Interview by Radio Mundo Real's Ignacio Cirio on Mano a Mano with Edgardo García of Via Campesina Nicaragua
http://www.radiomundoreal.fm/10479-nicaragua-siempre-libre?lang=es
Ignacio Cirio: Nicaragua is in a situation, a very special moment in its history. Precisely, a historical date for Nicaragua, the 19 th of July, which marks the triumph of the popular Sandinista revolution in the year 1979, 39 years ago. Edgardo Garcia is the founder of the ATC, (the Association of Rural Workers), and a member of the Via Campesina. Edgardo, what new significance has this date acquired? We remember that on July 19 th one year ago Radio Mundo Real looked back at July 19th with you in Basque country, a long distance away. What is happening in Nicaragua today is a violent regime change plan with a number of victims, not only deaths but also tortures and other excessive acts. Could this have been predicted a year ago? I welcome you to Radio Mundo Real (Real World Radio), Edgardo Garcia, with much pleasure.
Edgardo García: Okay. One year ago we discussed the government of Unity and National Reconciliation. And, for us, the term agrarian reform meant that the government was recognizing the land title and facilitating the technology and production of food in Nicaragua. Rural workers are more than 43% of all workers, as a workforce. Half of the economy is a rural economy, and the other half consists of other sectors such as services, and some small industries. So a year ago we talked about the growing economy in the country and about the stability and about tourism and the arts – about development – because we were seeing a growth in the economy of 7% or of 5%. We were the second most quickly developing country in Latin America, after Panama.
Meanwhile, many other countries’ were falling, such as Brazil, Ecuador, Argentina. Logically, last year the bullying of Venezuela and CELAC, the Economic Community of Latin America. But we talked about Nicaragua as a country of reconstruction, stability and growth. What happened? What happened was, as President Evo Morales said, “In the US, there is not a coup d'etat, because there is no US Embassy.” Between last year and this year - last year was the 38th Anniversary of the triumph of the popular Sandinista revolution and this year is the 39th - things happened that commenced a plan to change public opinion in the press and social networks. Call centers started to open up in various places with messages illustrative of disconformity and attacks – Personal attacks and attacks on ministries of the government, attacks on programs, critical in every way. This sultry state of agitation, of discontent, increased until the end of January and beginning of February of this year, 2018, and the US ambassador, Laura Dogu met with the private industry group of Nicaragua and presented a plan from the US Government about the development of Central America for Nicaragua for 2030. In some way, this meeting signified “another government” – not the government of Nicaragua, but rather, another government.
Therefore, between last year and this year, they began to drive a program of sanctions for Nicaragua on the part of the United States called the NICA Act, which consists of putting sanctions on the finances, international funding, and some operations in Nicaragua. And more than anything, to punish specific government officials for different reasons and the attacks on them that were created by the media.That is, what was being creating was a hostile environment of discontent. Attacks on the institutional functioning of Nicaragua; attacks on judicial power, attacks on electoral power, attacks on the police, attacks on the National Assembly of the Republic, attacks and complaints regarding improbable human rights cases. A quantity of positions which signified arriving at a moment in which private enterprise and the Episcopal Conference (the bishops) declared a total rejection of the government and support of the opposition force, which called for an immediate self-resignation of the president of the Republic; that he should get on a plane with his family and leave. This was the ultimate goal.
But before getting to this, they took advantage of an investigation done by the IMF which pushed for Nicaragua to readjust retirement pensions. The government made a readjustment that wasn’t just at the whim of the IMF, but rather a readjustment which would take some money from retirement pensions, but more from private businesses, which would have to pay more for the stabilization of the social security system. So in this moment the private businesses cried out, with the support of the Catholic Church. They developed a mobilization plan and called on young people and university students to protest. Then they claimed that there was a death on April 18th at said protests. But there really was not a dead student. On the 18th, there were no student deaths.
With this international and national cloud of scandal, with all of their awaiting networks and call centers connected to thousands and thousands of Nicaraguans and others around the world, with this enormous snowball of media discontent, they achieve a mobilization in the city of Léon, the university city of Nicaragua, in one restaurant that is attached to the university center of the CUUN. From this restaurant, a small group of young drunk men climbed onto the roof of the CUUN with flammable items, such as Molotov cocktail bombs, and allowed these incendiary products to fall from the roof. And one of the people fell. And this is the first death that happened. While the CUUN is burning, the young Sandinistas arrive there and see that it is right-wing forces who started the fire in the university, they go to the radio that took part in stirring things up, the radio of León, of the private businesses in Leon, they go to the radio and they set the radio building on fire.
