Nicaragua
Polarization and Depolarization
Envío team
“The Sandinistas are finished. There are tensions inside the army. The FSLN is divided between the hotheads who don’t understand the defeat, who only think of barricades and riots, and a minority who want something else, but don’t even know what. There are divisions inside the National Directorate itself. The FSLN’s days are numbered. It’s already part of the past.”
—UNO leader speaking on Radio Corporación
“The UNO government isn’t viable, it's the most fragile government in Nicaragua’s history. Toppling it would be very easy. There are internal divisions that are creating more and more problems for them. In what country in the world do you see as much enmity between the President and Vice President? There are problems between ministers, between leaders of the different parties and among their base of support. It's a disaster.”
—Sandinista leader speaking on Radio YA
“There are tensions and divisions, but both the UNO and the FSLN will overcome them. There's political experience on both sides, and the reality of the situation obliges them to do this. What's of most concern is not the divisions in one or the other group. The most serious is the division within Nicaragua.”
—Political analyst on Radio Istmo
The February 25 electoral results revealed the country’s thoroughgoing political polarization: two adversaries, the UNO coalition and the FSLN, captured 95.5% of the vote between them. The five independent centrist or center-right slates combined barely topped 2%, a fraction less than the three parties left of the FSLN.
Paradoxically, the polarization expressed by the votes carried with it a deeply felt desire for peace and economic improvement. Many people who voted for the FSLN, in addition to reaffirming an ideological belief, were convinced that if the Sandinistas won at the polls, the US would finally stop aiding the armed contra forces. And, while some voted for UNO precisely because it is anti-Sandinista and pro-US, many did so thinking that a quick end to the war could only be assured if declared friends of the United States were voted into office.
This pull between polarization and depolarization was reaffirmed with the March 27 signing of the Transition Protocol between the outgoing and incoming governments. The most rightwing sectors of UNO stridently opposed the Protocol’s prudent accords. So did some revolutionary sectors, both Sandinista and not, though far less strongly and from an opposite point of view. Beneath the obvious UNO-FSLN division, then, four political currents began to appear: the two that, despite their opposing political visions, were able to reach minimal agreement on the Transition Protocol, and the two extremes, both right and left, who opposed it to one degree or another.
After only weeks in office, the UNO government began an all-out offensive against the legislative and judicial branches of government, as well as against the significant “popular power” wielded by the revolutionary unions and mass organizations. The broad parameters of the offensive were marked by unconstitutional decrees, pressures on the National Assembly and judicial branch and a monetarist economic policy that sent the majority of the population reeling. All set the stage for dismantling the structural gains of the revolution over the last 11 years.
The reaction matched the offensive in speed and intensity; in May and again in July, two powerful strikes shook Nicaragua. The first paralyzed state institutions and the second virtually the whole country. The militancy of the July strike, provoked by the government's inflexibility and exacerbated by rightwing extremists, brought the nation to the brink of civil war.
These events demonstrated an almost evenly matched balance of forces: both the government and the popular organizations were able to exercise certain veto power over the other's plans. They also starkly highlighted the four distinct political currents in Nicaraguan society.
Rocked by Divisions, UNO Clings to UnityThe UNO government may be divided over some critical issues, but it agrees on the goal of reestablishing bourgeois domination in the country. The fundamental difference is whether the government will pursue a neofascist or a neoliberal model in the coming years: a short-term solution imposed violently, or a long-term path agreed to by negotiation. The differences in rhythm and method are far from negligible.
During the heat of the July strike, for example, the Godoy-allied business association COSEP and the pro-UNO union alliance called Permanent Workers' Congress (CPT) formed the “National Salvation Commission” together with the most rightwing political parties in UNO. “President Chamorro doesn't have to give us permission to defend constitutional order,” declared Vice President Godoy, who presides over the group, adding that “if instability becomes rampant, the demobilized contras will feel threatened and won't simply sit back and do nothing, they'll take up arms again.” Nicaraguan journalists who have visited Region V, where UNO won 70% of the vote, say that some former contra leaders are the ones forming the National Salvation groups in that region.
