Nicaragua to Get 160 More Metal “Trees of Life”, says VP
Meanwhile, deforestation continues at a rapid pace in Nicaragua’s forest reserves to facilitate cattle ranching and mining operations, environmentalists and indigenous groups have denounced.
HAVANA TIMES – As a sign of her authoritarian power, the co-president of the Sandinista dictatorship in Nicaragua, Rosario Murillo, announced this Wednesday through her official media outlets the installation of 160 metal structures she calls “Trees of Life” throughout the national territory.
“One hundred and sixty Trees of Life are being installed and continue to be installed throughout the country, which are a demonstration of the triumph of love and peace in Nicaragua. Those trees that were attacked with virulence, believing they were attacking us, and the perfidious, the ignorant, the delusional, did not realize they were confirming themselves as the destroyers. And those souls, full of hatred, become bitter, frustrated, and above all, reek of discontent,” Murillo ranted against the 2018 protesters who knocked down dozens of her metal trees in protest of the massacre that left over 355 dead, hundreds injured, and political prisoners.
She continued, “We also say, they do not silence us, they did not silence us, and they will not silence us, because here vibrates the holy blood of hundreds of thousands of Nicaraguans, and within that holy blood, as the center, as the heart, is the heroism of all our great and formidable spirits.”
To date, the Sandinista dictatorship has not made public how much it costs Nicaraguans for the manufacturing, construction, lighting, and maintenance of these metal structures.
In 2015, an investigation by the newspaper La Prensa found, through a source linked to the “Trees of Life” project, that just the construction and installation of 134 of these metal structures had cost more than $3.3 million dollars. Additionally, they revealed that they were assembled and mounted in workshops in coordination with the Managua City Hall.
They estimated back then that each metal “Tree of Life” cost 25,000 dollars, which means that today the cost must be even higher.