Commemoration of the 44th Anniversary of the Passing into Immortality
of Comandante Carlos Fonseca Amador, Founder of the FSLN and Leader of the Sandinista Popular Revolutions
Noviember 8th 2020
Remarks of President Daniel Ortega Saavedra
Good afternoon, Nicaraguan brothers, Nicaraguan families, in fact it's almost nightfall. Today we commemorate the 44th anniversary of the Passing to Immortality of Comandante Carlos Fonseca. November 7th and 8th was the period, the hours in which our Comandante faced the genocidal empire trained National Guard.
It was a National Guard founded and trained under the occupation of the United States troops in our country, during many years. And then our General Sandino resisted and fought, until the invaders withdrew. It was a defeat, because their objective was to make Sandino surrender, to assassinate Sandino, but they did not succeed on the battlefield; we know now that it was later, in the Peace Process, that the crime took place, a cowardly crime, where our General, with all the good will in the world, contributing to Peace, traveled to Managua and was murdered.
Then, other combatant Brothers of the Army Defender of the nation's Sovereignty, rose up to fight, among them General Ramón Raudales who fell in combat. He and a handful of men, a small group of Compañeros, there in Las Segovias fighting.
Meanwhile, Comandante Carlos was born in Matagalpa, and his commitment was in his blood, accompanied by that of his mother too, striving since he was a child, since he was in High School, giving battle, undertaking the fight, and finally managing to retake and update and project the Ideal of all Nicaraguan Heroes.
We have them here in this Mural, a work of the Great Master, Arnoldo Guillen, whom we salute and applaud . In the middle of a pandemic, he continued working, suffered a stroke and was admitted, and seemed close to death; but later, thanks be to God, he recovered. And the first thing he did was to come here again to continue this Work.
There we have the Indigenous Resistance against the Spanish colonialists; there is Diriangén, Nicarao. And then, throughout history, look at the anti-Yankee, anti-imperialist resistance. And it is not because we were looking for a fight with the United States, but because the United States considered itself the owner of Nicaragua, because traitors and anti-patriotic sell-outs were always the order of the day.
That explains why José Dolores Estrada is there and Andrés Castro, why General Benjamín Zeledón is there, marking another Stage; General Sandino, and Carlos, who managed to bring together the Thought, the Conscience, the Ideals, the Revolutionary Practice of all these Heroes who proudly represent Nicaraguans.
Nor should we forget, as Fernando Gordillo, a leader of the Sandinista Front and poet, said, 100 years on the enemy is the same, on the Centenary of the Battle of San Jacinto, the enemy is the same, and he said: "Throw the stone! Throw it!", referring to Andrés Castro who had thrown the Stone; and the Nicaraguan People also said, throw the stone!, defending themselves, not attacking, but defending themselves.
And in this New Phase that we have been going through, when we regained power through elections, the enemy has always been there, looking for ways to bring the Nicaraguan people to their knees, looking for ways to destroy the Unity that we managed to build over 18 years which was an example for Latin America and the Caribbean, that Process of Unity of all the Sectors of Nicaraguan Society. Of course, there are always minorities who do not agree with Unity, with mutual Understanding. But it meant growth for the Nicaraguan economy, it meant growth in Basic, Primary and Secondary Education; it meant building and multiplying doctors and nurses so that they could provide better service to the most humble families, who are the ones who attend the Dispensaries, the Clinics, the State Hospitals, the Public Health Service.
That is to say, we came to fulfill the Ideals of all our Heroes, which Carlos managed to raise in a new moment, raising the Red and Black Flag of our General Sandino, which is the Flag that was raised to be able to rescue the Blue and White Flag of the Nation from the mire of betrayal and ignominy.
The others, those of the Red Flag and those of the Green Flag, were rather those who were asking, begging for a Yankee intervention, representatives of the aristocracy, of the Nicaraguan plutocracy, disputing power and calling for Yankee intervention, with one exception, that of General José Santos Zelaya, who since he did not act as a traitor or as a bootlicker for the Yankees, and sought autonomy for Nicaragua, sought relations with the whole world, not only with the United States, but also with Europe. Then the United States decided to overthrow Zelaya's government, which was a Revolution, and with Zelaya's overthrow, the Yankee troops invaded Nicaragua, landed in Corinto, and then advanced through our Territory, facing the Resistance of Men of Dignity led by General Benjamin Zeledon.
And Carlos had the genius, the ability, a scholar, who knew how to combine theory with revolutionary practice, because theory on its own is of little value, and generally sometimes theory, when the theorist remains stuck in their in theory they end up confused and confusing. Hence the importance of permanently uniting theory with revolutionary practice.