The CPT made it clear that its workers were willing to act as strikebreakers and armed shock troops. During the strike, members of these unions formed the armed brigades in and around Radio Corporación and other places, alongside demobilized contras, ex-National Guardsmen and criminal elements. The CPT is a key link in these urban brigades, which aim to mobilize criminal or lumpen sectors, elements that historically have been critical to the fascist movements in Europe, backing them up with the military experience of ex-contras and National Guardsmen. In this sense, the term neofascist is not exaggerated.
Given this, many revolutionaries are trying to figure out which factor in UNO will be decisive: the unity or the contradictions. Some only see the unity, reducing the contradictions to mere accidents of a difficult situation. Others see only the conflicts and view unity as marginal, given the coalition's fragility. Both views are extreme, and each could lead to serious errors. The starting point of an analysis must be the understanding that a dialectic of unity and contradiction exists within UNO. This is not an academic point, but one that can help transform the grassroot sectors’ political practice so they work to strengthen contradiction as UNO's dominant internal element. Overestimating the unity could lead to total confrontation with a presumed monolithic model of bourgeois domination; overestimating the contradictions could result in negotiations that appear politically adept but give a lot away in exchange for nothing.
Splits in the CoalitionCiting international sources, El Nuevo Diario reported during the July strike that Vice President Virgilio Godoy proposed to the President that she call on the population to fill the “Plaza of the Republic” (previously the Plaza of the Revolution) as a show of support, and use that support to maintain an intransigent position against the strikers. According to Godoy, “Lacayo didn't like the idea of going to the people because he's afraid of them. But when he wants popular support, he won’t be able to count on it, because the people feel that the government has been wishy-washy and weak and has let its hands be tied.”
During the strike, Godoy characterized himself as the “clear and firm voice of this government.” Lacayo, with his customary calm, argued against politicians who “are demanding somocista solutions to problems, i.e., send out the Guard, throw everybody who takes the lead into prison and finish with the problem.” There are people, Lacayo added, “among them Dr. Godoy, who for some reason believe that reconciliation isn't feasible or desirable.... To the extent that they do, they don't fit in the government. Dr. Godoy has excluded himself, and this is why there now appears to be division.”
The divisions are more than “appearances” and they go beyond just Godoy and the executive branch of government. They are visible in the legislative and judicial branches, in the Cabinet, among the 14 parties that make up the UNO alliance and at the base.
In the legislative branchWhen the UNO government assumed office, pro-Godoy legislators were a clear majority on the UNO bench; this now seems to be eroding due to work by Alfredo Cesar, who heads the Chamorro camp in the National Assembly. Some see the controversial secret vote on President Chamorro's request to pardon her husband's assassins as proof of this. Although the request was defeated, 30 of UNO's 51 votes favored the pardon. UNO deputies in the National Assembly are also seriously discussing a Sandinista proposal to limit the powers of the Assembly president—currently Miriam Argüello, who backs Godoy.
Contradictions between the executive and legislative branches itself were symbolized by the $1,850 per month salary increase demanded by UNO deputies and denied by the Ministry of Finance. Many UNO deputies scoffed at the $1,500 they were granted, calling it a “reprisal by the executive branch.” It should be remembered that several of these parliamentarians were civilian contra leaders who enjoyed substantial salaries from the funds approved by the US Congress. Others were “civic leaders” inside Nicaragua who also received good incomes financed by US institutions “for the development of democracy." Still others were in the Somoza National Assembly, and recall the many “benefits” that complemented their salary. While the unhappy deputies formed a commission to analyze the problem and solicited the presence of the finance minister to present their claims, César tried to weaken them or win them over with more benefits.
In the Judicial Branch. Beneath the conflict between the executive branch and pro-Sandinista judges was one between the two UNO sectors. The Godoy backers wanted to increase the Supreme Court from 7 to 15 members, so that UNO, particularly Godoy’s side, would have a clear majority. Chamorro's side used the judicial budget—a miserly 0.54% of the national budget—and negotiations with the Sandinistas to increase the Court to 9 members, 4 of whom respond to the Chamorro project (2 of the original pro-Sandinista judges had resigned, citing personal reasons). Shortly after the new judges were sworn in on August 19, Chamorro cited two constitutional articles to replace Supreme Court president Rodrigo Reyes, a Sandinista, with Orlando Trejos, who is closer to her positions. (The move took the Sandinistas by surprise; clearly it had not been part of the deal.)