Thus, this is a spiral which they took advantage of to signal to the population that there was polarization expressed in violent fights and the fires. From there, they begin to develop activities in various places in the country: the burning of ambulances, the implementation of roadblocks and the torture of citizens affiliated with the FSLN or identified as Sandinistas, murders, and in the end, enough violence to destroy the country. And effectively, they have achieved that. The country has been hit extremely hard in an economic sense, social sense, and a spiritual sense. Under these conditions, they call for a national dialogue. But in the national dialogue, the opposition forces, with the president there, meeting with them, say they don’t want to speak about social security reform or justice. Instead, what they want is for the president to present his resignation and give it to a board of the government.
IC: Exactly. This is the platform, the demand. It starts and end in this way; with the resignation of Daniel Ortega and his wife, who is the elected vice president of the country.
EG: Exactly. This is what they are presenting. And on this basis, blessed by the bishops, the discussion begins, ‘What are we are going to do about the roadblocks?’ A moment arrives in which the bishops say, “Okay, here we have a very polarized point. What we are going to do...” they say, inthe open dialogue, with all of the television channels and press media there, “...is make a truce.” And under this truce, the police are quartered, the army is quartered, all of the Sandinista forces are quartered, and the democratic force are allowed to come out and expresses themselves.
And effectively, they came out to express themselves. But in each mobilization, attack groups were sent to go to destroy social projects. Between them they destroyed all of the main street in Managua, where there had been luminous places, parks- they went destroying all of this. They went to the family economy ministry, the polyclinic office, to the social security centers, to destroy them, and began a rampage of fires and crime against the workers that were there.
IC: It really calls to the attention the fact that the selected targets were never banks, private businesses, or international embassies. Instead, many times, they were symbols of the Nicaragua’s own Sandinismo and government. For example, the Hugo Chavez Plaza, and in Masaya, there are other populations too, sites with historical weight.
EG: Their thought is, right now, a position that is openly against Cuba, against Venezuela, against the symbols of the Nicaraguan government. That is more than clear. The right has said it, the press repeats it in its articles and editorials- they maintain it. And, evidently, it is a discourse against the socialists. It is a discourse against the Sandinistas. It is a discourse against the rights of workers and a discourse in favor of landowners and bankers. That is what there is here. So, they said that they were able to pay all of the costs. But when the workers and villagers occupied land of specific landowners which they had said that they were able to pay the costs, they began to request that the police go set the land on fire to evict the people.
So, it is one thing and it is another. When it is in their interest for the police to go out, there yes, they want to police to come. There are manifestations in which they have organized armed groups to attack workers who have taken some lots here in Managua. Land lots. So, there is a situation in which a very clearly expressed position has been taken from the right, financed by bankers. Financed by landowners, financed by extreme ring-wing businesses. And financed by the radicalized priests and bishops against the progress of the population. This is more than evident.
These three months have now served to identify exactly who they are and where they are. So, facing this, the population went out last Friday and we celebrated El Repliegue [tactical retreat] to Masaya. They (the opposition) had announced strikes, had announced human chains, had announced protests, but the population, having watched their works of destruction, their cruelty, the fact that they converted churches into centers of torture, the fact that many of their preachings have only served to identify them as murderers, as instigators, as violent; all of that shrunk their reach within the population. And, on the other hand, Sandinismo has been standing up and we took the population of Managua, practically from Managua to Masaya, in an immense caravan with people screaming and ready to celebrate the 39th anniversary beginning with El Repliegue to Masaya and continuing with the anniversary of the Revolution on the 19th that will happen the day after tomorrow. So, a Sandinista force that was cornered, that was waiting, that was observing, now has launched and is taking the streets and the roads, to liberate all of the highways of the roadblocks.
And now we are doing it jointly with the national police. There have been many crimes against the police. When the police go to their homes, they kill them in the road. So, all of that has been known by the population by their neighbors, by their friends. That has been gradually coming forward. In this way, the intervention of the priests, the intervention of the famous human rights organizations financed by the US, the intervention of the right-wing media has gradually revealed the murderous, criminal, terrorist character of these destroyers of the country and for that reason the people have advanced into the street and we have identified them. Tell me, Nacho.
IC: There are many things to take into account from what you are telling me, but in order to place it in an interview, eh, I say, for example, what role does the judiciary have in all of this? As in, will those who have participated in these have guarantees of due process or was the judiciary, by any of its actions or inactions, also involved in the sabotage?
