The Lessons Learned in Nicaragua over the Last Year

 

We have renounced violence. The young are the present. Justice does matter. We have to demand and practice accountability

 

 

By Max Jerez  (Confidencial)

HAVANA TIMES – A year has passed since many Nicaraguans, with a renewed conscience, left behind indifference and fear and raised their voice for freedom, justice and democracy against the criminal and totalitarian Ortega-Murillo regime. Since then we spoke of a new Nicaragua, that nothing is the same and that change has already begun.

The level of political maturity and awareness of the people has been surprising and a new political culture has been seen before all of us. It is because we have learned from the past and April has left us its lessons, here some of them:

We have renounced violence

The April uprising means the abandonment of political violence for the option for civic struggle and nonviolence. A significant change taking into account our history marked by war and the practice of violence as the way to resolve our political conflicts. April taught us that faced with the rifles of an archaic and decadent dictatorial regime, the courage of the people who responded with marches, slogans, boycotts, balloons and pickets has been stronger.

Young people are the present

A youth previously considered asleep, apathetic and indifferent, generated one of the greatest civic insurrections in the history of Nicaragua. The April insurrection immediately took on a youthful characteristic; the young people saw themselves as the new leaders and the people did not hesitate to recognize us as such.

What did the young people have that they managed to gain the immediate support of the general population? We are the personification of the idea of ??change, hope for a better future and the conviction that things can be done differently. The “moral reserve” as the Church has called us.

There are other ways of exercising power and doing politics

Today, we are seeing new proposals for democratic practices and more spontaneous forms of political organization that are less top-down and more horizontal. Processes that may be slower, but ultimately safer. There are also new leaders but with a renewed conception of leadership. April helped us recognize the mistakes and vices of the past and buried the tradition of the caudillo (strong-man) and authoritarian power.

Justice does matter

The horror and magnitude of the regime’s crimes has meant that the demand for Justice mobilizes a people accustomed to impunity as a way of life. The right to truth, justice, reparation and non-repetition remains the mandate. The victims must be listened to and those responsible identified and punished. After April we recognized that we deserve justice and that it cannot be set aside again.

We must demand accountability  

A country formerly used to corruption is today a country that demands accountability and transparency, and this is not only required of the regime but also all those who represent it. After April there are no more acceptable pacts, nor blank checks.

Today we say that we are a different people and we really are. We have learned from April and its hard lessons, because only these give us the assurance that the new Nicaragua is possible.

*Student of Upoli, member of the Nicaraguan University Alliance, and of the Civic Alliance for Justice and Democracy