In the Cabinet. At the time of the strike, a number of economic ministers, the most influential in the Cabinet, sided with Godoy. This was less for ideological reasons than because these “technocrats” saw the workers' demands as endangering the pace of implementing their economic plan. The agricultural minister, for example, found a legal way around the July strike agreement that no more state lands would be rented to big producers through Decree 10-90. Another agreement was that the government would stop firing state employees and give those fired for political reasons since April 25 the three months' severance pay required by law. Yet in just the first five days after the settlement, ministers fired over 200 workers. Managua's mayor fired another 117, citing independence from central government agreements. While a policy of massive layoffs to reduce state spending is a cornerstone of the government's economic plan, these firings followed no economic logic; they were reprisals against strikers. This continual non-compliance with agreement expectations has produced profound skepticism among workers, and increased their militancy.
Within the UNO Political Alliance. According to William Navarro, a leader of Godoy’s Independent Liberal Party, the UNO Political Council—representing all 14 parties and presided over by Godoy—is debating a complex proposal by Alfredo Cesar’s Social Democratic Party that would change the nature of the Council and weaken Godoy’s position in it. (See “Shifting Forces in UNO” in the In Brief section, this issue.) The Council is also discussing a proposal from Godoy himself to condition the Council's support of Chamorro on her “compliance” with the Plan for National Salvation drawn up by UNO as its campaign platform.
At the Base. In municipal government, councilors were elected by direct vote and they in turn elect the mayor. In some municipalities with an UNO majority, councilors have reached the point of violence in fighting out the differences between tendencies or parties. The most serious of these conflicts took place in Las Sabanas, Madriz, in August, leaving six dead.
The policy carried out by the government since April has been so aggressive that the assistance of the extremists hardly seems necessary to begin dismantling the gains made in ten years of revolution. Economic planner Francisco Mayorga's first-stage “shock plan” to adjust the economy, together with the avalanche of unconstitutional decrees, the beginning of a “counter agrarian reform” to return properties to their somocista owners, the confrontational style that has greeted any workers' demand and the lack of compliance with the many accords reached during the strikes were all moves in a strategic anti-Sandinista offensive.
But recent moves by the central government suggest a consolidation of the President's views on “reconciliation,” although internal conflicts still exist in some ministries. For example, after several days of meetings in mid-August, presidential adviser Haroldo Montealegre reported that the Cabinet had agreed to a new, 36-month structural adjustment plan. The President had requested it because of the severe social tensions caused by the original plan. Thus the mythical “100 days” (promised during the campaign by Mayorga as sufficient to stabilize the economy) came to an end. The Presidency thus rallied the economic team around Antonio Lacayo’s more flexible positions.
With this restructuring, the government also implicitly recognized the political weight and effective veto power wielded by the Sandinista unions and mass organizations during the two strikes. But, more than anything, it was another setback for the Godoy group. Thus, in the midst of its own internal conflicts and the broader social conflicts that led to the two strikes, the neoliberal project, at least temporarily, gained important space relative to the extremist current within the government.
US Still in the GameAnd the United States? Has it disappeared from the Nicaraguan political scene? It should be remembered that, in spite of a substantially lowered US profile n Nicaragua after the elections, the fundamental problem remains the same: the confrontation between the revolutionary Nicaraguan people and the US government and its imperial policies.
The current US ambassador, Harry Shlaudeman, has much more room for maneuver than his post-1979 predecessors. Stationed in the Dominican Republic in 1965 when US troops invaded and in Chile in 1973 when a military coup overthrew the democratically elected government of Salvador Allende, Shlaudeman is a specialist in destabilization and has an important role in the formulation of Washington's policy on Nicaragua. But, if he were questioned as to which group he supports, Shlaudeman would likely respond as a former US ambassador did when posed the same question: “People who think we're supporting the interests of one side or another are mistaken, We're supporting our own interests.”
