Nicaragua’s co-president Rosario Murillo would not survive in power after the death of her husband, Daniel Ortega, former guerrilla commander Mónica Baltodano said in an interview while in exile in Costa Rica. Baltodano, 71, fought, like Ortega, in the Sandinista National Liberation Front guerrilla movement, the leftist FSLN, which in 1979 overthrew the four-decade dictatorship of the Somoza family.
Stripped of her nationality and property, like hundreds of critics and opponents, she was forced to leave Nicaragua in August 2021 after denouncing Ortega’s “authoritarian drift.” Ortega has been in power for 18 years. Her four children are also in exile.
Opponents say Murillo, 74, is carrying out an internal purge ahead of Ortega’s eventual death. Ortega is 80 and suffers from lupus and kidney failure. In the small, welcoming garden of the house where she lives with her husband and dog, decorated with Nicaraguan photos, paintings and handicrafts, Baltodano shared her thoughts with AFP on Nicaragua’s future.
How Do You Experience Exile?
“Exile is difficult, but as you get older it becomes doubly painful. I thought I would be taking care of my grandchildren, I was dedicated to writing, and I ran a small hostel.
“But we have seen the opportunity to keep speaking, not to remain silent, to denounce, to do international work. We have found strength to also take on exile as a trench of struggle.”
How Do You Describe the Somoza and Ortega Regimes?
“Somoza was genocidal, but there was civic struggle combined with armed struggle, demonstrations, even the press. “If Ortega had faced an armed struggle like the one we waged, he would be more genocidal than Somoza. “This is a more closed regime. It resembles North Korea. It used exile, denationalization, and ended up brutally persecuting the Catholic Church. No independent institution can exist in Nicaragua.
“When he attacked demonstrations during the 2018 protests and murdered unarmed young people, he committed crimes against humanity. He and Rosario, because she also gave orders to shoot. “So, comparatively, this is a worse regime than the one we had to face under Somoza.”
What Are Ortega and Murillo Like?
“They express the brutal mutation of two beings absolutely corrupted by ambition”. “Ortega was not a brilliant person. He was never a great hero either. Rather, he was a dull person, second-rate, intellectually mediocre. He is obsessed with power.
“She is a person… I would say evil, very bad, with many inferiority complexes. She hates, for example, all of us who have history and a track record, because she could not build that for herself. She is also a very cruel person. To me, she has sociopathic traits.
“They have ended up building a regime that is not only dictatorial, but totalitarian. They now also control all branches of power in a family-based way, with their children. “They live in permanent distrust. That is why today they have more prisoners from within their own structures than from the opposition.”
Would Murillo Survive Ortega’s Death?
“Rosario would not withstand Ortega’s disappearance because she continues to manage him as a kind of icon, almost elevated to the level of a deity. The institutions would not subordinate themselves to her the way they currently do. “The FSLN no longer exists as an organization, as a party. It is an apparatus used mainly by Murillo to monitor, repress and manipulate.
“And there is enormous potential for rebellion among the people. The conditions need to be created for the internal mobilization of all that buried rebelliousness, not only because of the brutal expulsion of dissident leaders, but because of the terror that prevails.”
Do You Fear for Your Safety in Exile?
“We have taken the repression with a fair amount of calm so as not to punish ourselves, so as not to deny ourselves the minimums of a decent life. “Like every authoritarian regime, it uses mechanisms of infiltration, surveillance, threats, which we have never stopped receiving through social media and phone calls.
“We take certain measures, but we do not live obsessed with fear.”
Can a Fragmented and Exiled Opposition Help Bring Change in Nicaragua?
“The coordination of opposition forces, which have different ideological and political emphases, will come later. “The current moment must be one of building organization. “After that, the broad united front that we will have to create for the transition will come as a consequence.”
Some Expect U.S. Action Similar to Venezuela. What Do You Think?
“Nicaraguans have to be capable of solving our own problems, not with our backs turned to the international community, but not as the result of interventionist actions by any power.”
Where Do You See Yourself in Your Final Days?
“In Nicaragua, I am absolutely certain.”
