Nicaraguan Activist Embarks on Democracy Hunger Strike

A legendary Sandinista leader and political activist launched a hunger strike of indefinite duration on June 4, 2008 against the current president of Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega to protest his authoritarian policies. Dora María Tellez, who fought against the Somoza dictatorship during the 1970s and is currently a leader in the MRS (Renovated Sandinista Movement, Movimiento Renovación Sandinista)—an alternative Sandinista party—is among many who have launched protests against Ortega Administration actions, including recent threats to eliminate the legal status of the MRS party. ”I have decided to start this hunger strike in defense of our right to democracy and our right to life,” she stated.

Nicaraguan poet and writer Gioconda Belli has stated that Dora Maria Tellez “has emerged in the midst of the multitude that is not happy with the situation to demonstrate that liberty is nonnegotiable and that in the face of injustice, silence and passivity do not have a place.” She added that her actions “come out of the heart of the same historical patriotism that inspired Sandino to go to the mountains with 30 men [the legacy behind the Sandinista Movement] and that has inspired a whole people to rebel against a 45-year-old dictatorship.”

On August 22, 1978, as a young female Sandinista militant, Tellez was third in command of the operation against the Somoza dictatorship in which 24 Sandinistas occupied the National Palace and liberated 70 political prisoners, among them the current president of Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega. That action was an historical milestone marking the end of the brutal 60-year dictatorship. Throughout the Sandinista Revolution and beyond, Tellez has defended its original agenda to implement human rights policies on behalf of the Nicaraguan people, including a massive literacy campaign, public health campaigns, land reform, some women’s rights initiatives and expansion of democratic participation in Nicaragua.

The MRS platform is based on the democratization of the Nicaraguan society: respect for its institutions, human rights and women’s rights and, the eradication of poverty as well as efforts to create a healthy environment and social benefits for all. Women have been at the forefront of the process of reclaiming a Sandinismo that will restore their right to therapeutic abortion among other political, reproductive and sexual rights recently denied to them by the present Ortega Administration (FSLN, Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional).

Among the issues Tellez is protesting is the Supreme Electoral Council’s notification this past May regarding legal problems for four political parties—one of them the MRS Party that she co-founded. Despite the fact that all four parties took part in elections just two years ago, with the municipal elections scheduled to take place this year, the Electoral Council has notified them that their legal status as a political party is under review, accusing them of the unsatisfactory completion of all requirements for political parties as defined under the Electoral Law. If a final sanction is announced in the next weeks, these four parties won’t be allowed to participate in the November 2008 Municipal Elections in Nicaragua to choose mayors, vice-mayors, members of Municipal Councils and authorities of the Autonomous Regions of the Caribbean.
Many groups, along with the MRS Party, have expressed their concern about the deterioration of the electoral body that is in charge of safeguarding transparent and reliable elections. Critics who claim that the Supreme Electoral Council is losing its professionalism due to the strong political control from the governing political party, FSLN, cite the following:

• One and a half years after national elections took place in November 2006, the total final official outcomes have not been released.
• The legal authority of the Nicaraguan Liberal Party (ALN, Alianza Liberal Nicaraguense), that won second place in the 2006 elections, was taken from its presidential candidate, Eduardo Montealegre, and given to politicians closer to FSLN. In doing so, the FSLN automatically gains control of all local electoral authorities.
• Openly violating the Constitution and the Electoral Law, the Supreme Electoral Council decided last April 2008 to cancel the Municipal Election in three municipalities of the Caribbean, arguing that there were insufficient conditions due to the impact of Hurricane Felix in October 2007. This provoked a violent outcry in the Caribbean as the majority of the population in those municipalities is demanding that elections be held in November. Civil society is continuously protesting against this situation both in Managua and the Caribbean.

In addition, the 2007 Human Rights Report by the Centro Nicaraguense de Derechos Humanos (CENIDH: Nicaraguan Human Rights Center) as presented to the press by its leader, Vilma Nunez, in February 2008 states that access to justice is the weakest point in the country’s governing institutions. Nunez accused Daniel Ortega of disrespecting the Constitution and degrading the legal system and its separation from the state. She called on the president to eliminate nepotism and the excessive centralization of public institutions.
Popular protests surrounding Dora Maria Tellez’s hunger strike are taking place every afternoon at the Rotonda de Metrocentro in Managua, with support from political leaders, women’s organizations, cultural groups, social movements and international solidarity groups. They are demanding that the Electoral Council issue a favorable statement regarding the legal status of the MRS and also for respect of the institutions of Nicaraguan society.

Activist Luis Ulloa, in an email, called Tellez’s decision “admirable because once again she is willing to sacrifice her life so that our country can have a real state of rights; we need people like her in Nicaragua.”

Women in political parties and in social movements have been at the forefront of this struggle to recover Nicaragua’s institutional system and human rights framework because they were the first victims of its deterioration. It is well known today that the famous 2000 Alnoldo Aleman-Ortega “pact” of the FSLN and the head of the PLC (Partido Liberal Constitucionalista, Liberal Constitutional Party) in the Legislative Assembly came as a result of Ortega’s need for immunity in the face of charges by his step daughter of incest. Thus, evading responsibility in a women’s rights case produced this political pact.
Just Associates activist in Nicaragua Malena de Montis has issued a call to women, men and human rights organizations to join in solidarity by sending emails to the Nicaraguan Embassies demanding respect for Nicaraguan institutions and international human rights.