The issue then becomes: which sector within UNO best safeguards US interests? The US, which has always played several cards at a time, is surely interested in maintaining good relations with both groups. The Godoy option remains an important card should the more pragmatic project fail. During the July strike, the US Embassy supported the formation of the National Salvation Commission headed by Godoy. In addition, according to a generally well-informed and reliable radio commentator in Managua, Shlaudeman suggested to President Chamorro during the strike that she resign for “health reasons.” If the strike had indeed developed into a civil war, the US government would have pressured Chamorro to step aside in favor of Vice President Godoy, who would have ordered the army and police forces to end the strike with repression. Had the military disobeyed Godoy’s orders, the US would then have been able to intervene “in defense of democracy.” Significant US support would explain the virulent tone taken by Godoy and his supporters during the strike. That support makes the Chamorro governments relatively independent stance toward the US during the strike stand out more starkly.
Since the strike, the Embassy has gone back to the constitutional government card, to get at Sandinismo with less cost and visibility. One tool at its disposal is economic blackmail. Most of the $300 million approved by Congress in May has yet to arrive, and the US exercises pressure with each disbursement. Given the evidence of this, the Sandinistas should try and deepen the contradictions inside UNO, weakening the Godoy sector until the US decides it is no longer a high card.
Shell-Shocked Sandinistas Work for UnityThe Sandinistas' electoral defeat hit them like a political earthquake. The first reactions were shock, pain and confusion. That was followed by great uncertainty about the future, fear of reprisals or attacks and inevitable questions of job security and daily routines. That was followed by anger and self-censure: how could we have been so mistaken, why weren't we able to prevent this? With that came humiliation, as a majority of the country had voted to “beg the US for mercy.” And the perhaps inevitable process of looking for scapegoats—it was the Esquipulas process, the campaign itself, the change in economic policies, the errors made by the army. Along these same emotional lines, many named guilty parties: So-and-so was too arrogant, that guy has always been an opportunist, the other got rich off the process. Mixed in with all of this were much larger concerns about the meaning of revolution—not just in Nicaragua, but throughout the world. Finally came depression, due both to the electoral defeat and fatigue in the face of the realization that a new, and in many ways more difficult, struggle was about to begin.
These stages—shock, fear, shame, anger and depression—are classic psychological reactions, both personal and social, to significant setbacks. While an individual, or a group, must pass through them all to return to health, they are dangerous if one remains stuck along the way. In this case they must be gotten through fairly quickly, because the United States and UNO are more than just a crisis, they seek nothing less than the FSLN’s political death. To block that means looking at the errors and absorbing the lessons they offer while overcoming the emotional crisis. Only this way will defeat be transformed into victory.
Militant UnionismWith the government in post-election euphoria and the FSLN in emotional crisis, the unions and other mass organizations were the first to react. The FSLN had barely gotten its bearings when the Public Employee’s Union (UNE) took over the ministries and silenced the country's phone lines in May. A little more than a month later, while party “intellectuals” were still debating that strike, five powerful groups (rural and industrial workers, state employees, students and neighborhood residents) came together in one general strike, thus regenerating the popular Sandinista project.
Without idealizing the strikes or glossing over their errors and limitations, the point is to understand that the revolutionary people pointed out the road ahead—a road of militant struggle—even as intellectuals were warning that the conditions for such a struggle were not right. When a road is being pointed out, it would be a shame to miss it and concentrate instead on the dirty fingernails of the one do the pointing. Many did just that.
While a close reading of the July accords shows that the wage hike agreed to does not keep pace with inflation, other factors are more important: 1) the strike slowed down privatization, particularly in the countryside; 2) it cooled the returning Somocistas' voracious enthusiasm to invest in what they thought was a carbon copy of the 1970s; 3) it brought the people and the armed forces closer together, rather than dividing them; 4) it made the government’s economic Cabinet realize that economic recovery in Nicaragua simply cannot go forward without the workers' active participation; and 5) it exacerbated the division within UNO ranks. All these gains are momentary when one considers the long-term struggle, but they were key to breaking the post-election defeatism and served as an important moral boost for the coming months and years.
The pro-Sandinista unions, daily and directly affected by government measures, reacted rapidly and set out on a new road. The Sandinista Popular Army (EPS) did much the same, but the road was different.
