Only armed intervention will remove Ortega from power, says exiled Nicaraguan opposition leader

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Ariel Montoya, founder of the Nicaraguan Liberal Party from his exile in Miami, believes that only “armed intervention” will remove Daniel Ortega from power, and he believes that leaders like Margaret Thatcher, Mikhail Gorbachev and Pope John Paul II are lacking to overcome the legacy of the “cold war.”

“There is no alternative left but armed intervention, whatever you want to call it: national war, foreign intervention or armed conflict. I know it is difficult to say this, but thousands of Nicaraguans think this way deep in their minds,” he said.

Montoya stresses that next November’s general elections, in which Ortega is seeking his 5th presidential term and the 4th in a row, “are a given.”

“If there are international observers, they will be accomplices of Sandinismo,” he categorically stated before urging the international community not to recognize the legitimacy of the November 7 elections.

“There is no genuine anti-Ortega candidate; those who could oppose him are in jail and many have disappeared,” said Montoya, a former private secretary and press director of the now ex-president of Nicaragua, Enrique Bolaños (2002-2007).

Within the framework of the electoral process, Nicaraguan authorities have arrested opposition presidential hopefuls Cristiana Chamorro, Arturo Cruz, Félix Maradiaga, Juan Sebastián Chamorro, Miguel Mora, Medardo Mairena and Noel Vidaurre, under investigation for alleged treason to the homeland.

Two other opposition presidential hopefuls, María Asunción Moreno and former opposition leader Luis Fley, left Nicaragua alleging security reasons.

In addition, the Supreme Electoral Council (CSE) has cancelled the legal status of three opposition political parties on the grounds that they violated the Electoral Law.

THE COLD WAR IS NOT OVER

“We are in a moment of implosion that points to a warlike clash to remove Ortega (from power); it is not what one wants but there is no other alternative,” Montoya said.

The founder and current secretary of the Liberal Party maintains that the Cold War has not ended, because “there are still descendants like Ortega, who are satellites of Russia. He does not accept any internal dissidence and that makes him a despot and tyrant,” he stressed.

“All this is regrettable, but we need a Thatcher, a Gorbachev and a (Pope) John Paul II at this time. The International Criminal Court has already accused (Venezuelan President Nicolás) Maduro of crimes against humanity,” he said.

“But countries like Paraguay, Ecuador, Chile have not yet pronounced themselves. It is time for the international community to break with Ortega. Everyone must work with the resistance in their own trenches,” he pointed out.

According to Montoya, Nicaragua is immersed “in a war of hatred, blood, kidnapping, death, paramilitaries who go to houses and assault people.”

“This cannot be allowed,” Montoya insisted, who moved to Miami three years ago as a result of death threats he received for having taken part in demonstrations against the Ortega government, in which, according to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), at least 328 people died as a result of repression.

According to Montoya’s figures, the Central American country currently has over 100,000 exiles.

THE RETURN OF ORTEGA

Alarmed by the fact that the Nicaraguan government last Monday cancelled the registrations of six American and European NGOs, after accusing them of obstructing the country’s internal controls, Montoya said that Ortega “is somewhat pathetic and politically pathological.”

Ortega came to power with the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) in 1979 after overthrowing dictator Anastasio Somoza and, although he later lost elections to “three liberal governments,” Montoya said the current president “has been ruling Nicaragua for 42 years.”

“There were three democratic governments before he (Ortega) returned. Between pacts, transition protocols and vices of corruption of the bad right-wing, Ortega has continued to govern from 1979 to the present day,” he argued.

“Thanks to the bad right-wing, to a sector of liberalism that allowed him to lower the percentage of votes to win the elections (in 2002 to Arnoldo Alemán), Ortega won with 35% of the votes. Then he shrewdly divided the two existing large parties,” he pointed out.

Nicaragua can no longer count on candidate Cristiana Chamorro, journalist and daughter of former president Violeta Chamorro (1990-1997), who is backed from Miami by the Liberal Party, founded by Montoya and a group of “professionals, political scientists, intellectuals and authors.”

“Everything has failed and repression will be worse, there is no time left, the people will take to the streets again and an insurrection will begin,” the author foretells from his exile, where he managed to publish “Poeta autoconvocado” in 2019 and is now preparing a second edition.