By Carlos Fonseca Terán, on June 16, 2021
photo: Tortilla Con Sal
Nicaragua’s sell-out right-wing of creole colonial-remnant oligarchs and subordinate classless hangers on lives in a parallel universe and they believe everyone else does too. Among its various class components, it is the oligarchy which imposes the guidance to follow, namely, what is true and what is false, what is good and what is bad, what to admire and what to despise.
For them, the worst thing that can happen in life is to be punished by the gringos, which is to be expected, because the gringos are their idols. What makes it an aberration is that they assume this is true for everybody, ignoring, for example, that for a Sandinista to suffer sanctions from the gringos is one of the highest honors they could receive.
This oligarchic schizophrenia is explicable in part because, with zero achievements to their credit, the coup supporting right wing in Nicaragua has nothing else to brag about excpet the sanctions imposed on Nicaraguans and our country’s institutions by the U.S. government.
What really affects us in Nicaragua in the economic aggression practiced by the gringos is that it aims largely at hindering the work of our institutions, hindering our social policies aimed at fighting poverty in our country and also our policies aimed at fighting delinquency and organized crime, which, as it happens and whether they like it or not, is counterproductive for the US authorities applying them, since Nicaragua is a containment wall for the scourge of organized crime which United States itself considers a threat to its governance.
But they prefer to prioritize what they consider a threat to their global power in the form of Nicaragua’s example of dignity and defense of its sovereignty and self-determination, a threat which Nicaragua poses along with countries like Cuba, Venezuela and Bolivia, thus demonstrating that it is possible to challenge the world’s leading powers while also improve the living conditions of the people and promoting the country’s progress. In fact that challenge to US power is a pre-condition for achieving those objectives.
Consequently, those who are really affected by US economic aggression are the popular classes, beneficiaries of social policies made more difficult by such sanctions.
But in spite of this and thanks to great efforts by Nicaragua’s Government of Reconciliation and National Unity, as well as its proven management ability and the high level of organization among our people, we continue to make progress with the social programs derived from our policies of poverty reduction.
The most recent imperialist aggression against our country was announced as a set of reprisals, in what is a really insolent and abusive response by the United States to Nicaragua’s straightforward acts in defense of its national dignity and sovereignty. In reality that aggression was already prepared to be carried out against Nicaragua, whether or not we took the measures we did against the US-supported opposition here, as a form of pressure in the mistaken belief that we might hold our elections to suit foreign, hegemonic, hostile interests, while at the same time, leading figures favoring another coup were going ahead to carry out a new destabilization plan in the context of the elections.
It is absurd to think that the actions carried out by our authorities against the terrorist conspirators at the service of the United States, some of them posing as possible election candidates simply as a a cover for their criminal plans, are aimed at removing them from the electoral race. Even supposing any of them had electoral prospects at all, which none of them do, it would be impossible for the people concerned to run all at once.
In fact, one of those not visibly involved in the frustrated coup attempt in 2018, suddenly in recent days appeared in an audio clip that went viral on social media, speaking openly as a US agent or US government spokesperson, announcing the results of his work against Nicaragua, mentioning among other things, an eventual suspension of Nicaragua from the OAS and the application of yet more coercive measures by the gringo government against our country.
Anyway, the specific causes for which all these people have been arrested are basically three:
Thus, even knowing that the false accusation would be made, namely that the arrests are related to the presidential aspirations of some of the detainees, our country’s institutions, far from acting on short term electoral or political calculations, but in fact protecting the nation’s supreme interests, were obliged to take steps putting those national interests above all else, in the conviction that any political cost would be less than the damage to the country caused by failing in this case to apply the law.
Any self-respecting country would act in the same way, and it is no coincidence that the world’s leading powers all have laws similar to those the Nicaraguan State is applying in this case.
But the imperialists think that what is good for them is not good for others. In the United States, for example, the right-wing conspiracy fantasy according to which Russia is trying to influence its internal politics caused great consternation and led to investigations of all kinds, even to the point of broaching the impeachment of former President Donald Trump.
However, in our case the perpetrators of such crimes against the State openly acknowledge them.
Of course, a legal order defending the national interest, especially in the case of countries that have been victims of imperialist domination, requires the political will and a political and socioeconomic model that corresponds to the national interest of the country concerned, one expressing the nation’s right to sovereignty and self-determination. Given the reality of our countries, that is only possible with a revolutionary process under way as in our case, or, if not with a revolutionary government then at least one defending popular interests. Because in countries historically dominated by imperialist powers the struggle for their political and economic independence is inextricably linked to the struggle for social emancipation.
Imperialist domination is really nothing more than the maximum expression of the class domination exercised by the exploiters over the exploited, who at a given phase of capitalist development change from being only the exploited social classes within each nation to become entire nations exploited by those who see themselves as great hegemonic powers entitled to exploit other countries. Apparently, that was what the gringos and Europeans thought when our country passed the laws now being applied.
They seem to have thought that Nicaragua was not serious, since their nature as imperialist powers (rich and hegemonic in the case of the United States, or poor, marginal and subordinate in the case of the Kingdom of Spain, which apparently still dreams of being our colonial metropolis) does not allow them to understand that no matter how small and poor we are, we are a country with dignity. Nicaragua holds its head high and will never humiliate itself before any power, no matter how powerful or arrogant it may be. Nor do they seem to understand, in fact they seem to have forgotten, that their imperial arrogance has been laid low many times faced with the dignity of our country, something which has happened in very few countries they have dominated elsewhere.
Their insolence will continue to fall flat against our dignity in exactly same way, no matter how many times they try to regain domination over our nation, which is now and will continue to be governed by the followers of the revolutionary struggle initiated by the General of Free Men and Women, Augusto C. Sandino, who indeed meant what he said when he declared that with his sword he would defend national decorum and redeem the oppressed. Faithful to his indelible legacy, we will continue to do so too.
Carlos Fonseca Terán is Secretary for International Relations of the Sandinista National Liberation Front.
Source: Tortilla con Sal