The “New” armyWith the signing of the Transition Protocol, the EPS secured its existence within a constitutional framework and respect from the new government for its legitimacy as a national institution. The Protocol also called for, and achieved in a relatively short time, the complete demobilization of the contras Although the contra forces' military demobilization does not guarantee their wholesale dismantling—many arms have been secreted away and the contras are still grouped together geographically in the development poles—it is a crucial step on the long road to peace. The demobilization seems to have carried with it a dynamic toward dismantling. Despite the FSLN's electoral defeat, the EPS remains and the contras have been disarmed. Nicaragua in 1990 is not Chile in 1973.
After contra demobilization ended, the army was reduced by nearly 50% with the abolition of the draft. As part of another accord between the army and the President, further reductions will follow, conditioned on “a reasonable balance of forces in the region” as called for by the Esquipulas peace process. To date, the armies of Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador have given no sign that they are willing to reduce their forces. Honduran armed forces chief Arnulfo Cantarero said during a 24-hour visit to Managua in August that the Honduran army is not ready to cut back and rejected Costa Rica as the regional “model” for demilitarization. “They have more men under arms than we do,” asserted Cantarero.
Only in this context can the taking of arms from civilians be understood. This process, underway since July, is being carried out by the army and police. With the contras demobilized and the country extremely polarized, the collection of arms from civilians helps strengthen the political option as the best way to solve the country's conflicts. It affects Sandinista civilians and peasants in cooperatives, but also potential members of the “National Salvation Brigades” promoted by the Godoy group.
But might this measure not also tempt the US to intervene militarily in Nicaragua? The reality of a “people in arms” dissuaded the Reagan administration more than Nicaragua’s professional army. Nicaragua’s Constitution makes clear that, in the event of foreign intervention, citizens have a right to arm and their “preparation, organization and direction” falls to the Sandinista army. There would be no lack of people who, from behind new barricades, would exercise this right if such a situation should present itself.
The path Nicaragua hopes to follow, however, is different. The best military victory is the war that is avoided. And the best way to avoid a new war is to strengthen the country's democratic and constitutional option. This is the path that the FSLN itself consistently promoted, although many forgot that in the fog of the electoral aftermath. From this perspective, the Sandinista army's apolitical positions and its declared respect and loyalty to the Constitution and to the President help pave the road to a democracy and peace in which the struggle to defend legitimate rights and demands can be civilly waged.
In synthesis, after the demobilization of the contra forces, the EPS has taken many military steps along with the police force—to avoid the possibility of armed conflict between civilians—and political steps to strengthen the stability of the democratic and constitutional option in Nicaragua. In this way, it has begun to build a political shield to prevent another war and guarantee, among many other things, that the peaceful transition of power through elections is respected in Nicaragua.
In a September 3 interview with envio, COSEP President Gilberto Cuadra declared that the Sandinista army should be radically reduced in size and proposed that the “thousands” of unemployed former military officers should be transferred to “productive ministries” until they find work in nongovernmental institutions. Cuadra says the army’s budget could be transferred proportionally to these unnamed productive ministries.
envío feels that the army should look towards a different kind of “productivity.” Now that peace has come, the army itself could play a productive role that would benefit the entire nation. It could build houses side by side with the country’s poorest sectors, help carry out vaccination campaigns in the most remote and marginalized areas and repair or build roads so peasants and cooperatives could get their produce to market. This would make army salaries truly productive and army discipline would likely make its work more efficient and organized than that of any other civilian ministry.
A Divided FSLN?Both national and international reports have pointed to divisions within the FSLN. Some saw divisions they wanted to see, others reported half-truths, while still others were on the mark. There has been talk of old scars related to the three FSLN tendencies of the late 1970s, while others have emphasized tensions between institutions created by the revolution. The list to choose from is long and varied: GPP tendency vs. Terceristas, EPS vs. Ministry of the Interior (MINT), civilians vs. military, Ortega vs. Borge, Ortega vs. Ortega, social democrats vs. true revolutionaries...
