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It is for the Nicaraguan people to determine their future

With Nicaragua coming under increasing pressure from Washington, TONY BURKE explains why defending the country’s right to self-determination is of paramount importance

SUCCESSIVE US administrations have over the years done everything they can to crush Nicaragua. 

Over 40 years ago, during the Thatcher-Reagan cold war era, the US launched an undeclared mercenary war that cost some 30,000 lives and devastated the Nicaraguan economy. 

An intense media campaign, which bears striking similarities to what is happening today, depicted Nicaragua as a communist totalitarian dungeon with troops poised to storm the Texan border.

Under the Trump administration, the US vendetta against Nicaragua has continued.  

For four years the US poured $35 million (£27m) of funding into right-wing opposition groups in Nicaragua in a bid to oust its democratically elected government and bring about regime change. 

A US-inspired coup attempt in 2018 failed, but since that time Donald Trump has escalated Washington’s economic and psychological warfare by imposing a series of coercive and illegal sanctions which aim to isolate the country. 

Trump has even labelled Nicaragua an “unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.”

The US has cut the country off from access to international loans that would be used to implement a range of social programmes which benefit the poorest and most vulnerable in society.  

Over the past year, as the US administration has escalated its economic war, US-backed right-wing groups have exploited the Covid-19 pandemic to try to destabilise the government.  

They have also successfully organised a barrage of hostile stories in the international corporate media.

Since 2007, when the FSLN government under President Daniel Ortega returned to power after 16 years of neoliberal government, Nicaragua has undergone remarkable transformation. 

On regaining power, the government restarted the social investment and anti-poverty programmes which the revolution promised. 

Nicaraguans now enjoy universal free healthcare and education. Poverty fell from 48.3 per cent in 2007 to 24.9 per cent in 2016, and extreme poverty also fell from 17.2 per cent to 6.9 per cent.  

In part this resulted from government subsidies for basic needs such as electricity and bus transport, but also through massive promotion of what is known as the “popular economy” of small businesses and co-operatives.

It enabled Nicaragua to minimise its dependence on large firms and foreign-owned multinationals which dominate most Latin American economies.  

Electricity coverage, only 48 per cent during the neoliberal period, has increased to over 97 per cent. 

Nicaragua also ranks fifth in the world in the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap report, because of its policies of securing equal rights for women at all levels of government and political institutions.

In July, Nicaragua celebrated the 41st anniversary of the Sandinista Revolution.  

Elected with 72 per cent of the popular vote in 2016, the FSLN government faces new elections in November 2021. 

Current indications point to another victory for the FSLN, which retains huge support among Nicaragua’s trade unions, co-operatives and those working in the social economy.  

On the other hand, if the Trump and the US succeed in their ambitions, we will witness the establishment of yet another US puppet government in Latin America and Nicaragua will see a return to the neoliberal policies of the past. 

If anyone doubts this is the case, they only have to look at what has happened since the US-inspired coup in Honduras a decade ago, or the current oppression in Bolivia after Evo Morales was forced out of office.

The defence of Nicaragua’s sovereignty and its right to self-determination is therefore of paramount importance. 

It is for the Nicaraguan people alone to determine their future, free from outside interference by the US and other interests.

Tony Burke is assistant general secretary of Unite.

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