More on Nicaraguan Elections

["Ken Hanly" <khanly@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

>From the Independent (UK)

Troops on stand-by in Nicaraguan elections
By Jan McGirk, Latin America Correspondent
05 November 2001
With 16,000 armed security troops on stand-by to prevent election violence,
Nicaraguans went to the polls yesterday in a presidential election that may
drastically alter the strategic balance of power in the hemisphere.

Washington fears a victory by Daniel Ortega, the former Sandinista
revolutionary, over Enrique Bolanos, a wealthy businessman whose sugar
plantations Mr Ortega once confiscated.

The State Department said it feared the emergence of an "iron Communist
triangle" in Latin America, comprising Cuba, Nicaragua and Venezuela, whose
President, Hugo Chavez, is a close friend of Fidel Castro.

Voters as young as 16 can cast ballots, though they are too young to
remember the eight-year civil war with the Contras, backed by America under
Ronald Reagan, that left 30,000 Nicaraguans dead, or the Sandinistas'
socialist policies, which wrecked the economy.

Many of the advisers in President George Bush's administration are the same
men who mined Nicaragua's harbour and slapped a punishing embargo on the
country because of Sandinista links to Moscow and Havana.

Nicaragua's 2.8 million voters are closely divided. Mr Bolanos is the
current vice-president in the centre-right Liberal administration, but has
been accused of failing to curb massive corruption. Mr Ortega still appeals
mostly to the poor.

If Nicaraguans choose Mr Ortega, America may cut foreign aid programmes and
investments, a serious threat to a country where more than 80 per cent live
in poverty and unemployment tops 50 per cent.

Cutbacks in the coffee industry and tourism, compounded by food shortages
due to drought followed by floods, have devastated the rural poor. Millions
struggle to survive on the equivalent of 70p a day and are malnourished. Mr
Ortega, 55, and Mr Bolanos, 73, both promise to create new jobs.

Mr Ortega, who ruled Nicaragua for 11 years after toppling the dictatorship
of Anastasio Somoza in 1979, has reinvented himself. Shedding his army
fatigues and anti-American rhetoric to secure alliances with other parties,
he has portrayed himself as a peacenik, appealing to Jesus Christ in nearly
every speech.

Moves by his stepdaughter to revive child abuse charges against him have not
greatly dented his support. To curry favour with the United States, Mr
Ortega said he would appoint Antonio Lacayo, a pragmatist who served under
president Violeta Chamorro, as his foreign minister. Two other cabinet posts
would go to prominent figures who were jailed by the Sandinistas in the
1980s, he said. Mr Ortega also pledged to work against terrorism.

American officials have cited "grave reservations" about a 21st-century
comeback by the Sandinistas. Washington claims they have links to supporters
of terrorism such as Libya and Cuba. Its overtly partisan meddling included
an endorsement for the free-marketeer Bolanos from the American President's
brother, Jeb Bush, the Governor of Florida. "Daniel Ortega is an enemy of
all that the United States represents," he said in an advertisement.

President Arnaldo Aleman warned that he would declare a state of emergency
if disturbances broke out. Mr Ortega promised that his Sandinistas would
honour the election results and alleged that the Liberals may attempt to
annul the vote, if it went against them, by calling in the army.

Former US president Jimmy Carter, who is observing the elections, told
reporters that it was "not acceptable" to declare a state of emergency if
there was merely a close vote.

Mr Carter, who also monitored the 1990 and 1996 elections, which Mr Ortega
lost, said he expected the election to be fair. "I have noticed the strong
opinions expressed in Washington about this election's outcome," he said. "I
personally disapprove of statements or actions of another country that might
influence the votes of people of another sovereign nation."