And now, after the crime committed by the traitors, encouraged by the Yankee Government, organized by the Yankee Government, financed by the Yankee Government, because that has been openly admitted by the person who is still President of the United States, he has said openly that the financing continues and that they are going to seek the overthrow of our sister Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, and seek to destroy and shatter Cuba, and continue to attack Nicaragua with different types of aggression, the most terrible was that of April 2018, because it meant a stab in the heart, in the soul of this People who had been enjoying economic growth, social benefits. And here there were people who were sowing terror, horror.
So, we have been advancing, recovering, because the damage they caused to the Economy, the damage they caused to the Nicaraguan Families; they managed to drag some Families, or part of the Families, confused by the mass use of Social Networks, they managed to confuse some Families. Now we are in a process of finding each other again, finding each other again at Work, in our Health Care, in our Education, in our Economic Production; finding each other again in all the Social and Economic Sectors, accepting that everyone has their own political thought, their own ideology.
To come together again for the Good of Everyone, because it has been more than demonstrated, and we have demonstrated it here in Nicaragua, that when we all came together again, those of us who had confronted each other before, since the time of Somoza, and who had confronted each other through the period of the 1980s, in the end, when in 2007 we came together again and the great Unity of the Nation was produced, with all the different Economic and Social Sectors of the Country, then, it was demonstrated that the Unity of All, with no political conditions, because there was never any discussion on that score... Ah, we are going to unite, but you are going to become a Sandinista, we are going to unite, but you are going to join us from another party? No! It was simply to talk about material issues of interest to the Nicaraguan people: health, education, road construction, housing, etc.
The Fight against Poverty was the starting point of that Great Unity, uniting all of us, including the big investors who come from other countries, but contributed to the Fight against Poverty, and our progress was dizzying, impressive, our sustainable growth, year after year, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, economic growth, even going through critical moments like 2008, with the great crisis in the United States and Europe.
Until the explosion of the conspiracy of those who want to destroy instead of building, and who provoked, as we all know very well, death, pain, suffering, destruction, sowed hatred; and later, all that it has cost us to advance and restore stability in the country.
Because then came the pandemic, and the first thing that caused which is the most painful, and is irreplaceable, is the loss of Lives, thousands and thousands of Human Beings of all ages who have died all over the World. And when it seemed that the pandemic was already decreasing and spaces were beginning to open up in those countries that made the decision to lock up all their people, and people were desperate, they wanted to get out, so they began to get out and about because the pandemic was supposed to be decreasing, and it turns out that now the pandemic has multiplied. In Europe, in the United States, the pandemic has multiplied, thousands of new cases every day, thousands of deaths mounting up in all these countries, there are already more than 44 million Human Beings who have been affected by the virus, of those who have been detected, there will be many more, and also more millions of deaths.
Here in Nicaragua we have also had sister and brothers who have died, and thanks to the accompaniment of God, with the people, with the doctors, with all the institutions, we have managed to have one of the lowest mortality rates in the world.
That's why we have to maintain basic rules like these, they are carried out here by all our young people, wearing masks; keeping distance. In other words, we must be careful, we must appeal to the responsibility of each family, to take care of ourselves, because the disease is still there, and the serious thing is that it is multiplying in these other countries, and it is destroying the economy of these countries. It is seriously affecting the economy of those countries, and they are looking to take extraordinary measures to confront the millions of unemployed, there are millions of unemployed; in the United States there are millions of unemployed, millions of citizens who end up in the streets because they cannot continue to pay for their housing, because they had bought it paying in installments and cannot pay, so they are evicted, or because they rent the apartment and the landlords evict them.
In other words, the situation in developed countries is terrible, and they are looking for ways to take extraordinary measures to contain the pandemic, to reduce the pandemic, and to achieve stability in their economic and social order again. There is no economic and social stability in the world right now. It does not exist. Why? Because this is a global problem, and if world markets are affected by the economy, the failing demand of the population, in European countries, in the United States, etc., then they begin to suffer among themselves, because companies can no longer sell goods back and forth. And the same thing happens to other regions, what they buy in Latin America, what they buy in Asia, what they trade, all of that collapses. That is the reality of the World Economy.
And we are fighting, yes, to move forward in the midst of this situation. And what is it that inspires us in this battle? We are inspired by our Heroes, our Martyrs, throughout History, and we are inspired by Carlos, who was the one who, together with other Brothers and Sisters, rescued the Thought of Sandino, rescued the Thought of Zeledon, rescued the Thought, the Example and the Practice of the Heroes of San Jacinto, rescued the Thought of the Indigenous Resistance. All of this is consolidated and strengthened in the Nicaraguan people.
