life. For them, the important thing was the benefits Daniel Ortega gave them, "Jagger told RFI.

With more than 60,000 exiles, 325 dead and hundreds of political prisoners liberated en mbade, the government of Daniel Ortega has stifled the big demonstrations of last year.

But the economic crisis and the pressure from US and US state organizations led him to sit down and negotiate with the opposition without even reaching a solution for the future. democratization from the country.

In its resolution of 28 June, the Organization of American States asked the Ortega government to "allow the entry of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights"and other international organizations". The OAS also reiterated its "concern" regarding the "deterioration of democratic institutions" and the violation of "human rights" in Nicaragua.

Watch & # 39;The road to freedom, Nicaragua 1961-1979& # 39; Documentary by Mónica Baltodano.