MANAGUA, Nicaragua — Daniel Ortega grew to become a hero in Nicaragua for serving to overthrow a infamous dictator. Now, 40 years later, he has develop into the sort of authoritarian chief he as soon as fought towards.
After methodically choking off competitors and dissent, Mr. Ortega has all however ensured his victory in presidential elections on Sunday, representing a flip towards an brazenly dictatorial mannequin that might set an instance for different leaders throughout Latin America.
He detained the credible challengers who deliberate to run towards him, shut down opposition events, banned giant marketing campaign occasions and closed voting stations en masse. He even jailed a number of the aged Sandinistas who fought with him to depose the dictator, Anastasio Somoza.
“This isn’t an election, it is a farce,” mentioned Berta Valle, the spouse of one of many jailed opposition leaders. “Nobody will elect anybody, as a result of the one candidate is Daniel Ortega.”
Mr. Ortega’s path to a fourth consecutive time period in workplace and near-total management of Nicaragua has ushered in a brand new period of repression and terror, analysts mentioned. His declare to victory would ship one other a blow to President Biden’s agenda within the area, the place his administration has didn’t sluggish an anti-democratic slide and a mass exodus of determined folks towards the US. Even earlier than the outcomes had been introduced Sunday, the White Home launched a press release denouncing “a pantomime election that was neither free nor truthful, and most actually not democratic.”
A report variety of Nicaraguans have been intercepted crossing the Southwest border of the US this 12 months since Mr. Ortega started crushing his opposition. And greater than 80,000 Nicaraguans live as refugees in neighboring Costa Rica.
“This can be a turning level towards authoritarianism within the area,” mentioned José Miguel Vivanco, head of the Americas area for Human Rights Watch, who known as Mr. Ortega’s crackdown “a slow-motion horror film.”
“He isn’t even attempting to protect some kind of facade of democratic rule,” Mr. Vivanco mentioned of the Nicaraguan chief. “He’s in a flagrant, open method, simply deciding to deal with the election as a efficiency.”
The fee that displays elections has been entrusted to Ortega loyalists, and there have been no public debates among the many contest’s 5 remaining candidates, all of whom are little-known members of events aligned along with his Sandinista authorities.
As soon as polls opened early on Sunday morning, some polling stations had traces as Nicaraguans turned out to solid their ballots. However because the day progressed, most of the stations had been largely empty. The streets of the capital, Managua, had been additionally quiet, with little to point out {that a} important election was underway.
The evening earlier than, a minimum of 4 folks from opposition organizations had been arrested and their homes raided by the police.
“These elections are, thank God, an indication, a dedication by the overwhelming majority of Nicaraguans to vote for peace,” Mr. Ortega mentioned in a nationwide tv broadcast on Sunday. “We’re burying conflict and giving life to peace.”
Mr. Ortega first got here to energy after serving to lead the revolution that overthrew the Somoza dictatorship in 1979. Greater than a decade later, he was ousted by Nicaraguan voters, in what was thought of the nation’s first democratic election.
That lesson in regards to the dangers of democratic rule seems to have formed the remainder of Mr. Ortega’s political life. He took workplace once more in 2007, after getting a rival get together to comply with a authorized change that allowed a candidate to win an election with simply 35 p.c of the vote. He then spent years undermining the establishments holding collectively the nation’s fragile democracy.
He made it clear that he wouldn’t tolerate dissent in 2018, when he despatched the police to violently smother protests towards the federal government, resulting in a whole bunch of deaths and accusations by human rights teams of crimes towards humanity.
However the sudden sweep of arrests previous the elections, which despatched seven political candidates and greater than 150 others to jail, reworked the nation into what many activists described as a police state, the place even delicate expressions of dissent are muted by concern.
A sportswriter was not too long ago imprisoned for a collection of posts essential of the federal government on Twitter and Fb, below a brand new regulation that mandates as much as 5 years in jail for anybody who says something that “endangers financial stability” or “public order.”
After the detentions started, the US positioned new sanctions on Nicaraguan officers and the Group of American States condemned the federal government. This month, Congress handed laws demanding extra punitive measures on Nicaragua. However that strain has not stopped Mr. Ortega from systematically eliminating any impediment to his victory on Sunday.
A latest ballot confirmed that 78 p.c of Nicaraguans see the attainable re-election of Mr. Ortega as illegitimate and that simply 9 p.c help the governing get together. But many refuse to query the federal government in public, afraid that they are going to be arrested or harassed by Sandinista get together representatives who’re stationed in each neighborhood to observe political actions.
The chief of 1 electoral watchdog group, Olga Valle, left the nation after Mr. Ortega’s authorities started concentrating on anybody who spoke out towards it.
“There was a variety of concern of displaying your face,” mentioned Ms. Valle. “There’s a complete restriction of freedoms, folks have completely no capacity to satisfy, to prepare.”
The primary aspiring presidential candidate to be focused was Cristiana Chamorro, Nicaragua’s most outstanding opposition chief and the daughter of the lady who unseated Mr. Ortega in 1990 after his first stint in energy.
Law enforcement officials put Ms. Chamorro below home arrest on a Wednesday in June — the day after Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken delivered remarks on the significance of strengthening democracy subsequent door in Costa Rica.
Félix Maradiaga, who additionally deliberate to run towards Mr. Ortega, was tossed in jail days later and saved there for months earlier than his sister was allowed a 20-minute go to.
His spouse, Berta Valle, who has been in exile in the US since going through threats after the 2018 protests, mentioned that he had misplaced 45 kilos and that for months his solely lavatory was a gap in his cell. He advised relations that he’s pressured to stay in full silence, besides when he’s subjected to every day interrogations. “It’s psychological torture,” she mentioned.
Mr. Maradiaga has been allowed one assembly along with his lawyer, surrounded by closely armed guards, his spouse added. That lawyer has since fled the nation.
By August, the one opposition get together left standing was Residents for Liberty, a motion on the precise that some speculated could be allowed to run to provide a minimum of the impression of a good struggle. However then the electoral fee held a information convention asserting that the get together had been shut down.
“I didn’t even end watching it,” mentioned Kitty Monterrey, the get together’s president. “I grabbed my passports and I ran. I didn’t look again.”
She slipped out within the late afternoon, avoiding the police who had been stationed out entrance. To achieve Costa Rica, Ms. Monterrey trudged by means of rivers on foot and horseback for 14 hours. She turned 71 the day of her journey.
“This isn’t an election course of in any respect,” Ms. Monterrey mentioned. “Elections are when you’ve got the precise to decide on, however everyone seems to be both in exile or in jail.”
There aren’t any election observers in Nicaragua, solely so-called “election companions,” a hodgepodge of officers introduced in from nations like Spain, Argentina and Chile, lots of whom are members of their native Communist events. Their job, one member of the electoral fee not too long ago mentioned, is to not “intervene” however somewhat to “watch” and “get pleasure from” the voting course of.
Throughout Nicaragua, there are few indicators {that a} contest for the nation’s highest workplace is underway.
Gigantic photographs of Mr. Ortega and his spouse, who’s his vp, loom over the streets. Vaccination websites play revolutionary jingles with titles like “The Commander Stays.” Authorities buildings fly the flag of the Sandinista get together subsequent to the nationwide flag.
However other than a smattering of fliers with opposition get together logos in Managua, the capital, there aren’t any billboards or marketing campaign posters that includes anybody else.
“Ortega’s masks is off,” mentioned Ms. Valle, the spouse of the imprisoned opposition chief. “He can’t disguise anymore.”
Oscar Lopez contributed reporting from Mexico Metropolis.