With the defeat, even the National Directorate’s prestige has been questioned; many who before looked on the nine comandantes as having some kind of “divine halo” now immaturely lay the blame for practically everything at their doorstep. As an elderly Sandinista put it, “That’s life, if we had won, the Esquipulas process and the unilateral concessions would have been called ‘audacious,' the MINT would have been 'inspired' because it would have had its finger on the pulse of the people, the EPS actions against the contras conclusive'.... Now it’s all the reverse. I’ve been around a long time and I’ve seen a lot. If you sit around and drink but win, they say you're great; if you lose, they call you a drunk. We all have a lot to learn from the past.”
According to Tomás Borge, the FSLN’s recently created ethics commission entrusted with receiving complaints against party members has received almost no complaints to date. Given that corruption and misbehavior at all levels has been publicly denounced many times, it is difficult to believe that suddenly no one has anything to say. This silence would appear to be due to fear more than anything. The revolution and revolutionaries demand not a witch hunt, but an honest and open review with corresponding punishments where they fit. The FSLN's future credibility depends to a significant extent on how it deals with this issue.
Harmonizing DissonanceThe Left should understand UNO as a contradictory unity, and its own task to make contradiction the dominant factor. But this will be difficult given the tensions within the FSLN itself. Meanwhile UNO is delightedly trying to promote contradictions inside the FSLN: divide the revolutionary people from the army, play the “radical” Sandinistas off the “moderates,” work to further divide those favoring concertation from those who oppose it and promote a thorough split between those giving priority to “national unity” and those who emphasize “popular unity.” It is difficult for the FSLN to bring the contradictions inherent in the current situation into harmony and mold a new strategy and coherent tactics. Complicated under any conditions, this effort has been exacerbated by the post-electoral “shock” inside the FSLN, the unions and the army, although the latter two rallied rapidly to their particular realities. It has also been hindered by the loss of the cohesive structure that the former government offered, along with a drastic cutback in paid party activist.
The pro-Sandinista unions, hard hit by the government's economic measures, set off on a new road of militant struggle. The Sandinista army set off on a new road too, one of intelligent negotiations with the government. Which of these is the Sandinista road? In very broad strokes, this is the heart of the problem being fought out inside the FSLN; both the unions and the army have brought the issue of Sandinista unity to the table.
From envío's earliest issues after the change in government, we took as ours the opinion of an experienced agricultural leader who expressed the current tasks by use of an old slogan: “People, army, unity: guarantee of victory.” Given that both the militant road taken by the revolutionary people and the negotiated one upheld by the army are fundamentally correct, the task facing the FSLN is how to synthesize these two positions. Once synthesis is achieved, the question becomes how to bring the two different rhythms into harmony. It is around this problem that the unity issue is being played out.
In the same way that the US is working to forge unity out of UNO's contradictions, revolutionaries need to work to synthesize their own contradictions. As Carlos Fonseca said, Sandino shows us the way: a united people cannot be strategically—only institutionally—separated from an armed people.
The July strike was a test of strength for the Sandinistas. The UNO extremists were essentially demanding that the armed people repress the united people. The FSLN’s mediation was key both to maintaining unity and to the strike's success. It is critical now, for both the popular sectors and the nation as a whole, that solutions be found to stabilize that unity and continue forward.
Towards a Lasting Accord“Concertation” is on the agenda in Nicaragua. Everyone speaks of the need to reduce the polarization and come to some working agreement among forces to make the country more governable. An authentic concertation, or minimal harmonizing of positions, between the government and the FSLN can only result from the unity of the FSLN. In turn, Sandinista unity will be solid only if it can dialectically bring together the contradictions springing naturally from the current situation.
The army has already carried out its concertation with the pragmatic wing of the government. The unions and mass organizations have been unable to do so because the political and economic assaults they face create tensions and obstacles, but the effective veto power they have demonstrated in the two strikes seems to have demonstrated to the government that a national concertation without them will not be viable over the long haul.
The unions and mass organizations have to put their cards on the table. There are both short- and long-term issues, including the question of privatization, the controversial Decrees 10-90 and 11-90 and reactivation of industry. Not all issues have to be part of the same agreement, but only a deepening of the civilian aspects of the Transition Protocol will bring the country much needed stability.