And we have confronted the pandemic, combining the vocation, the disposition of solidarity and service of all the workers in all the institutions of the State, and above all the young people who are organized in their neighborhoods, in their communities, in their regions, in the mountains, the youth who are organized in the institutions, the youth who are members of our army, the youth who are members of the police; In other words, Youth is the determining force here. Of course, the Command Structures are important, the Senior Officers, because of their knowledge, their experience, their practice which is also exemplary in the defense of the Nation, in the defense of the Revolution in the 1980s, and to continue defending the Nation and the Revolution in these New Times. And we can be sure that, in that regard we have managed to advance Victorious.
And now the hurricane here has left damage that we can be repair, because what is the number of victims here in Nicaragua? Where death did occur was as a result of some mining activity, but in fact before the hurricane entered. We already know the problems that have always existed in Artisanal Mining, which is a high risk occupation, and in that regard we are trying to integrate Artisanal Mining with Industrial Mining so that the miners can change their current dangerous artisanal activities. We have been looking for agreements so that artisanal mining can be incorporated into industrial mining, which is already better organized through the Ministry of Energy and Mining.
Well, now we put to the test again that capacity we have demonstrated in the past confronting Hurricanes, confronting Tropical Storms, and we only remember with that Hurricane, Hurricane Joan. Of course, Joan had a much greater impact, it destroyed the city of Bluefields, in Bluefields it devastated Corn Island, the big one and the small one, it destroyed the forests; but we managed to avoid deaths there. And there the organization of the People, the Organized People, the Organized Youth, the Army with its different Directorates, Air, Land and Sea; the Police with its different Directorates; the Firemen with all their efforts, and the capacities also of the Health Institutions, ready to attend to cases of Emergency, were fundamental.
Then also the capacity to be able to restore the Services that were lost, that were damaged. We already know that these Hurricanes cause power cuts, even in large cities; when these Hurricanes enter the United States, the power goes out, there is no energy, and it takes time to recover it. Here we have managed to recover power where the elecricity was lost as well.
And there were Towns that were totally devastated, some towns in the Miskito Communities were totally devastated, but there was not a single death there, why? Because they had been evacuated in good time. Anyway, the Brothers and Sisters of the Keys, the ones in the Miskitos Keys, who are in all these Keys, these little islands in the Caribbean, also accepted the evacuation, because before it was difficult to evacuate them, now they accepted the evacuation, and that meant saving Life.
So, now today we are fighting the battle in the economic field, we are fighting it together with the producers, we are fighting it together with the traders, we are fighting it together with the entrepreneurs, training, providing more knowledge, more technology as far as possible, as well as providing tools to give better and greater means to producers to increase the quality and quantity of their production; First the agrifood sector, of course, the entire agrifood sector, and then other activities, thousands of activities carried out by the people, who all feel full of strength in the face of a challenge, a great challenge that is to remake the economy from below.
We cannot think that now the European countries, or the United States, are going to come and make a huge contribution to Nicaragua... No! No! They are solving their own problems, and to the extent that they can, they may have some resources for the countries here that have being affected, in this case the Central American countries, our Central American Sisters and Brothers, with whom we share coordination in this fight against the hurricane; we share communication with our Cuban Sisters and Brothers as well, because it was a Tropical Storm there. And we also shared the pain with them for the people who died, in the case of Guatemala, in Honduras, in El Salvador, in Costa Rica, even in Panama people died.
So, sharing with with all of them, and today more than ever, all Central Americans are striving to find a way to come together and make a joint effort to confront this world crisis. In other words, the world is going through a crisis without precedent in the last centuries, why? Because the great Powers of the Global Economy are broken, and the first thing they have to do is to defeat the pandemic, so that economic activity can be normalized in their countries, in Europe, in the United States.
So, for us Carlos is present in all these struggles that we are waging. We are striving with Work, we are striving with Education, with Health, we are fighting accompanied by all Working People in these difficult times. We are putting Solidarity into practice, Solidarity which is Love, which is Tenderness, as Tomás said, Tenderness of the Peoples. Solidarity is the most valuable thing that we Nicaraguans have, and there is no Nicaraguan, , even the most poisoned with hatred, who does not have at heart even a little bit of Solidarity.
But well, the time will come when we will be able to dialogue even with the most poisoned, we will be able to come together around the Economic Programs, the Social Programs. And then, the time will also come, as we have said, yesterday, today, we have already started, not that we are just setting out but that we continuing our work for the benefit of the people, and to ensure peace in our country.
Now it is a matter of multiplying this effort, because we are a year away from the next national Elections, and our responsibility as Nicaraguans, as heirs of Carlos, of his Thought and of all our Heroes and Martyrs, is to guarantee Economic and Social Stability, Health, Education, the construction of Highways and Roads, and of Bridges, which will not stop, as it has not stopped even in the midst of the April Terrorism of 2018, or even in the midst of the pandemic, or even now with Hurricane Eta. In other words, where construction was going on and there was no major problem, construction has continued; where the hurricane caused damage, it destroyed Bridges, immediately we make ready to rebuild the Bridge.