EG: Always in the judiciary, one or another of the judges makes themselves partial to a side, above all, when the businessmen here are involved and buy and sell conscience. But, in this case, the population has evidence of ambulances destroyed, people killed, people tortured, property damage. Homes of families that have been set on fire in Masaya, in Jinotepe, in Matagalpa, in San Pedro del Lóvago. So, concrete destruction. All of this is extremely demonstrated, not only denounced, but demonstrated. And they’re actual people. There aren’t accusations that don’t have sufficient backing, like those of the opposition; the human rights organizations made enormous lists of supposed murders, many of which appeared afterwards in their houses, or appeared, some of them, including one that called from Spain saying that he was there, that he had left the country.
And they were going about this in the streets, carrying around a gallery of photos of people of supposed deaths. Of little angels, of killed students, when in reality what they had in the blockades were vandals, hired groups, including killers coming from Honduras and El Salvador. Members of gangs. But also they hired snipers from farther north. From Mexico and from California, using positions in high places so that when there was a protest from one side, they killed on that side. And when there was a protest from the other side, they also killed from that side. From this position, they create what they call a “ guerra de perros ” (dog war). That is the role that the snipers play, in this direction.
Logically, everyone had to defend themselves from a protest where there were groups that were going to end burning your house. And because of this, counter-protests emerged, because they (the opposition) had nothing to do with any democratic approach. They had to do with criminal hordes. Of planned, oriented, and financed crime. That is, there has been a position of funding since the last year of agencies for democracy, agencies of Republican Institute of the United States, agencies of professional criminals who have brought war manuals from other situations, both in Venezuela and oil countries of the Middle East. That is what has happened here.
IC: Okay. Finally, Edgardo, the Nicaragua of August, of September, that is, once Nicaragua returns to organize itself and control this public violence or the street terrorism that today impedes the normal functioning of the country, are we talking about the end of Nicaragua’s national reconciliation and are we talking about, say, the reinforcement of the historical line of Sandinismo against this process of great alliances?
EG: We speak of the aspirations of peace, the aspirations of progress, the aspirations of well-being that all of us have. And logically, in that search you find religious spaces, economic spaces, cultural spaces, spaces of alliance or spaces that the popular movement itself is permitted to carry forward. Campaigns, for example, literacy. In this case, a technological literacy against social networks because social networks have been converted into an obstacle for development since they have permitted the poisoning of half the world. But social networks can be converted into a gateway of formation for the youth, for technology, for progress, for the marketing of products, in short.
There’s a path that we want for the wellbeing of the population, for food sovereignty, to show ourproducts with quality, to promote health, to promote the well being and recreation of youth. In short, that is the path we follow. We follow a way that creates communication for the country to progress. It's absurd that here with these roadblocks that they [the opposition] put in the main streets of Managua and the main highways, we had to pass through big ditches and poorly maintained roads even though we have highways. This is the process of the right, this is a reaction - a reactionary position - moving us backward. We want and have to move forward.
So, we have space to work with the business sector, with mid-size business, with artisanal producers, with rural agricultural sectors, and through this we move forward and rebuild the country. Logically, the empire and its programs will be for some time helping its assassin children. They will be maintaining that for some time. But we who live here, who are from here, who want the future of this country and our family - eventually we are going to win this battle. We are winning. We are winning the peace.
The opposition already has their own battles amongst themselves. They themselves can't agree on candidates when they talk about elections and they won’t be able to, simply because they rely heavily on external financing. We depend on our own lives here in order to continue working. So, our future is to work with patriotic sectors and those sectors who are interested in peace. Their future is to sell to the world a business of war and with this war business, make war between themselves and ruin the country.
This is their future. They're not going to win, we will not be defeated. They will not take away our happiness of moving forward and toward progress. Logically, the reconciliation is between everyone who accepts - with everyone who has a position of respect and patriotism. With everyone who considers that the constitution of the republic has to be respected. In this direction there's space.
IC: Edgardo Garcia, from La Via Campesina and the Association of Rural Workers, and militant of the Sandinista National Liberation Front. Thank you for your time and for your practical pedagogy about what has been occurring in this beloved country. It appears, right, that so many people appear to be paying attention to the devices which misinform. It was great to have your words to clarify a few questions. Including from popular spaces - which in some cases have followed the easy temptation to condone Nicaraguan Sandinistas for what has occurred, when we are talking about other authors and other interests. Thank you so much for your time, Edgardo - a big hug, and take care of yourself.
EG: A greeting to all my brothers and sisters listening to Radio Mundo Real, from Sandinista - and always free - Nicaragua.