Nicaragua: Attorney General Now Controls University Grants
Students from several universities told to resubmit their scholarship requests by June 20 to the Attorney General’s Office, now charged with “administering” the universities.
HAVANA TIMES – University scholarships in Nicaragua were suspended in the last few weeks, and students asked to resubmit their requests to the Attorney General’s Office (Procuraderia General de la Republica, o PGR). Recent changes to the Law for the Autonomy of Institutions of Higher Education has assigned this entity the “regency” of the public universities.
Important changes to the Autonomy Law were approved in the Nicaraguan National Assembly in early June. Before the text of the new law was even published in the official La Gaceta on Monday, June 9, 2025, students from several public universities in Nicaragua were denouncing on social media the cancellation of their grants.
A video released by university students, whose identity has been protected for security reasons, notes that – as of the law reform – academic scholarships are to be administered by the Attorney General’s Office. The images show students lining up at a branch of this institution, where they were allegedly taken by university authorities to initiate a new scholarship application process.
“They took us at 3:00 p.m. and we left at 6:00 p.m., leaving several still waiting for their turn, because the lines were super long,” commented a student.
The university students’ denunciation was confirmed on June 10, when a call for applications to academic scholarships offered by the Attorney General’s Office was posted on the official web pages of the National Engineering University, the Managua branch of the Nicaraguan National Autonomous University (UNAN), and the National Polytechnic University (UNP).
Following the students’ original posting of their situation, sympathizers of the regime of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo called out the university students’ posts as fake. “False. They’re only asking the students to fulfill one more requirement, so that later their documentation can be filed with the Attorney General’s Office,” the comments read.
According to the posted process, applicants for academic scholarships must now write a letter of application addressed to the self-appointed “co-presidents” Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo; attach their registration form, transcript, copy of identity card; and complete a form provided by the Attorney General’s Office. They must then deliver these documents to that office during working hours. The application process for academic scholarships ends on June 20, 2025.
Attorney General’s Office now in charge of the public university system
According to the change in the law, the Attorney General’s Office, together with the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit, will take charge of “all financial, budgetary and accountability aspects.”
Prior to the reform, the Ministry of Finance was responsible for approving the policy for distributing the funds allocated to the universities – a sum representing 6% of the national budget by Nicaraguan law. Now, it lists the 12 universities that will receive money from the national budget but also leaves open the possibility of allocating resources to private universities. The administrative powers have been moved to the Attorney General.
“In financial, budgetary, and accountability matters, the universities, will follow the guidelines issued by the Ministry of Finance and Public Credit, and will be under the regencia [regency] of the Attorney General’s Office,” reads the amended Autonomy Law.
Ernesto Medina, academic and former rector of the UNAN in Leon and of the private Americana University, explained that it’s the first time the Attorney General’s Office appears within the Autonomy Law. He warned that if the word “regente” (authority) is interpreted as defined in the Spanish Royal Academy of the Language, then this entity is being named to “govern” the universities.
“If the Attorney General’s Office is going to have regency, it means they’ll be governing the universities,” he continued, “throughout the entire text, the reformed law speaks of the role of the Technical Secretariat and the National Council of Rectors [not of the Attorney General’s Office]. So we don’t know what they really want, they can’t express it, and instead they’re confusing everything.”
Over 50,000 university grants
In 2023, the annual statistical report issued by the now-extinct National Council of Universities (CNU) reported “55,764 student scholarships at a national level.” However, that document doesn’t specify which of those scholarships were for the public universities and which for attending private universities.
In 2024, reports from official sources informed that 19,650 scholarships were awarded for the public universities directly under the CNU. Of these, 4,340 were scholarships which included room, board, health care and other services. The other 15,310 were “external grants” that merely consisted of a small sum awarded to students for their transportation fees. The public universities in Nicaragua are free.
In January 2025, Ramona Rodriguez, former CNU president, declared that between the CNU scholarships and an additional 28,000 scholarships offered to the private universities, the total number of scholarships awarded in Nicaragua would reach 50,000 this year.
No trace of university autonomy
The regime’s changes in the law also eliminated the National Council of Universities (CNU) and the National Education System’s Council for Evaluation and Accreditation, which in theory enjoyed a certain degree of autonomy. In their place, the law now establishes the Technical Secretariat for Attention to Universities, which is subordinated to the Presidency of the Republic.
The law now transfers “the financial and patrimonial resources, real estate and property, vehicles, computer and office equipment and systems, furniture and any other items registered to the National Council of Universities (CNU) and the National Council of Evaluation and Accreditation of the National Educational System (CNEA) to the Technical Secretariat for Attention to the Universities,” reads the third article.
The subordination of the Technical Secretariat to the Presidency is stated explicitly in another article of the law: “The Technical Secretariat for Attention to the Universities is created under the sectorial leadership of the Presidency and will act as the Secretariat of the National Council of University Rectors.”
Among the functions of the Technical Secretariat described is the duty to “submit a draft of the National Policy of Higher Education to the Presidency for its approval.” This direct subordination to the presidency did not exist until the recent change in the law.
To Medina, this reform shows that the regime “doesn’t know what it wants and hasn’t found the most ideal way [it desires] to totally control the universities. He recalled that the regime has made “three extensive reforms” to the Law for Universitry Autonomy.
Ever more universities depending on the 6% budget allocation
The changes also incorporate the new universities created through the confiscation of private universities into the pool of institutions that will divide the total resources allocated – by law, 6% of the national budget of Nicaragua.
The universities that already received a portion of these monies are:
- National Nicaraguan Autonomous University in Leon
- National Nicaraguan Autonomous University in Managua
- National Engineering University
- National Agricultural University
- National Polytechnic University
- Antonio de Valdivieso International University
- Bluefields Indigenous and Caribbean University
- University of the Autonomous Regions of the Nicaraguan Caribbean Coast
Four other universities – confiscated and renamed – will now receive part of the money allocated as well:
- Ricardo Morales Avilés National Multi-disciplinary University
- Casimiro Sotelo Montenegro National University
- Francisco Luis Espinoza Pineda National University
- Comandante Padre Gaspar García Laviana National University
In addition to these 12 public universities, certain private universities “designated by the Presidency through the Technical Secretariat for Attention to Universities” will receive money from the 6%, states the reformed law.
First published in Spanish by Confidencial and translated and posted in English by Havana Times.