The Humiliation, Isolation and Death of Humberto Ortega
Humberto’s situation reflected the dispute over power and the correlation of forces between Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo. It’s also a challenge for the Army.
By Monica Baltodano (Confidencial)
HAVANA TIMES – Days before being put under house arrest by the Ortega-Murillo dictatorship, Humberto Ortega phoned us and conversed at length with my partner Julio Lopez and myself. As is known, shortly after our talk he was detained, in reprisal for his May 2024 interview with Fabian Medina of the Argentine news site Infobae.
In that telephone call, Humberto Ortega wanted to let us know what he was thinking. He commented that in December 2022, he suffered a serious health crisis that he had now overcome. “I’m feeling good. I’ve recovered. You could say that I’m now well, active, and with energy to continue contributing to the solution to our country’s crisis.” Later, he repeated to us the key principles of his current political position.
He told us that during his health crisis he had reopened communication with Daniel – who visited him in his home – and that in their conversations he’d told him he wasn’t against the government, but neither was he against the opposition. Rather, he felt that Nicaragua’s political crisis should have a [negotiated] solution like that of many wars, including the war of the 80s in our country. He said his viewpoints weren’t new to Daniel, because, “I’ve given public declarations, like for CNN in 2021, where I said that the political prisoners weren’t terrorists; and later, when Hugo Torres died in jail, and also in favor of Bishop [Rolando] Alvarez in 2023, calling him a serious and valiant person.”
In answer to our questions, he responded that Daniel Ortega was very clear about his position and that he advised the path of dialogue. He recalled his experiences when they met face to face for the first time with the Contra in the [1988] negotiations at Sapoa, and the mutual hate they felt. “With the Contra, we were killing each other with bullets, and even so, we were able to rise above so much violence and resentment and arrive at agreements.” “From the Asian thinkers, I learned that in those circumstances you must look your adversaries directly in the eye, but also look into their heart to see their humanity. We’re all human, although we may be in different bands.”
He summarized for us his position: ”My position continues to be that of the political center. To reject the extremes. Propose moderate, centrist alternatives involving compromise among all the sides. All of us should be capable of coexisting in Nicaragua. Only in that way can there be peace and stability.”
At another moment, he recognized: “There are extremist sectors on all sides, among the Sandinistas but also among some on the right, who prescribe a settlement of scores with all the Sandinistas, beginning with myself,” he recognized. “But you have to have patience.” He recalled: “Everything has its moment.”
He attributed those focuses to his experiences in Asia and related an anecdote when he traveled with Oscar Turcios to “snowy Manchuria.” There, they arrived for their military training minutes before the assigned hour, and the Koreans sanctioned them for arriving early. “Arriving early is a mistake, just like arriving late,” they told us. “The issue is to arrive at the correct moment.”
In his long conversation, he reaffirmed that he had shared his positions at other moments with personalities such as Oscar Arias, Rafael Calderon, and others, regarding the need for dialogue and the difficulties for democracy in Nicaragua when there isn’t a unified opposition. “Arias complained that the opposition never manages to arrive at an agreement, and without a unified opposition they can’t help much (…) They’re clear that there should be elections in a “certain period” as a way out. No one wants another military confrontation.”
He emphasized that it was “crazy of Chayo [Rosario Murillo] to want to impose a family continuity in power. None of them have the authority nor the leadership that Daniel succeeded in attaining. That can’t be repeated. It’s nuts.”
We asked him what Daniel Ortega said about his proposals, and he told us that he didn’t offer a verbal response, but “I know him, and he’s clear that in the end, it’s essential to seek a new turn, other ways out.” He asserted: “Daniel, like an old fox, didn’t give any direct response, but he knows that I know him, and I can analyze intelligently.”
Humberto Ortega left us clear that his intention is to be a bridge and contribute to the search for a solution. He expressed confidence that the communications between the brothers were left open, but “everything has its moment, and only happens when the moment arrives, like a stone rolling down to the river that can’t be stopped.”
When I asked why he didn’t leave the country so he could express his positions without danger, he insisted: “I’m not going to leave the country. The force of my positions lies in the fact that I’m proposing them from within.” He recalled that “I’ve been the only one from the historic directorate of the Sandinista Front who’s had the valor to call things by their name,” referring to those who are still in the country. At the same time, he criticized the cowardice of the current Head of the Army (Julio Cesar Aviles) for not having awarded Hugo Torres the military honors that corresponded to him as a General and a hero.
“My position is to have patience and wait, but actively, not passively, like others from the historic directorate are doing (…). And although I can’t be talking a lot, our ethics must be maintained, and the commitment to act when necessary, even if it be at great cost. (…) In 1977, I had the wisdom to launch an audacious measure, the October Offensive. You can only advance by sometimes having setbacks.” He was referring to the attacks on the San Carlos military headquarters, the offensive in Northern Nicaragua and in Masaya in October 1977, which began the FSLN’s final offensive against the Somoza dictatorship.
As our conversation drew to an end, he had some words of recognition for the work of historical memory I’ve completed. “Which is more than that of a historian, it’s someone who has a historic profile.” He reiterated to Julio their mutual acquaintance “since we were kids.” I promised to send him a printed copy of the chronology El Pueblo contra la Dictadura [“The people against the dictatorship,” book by Monica Baltodano published in December 2023] and meanwhile I sent him a digital copy via e-mail. At the end of our conversation, I asked him some personal questions about his family, and he offered me some private details that we were unaware of, such as his separation from Ligia Trejos. We committed ourselves to keeping our lines of communications open.
Days later, his declarations to Infobae came out – the interview where, among other things, he affirmed that the regime was authoritarian and person-centered, and there was no possible continuity. We believe that Humberto couldn’t have suspected that these remarks would be the pretext for reducing him to house arrest and taking away his computers, cellphones, and all ways and means of communicating with the outside world. Later it was learned that he was being held prisoner, in isolation in the Military Hospital.
We know from trustworthy sources that nearly two weeks before [his death] he was sent home, as supposedly recovered, a fact the Army covered up in its September 29 communique, informing of a serious relapse that augured poorly for his life.
We don’t doubt that reducing [Humberto] to being a prisoner in his own home, and later his own brother calling him a “traitor to the homeland,” and accusing him of selling his soul to the devil, were Daniel Ortega’s concessions to Rosario Murillo. Hearing the enthusiasm and confidence with which Humberto told us of his recovery days before his arrest, we also don’t doubt that the house arrest had a strong emotional and physical impact on him. Humiliation and political torture – a direct blow to the heart.
Humberto Ortega’s situation reflects the dispute for power and the correlation of forces between Ortega and Murillo. It’s also a challenge for the battered institutional character of the Army, which had already been humiliated with the death of Hugo Torres, to whom they weren’t allowed to render the honors due him as a Retired General.
Will the Army now be humiliated again? Will Daniel Ortega expose to the public the decline of his authority? Will Aviles once more bow down before Murillo, or will he recognize that Humberto Ortega must be buried with the honors that correspond to him as a former Army General, and the indisputable founder and former Commander of that institution and its process of professionalization?
It’s clear that behind this lies not just a political matter, but the message that will go out to all, including the [Sandinista] militants, of disdain towards those of their own family, their own blood. At the end of the day, whatever they do and whatever they say, they won’t be able to erase him. Humberto Ortega is another Sandinista leader who died as a prisoner of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo, and this, among many other of their actions, will have a price, leading day by day to contempt for the autocrats and the end of their dictatorship.
First published in Spanish by Confidencial and translated and posted in English by Havana Times.