That is to say, the battle today is being fought by us, the Nicaraguan Brothers and Sisters, in that way, what for? So that from those Elections that we will have in a year's time, we will have the results that people expect and for which our Heroes and Martyrs have fought, and for which our Brother Carlos Fonseca fought, which is Peace, Stability, Economic Growth. Let's go in that direction, to conquer Peace, to assure Peace, to develop the Economy.
And we cannot ignore today when last night the results of the elections in the United States of America were made known. We are of the Principle that one cannot intervene, for reasons of Principle, Agreements signed by all the Countries of the World, including the United States. You cannot intervene, you must not intervene in the Internal Affairs of another Country, of another State!
We have been victims historically, there is our History, victims of the permanent Intervention by the United States. And well, there was that vote in a country that was polarized, and a world that was concerned about this polarization, and where the winner was finally the one who is now President-Elect, President Biden.
Meanwhile, the current President simply says that he does not recognize those results. Well, that's their problem, and we're not going to talk about the reality of the electoral system in the United States, because that's their problem and they have to resolve it. Because we would not like or accept as in our interests, as other European countries, the United States and some Latin Americans constantly do, that they dare to come and give us lessons.
Imagine, an Election like the one in the United States here in Nicaragua. What would happen? They would be shouting against us, the Europeans, the United States: What an outrage is happening in Nicaragua, they do not recognize the results, they have cheated!
Look at what happened in Bolivia! Of course, in Bolivia it was in their interest to cheat in order to overthrow the MAS, the Movement Towards Socialism headed by our brother Evo Morales. And they succeeded, they overthrew the MAS, and anyone would say: Well, yet another defeat? Or a shameless coup! The OAS appeared there, openly, endorsing the coup, and blessing the coup leaders. There were no sanctions against the coup plotters, but rather there were acknowledgements for the coup plotters.
Ans so, in the end, the coup plotters did not want elections, and the coup plotters installed themselves, without having been elected, but pressure from the Bolivian people forced them to hold elections, and there they made ready, they made their plans and were sure that they were going to win the elections.
But then it was demonstrated that when a People have Conscience, have Dignity, even in such disadvantageous conditions as those, the People go out to vote and they go out to defend their vote, and they achieve Victory as the Bolivian People did. And today our Brother Luis Arce, President of Bolivia, and Brother David Choquehuanca, Vice President, took office. Luis and David, two brothers. And Evo is already on his way to enter Bolivia, tomorrow he will be entering Bolivia.
As for the elections in the United States, we simply recognize the person who was elected, and we have already made a statement recognizing the government that was elected. Well, those contradictions, those clashes, that polarization that exists there, where they accuse themselves of fraud, that is a problem that they will have to resolve, and we do not get involved there giving our opinion, nor do we get involved in asking any international agency to help the United States to bring order to its electoral processes.
We don't get into that, because we don't want them to mess with us, as they have done in other times, where Yankee troops even ran the Supreme Electoral Council, the Yankee high command ran the Supreme Electoral Council of Nicaragua, organized here in Nicaragua in 1928. We must remind people of that, because many people do not remember it, they have not come across that fact; the Yankee troops at the head of the Supreme Electoral Council, of the Departmental Electoral Organizations, the Yankee troops, the Yankee senior officers heading up the Electoral Organizations, while the Liberals and the Conservatives calmly accepted it, because they asked for it.
That is, the Yankees assumed that role because the Liberals and Conservatives asked them to manage the counting of the votes. And the Yankees counted the votes, and the Yankees gave the results, and they of course were respected by the Sell Out Party, the "wimps" as Sandino called them. They accepted that kind of election overseen by Yankee troops, or by representatives of the United States interventionist policy wanting to run the elections in Nicaragua. That will not happen again! It will not be repeated again, and it will be our People who will decide their Future!
Dear Sisters and Brothers, Dear Families, let's continue working as we have been doing, in Peace, without hatred. We cannot be responding to people speaking out of hatred. There they are, the ones who speak out of hatred.
We respond to those who speak out of hatred with work to ensure Health Care, with work to benefit the Poor, by constructing Housing, by building Hospitals, constructing Highways, multiplying Agricultural Production, going to rural families without asking them what party they are from, because to us they are simply rural families and here we bring the tools so that they produce better and produce more to guarantee food for all Nicaraguans. That is our Great Challenge and that is our Great Struggle : The Struggle to eradicate Poverty, to guarantee Education, so that Nicaragua can live in Peace.
Long live Nicaragua, Blessed and Always Free!