Gioconda Belli

“At this juncture how can I not ask myself if it was worth it to have given over my youth and a large part of my life to a revolution that I saw as the most beautiful thing that could possibly happen to me? The horror of the events that have occurred in Nicaragua since April 18th, when a citizen protest was violently repressed, doesn’t cease to astonish me.

This situation could be defined much more easily if we had the humility to simply face the fact that a forceful civic struggle like the one carried out over these past 6 months in Nicaragua must now reconsider how best to confront a ferocious repression.

A poem by Gioconda Belli, dedicated to the political prisoners of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo.

In interviews with foreign media, Daniel Ortega has declared that the country is returning to “normal”. His contradictions compete with those of Donald Trump. The only difference being that here, in our case, he is lying about deaths, about the blood spilled of over 300 Nicaraguan citizens and the arrest, persecution and unfair trial of hundreds.

How do we respond to a president who declares war against all those that oppose him? A president who has demonstrated his willingness to use arms, to persecute and condemn as “terrorists” those who dare to contradict the version of reality he’s been fostering to explain what has happened in Nicaragua.

Over this past horrific weekend, first the God of Wrath that our disoriented leaders pray to had them proclaim peace while causing nine deaths in Carazo alone. Then, to top things off, on Monday July 9th, we witnessed…

A few days ago, I called a businessman friend who is usually a jokester. I didn’t expect that when I asked him how he was, he would answer – “very depressed”, then be unable to continue any further. His voice broke, and I could hear that hoarse sobbing that emerges when men don’t want to cry but can’t hold it back.

“I don’t know what we could expect from you, a mother who showed no pity for her own daughter, flesh of your flesh and blood of your blood. But even amid the grief of over 170 deaths, you haven’t stopped the lies, nor felt any scruples…”

Dear Luis Almagro, I understand that it’s difficult for you to assimilate the fact that Daniel Ortega, one of the nine leaders of the Sandinista Revolution, has become a dictator. How can you ask us to “strengthen the democratic institutions” of the Ortega dictatorship if there IS no democracy?