Within the FSLN, there may certainly be discussions over specific points that should or should not be negotiated in a concertation with the government, but it is hard to imagine that concertation itself would directly cause a division. If tensions persist, they will more likely have to do with power disputes rather than long-term programmatic issues. A radicalism in search of a concertation that would move the country forward in a democratic and constitutional manner differs substantially from a radicalism that attaches such unrealistic conditions to a concertation as to make it impossible. “Between workers and capitalists, there's nothing to talk about. They're robbing us, forcing us into unemployment and we have to fight against this. Down with concertation!” was the position taken by Bonifacio Miranda, leader of the Revolutionary Workers' Party (PRT) in a debate on concertation held in Nicaragua's National Autonomous University on August 31. Other ultra-leftists and some Sandinistas support that position, but they offer no viable project for Nicaragua today. This extreme left wing limits itself to criticism, sometimes brilliant and always easy, of any currents that do have a viable political project.
Synthesizing contradictions: A national solutionOf the country's four existing political currents—the extreme Right, which promotes a neo-fascist solution to annihilate the FSLN; the extreme Left, looking for a radical and unreal solution to the crisis; the pragmatic sector of UNO pushing its neoliberal project; and the FSLN, which hopes in the long term to build a democratic socialist alternative—only the last two have a project that can work in Nicaragua. But they will have to reach a concertation. The country’s problem lies in the fact that while the extreme Left has no veto power, the fascist Right does insofar as the US Embassy supports it strategically, offering only tactical support to the pragmatists. Dangerous signs of this have become clear in recent weeks. The US will condition continued disbursement of its aid package on government compliance with IMF economic measures and with the key tenets of the extreme right-wing project: total and rapid privatization of state property and the dismantling of the Sandinista army.
Considering these pressures as well as the economic abyss over which the country hangs, concertation has another critical goal: bringing the United States to the negotiating table. If this is achieved, Nicaragua can become a viable country and the US will have contributed, albeit in its own interests, to regional stability. In a concertation of this nature, strategic foundations could be established that would last well beyond the 1996 elections and be respected by whichever party is elected in the next round. If this is not the case, sooner or later armed struggle will again become the only solution to the country's ongoing social problems.
The fundamental problem in post-election Nicaragua has its roots in the division of the bourgeoisie during the Somoza dictatorship into two factions: the strictly Somocista one and the Conservative Party opposition.
Although they managed to maintain certain cohesion for decades, the Somocista form of capital accumulation heightened the division in the 1970s. The rupture came when the dictatorship assassinated Pedro Joaquin Chamorro, the most visible leader of the Conservative opposition, in January 1978. The FSLN at that time came to an accord with the bourgeois opposition under the slogan, “death to Somocismo.”
With the 1979 toppling of the military dictatorship, the FSLN took power with the bourgeois opposition as a minor partner. Eventually, the alliance broke down, and Reagan set to work to reunite the bourgeoisie, giving the Somocistas military tasks and the opposition civilian tasks in the new contra war. This recomposition had as its final expression the formation of the National Opposition Union (UNO).
The current division inside UNO is another chapter in this structural bourgeois conflict. Godoy's project is a reincarnation of Somocismo, attracting those who were expropriated and fled the country. COSEP, allied with those exiles and more recently with Godoy, took the following position in an internal letter published July 23 by Barricada. “We will emphasize once again what we have said many times in the past. As long as the FSLN exists as a political force in Nicaragua, there will not be peace or economic progress.” The pragmatists, on the other hand, are the heirs to the Pedro Joaquín Chamorro opposition of the 1970s; the project of his widow and son-in law appeals mainly to independent “modernizing” entrepreneurs who stayed here fighting, and at least partially changing their mentalities. It is logical that those seeking a climate to guarantee economic development do not feel represented by those promoting instability and possible civil war implied by “annihilation” of the FSLN. A successful concertation on the FSLN’s part consists essentially of a long-term accord with those UNO pragmatists to isolate and bury Somocismo once and for all.
Meanwhile, the economic crisis is unfolding far faster and is more pressing than the political positions taken by any party or group. Hunger could well generate the conditions for a social explosion far beyond anyone's control.
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