365 - Despotism Flourishes, Even in the Western Hemisphere

Alongside the globe's more horrific despotisms -- China, Russia, Cambodia, Equatorial Guinea, Turkmenistan, and Zimbabwe, plus the military potentates in Myanmar, Mali, Niger, and Burkina Faso --- Nicaragua often escapes notice. But a killing earlier this month in neighboring Costa Rica of a prominent Nicaraguan dissident reminds us that the husband/wife team that rules Nicaragua harshly will pursue its critics relentlessly everywhere, just like Putin and Trump do.

Major Roberto Samcam Ruiz had been loyal member of the Sandinista political party before breaking with its cruel married rulers -- President Daniel Ortega, 73, and Vice-President Rosario Murillo, 67. His assassination in his house in San Jose, Costa Rica's capital, was not the first attempted hit orchestrated by Ortega/Murillo on Samcam, wounded in drive-by shootings earlier. He was at least the sixth Sandinista dissident shot or abducted since 2018. Ortega/Murillo have waged a ceaseless battle against their former comrades in Costa Rica and elsewhere in Central America from that year.

Since 2007, when Ortega returned to office after seventeen years, the ruling couple have manipulated elections, destroyed judicial independence, and made the legislature bow to their authoritarian will. For at least the last decade, Ortega and Murillo have eliminated opponents, especially those who were allied with Ortega as Sandinista guerrillas trying to overthrow the long despotic reign of the Somoza family.

The Somozas ruled Nicaragua in a heavy-handed manner from 1936 until 1979, when the Sandinista National Liberation Front managed to oust Anastasio Somoza Debayle, the son of Anastasio Somoza Garcia, founder of the kleptocratic dynasty. The Sandinistas were backed by the Soviet Union and Cuba.

Somoza Garcia, the family founder, died in 1956, being succeeded by Luis Somoza Debayle from 1957 to 1963. His younger brother took over and served two terms between 1967 and 1979. During these years the Somozas largely ruled with backing from Washington. They accumulated huge sums of cash -- 33 percent of the nation's GDP --while the country remained poor and largely dependent on banana exports to North America.

Hundreds of thousands Nicaraguans fled their country in 2018 and 2019, after Ortega's regime cracked down on spontaneous protesters who had repeatedly taken to the streets of Managua and other Nicaraguan cities in anger at the way Ortega and Murillo were betraying the goals of the revolution that they had all participated in and which had achieved victory over the long-standing Somoza machine.

Ortega responded in a draconian manner: He accused opponents of plotting a coup, jailed hundreds, compelled thousand to flee across nearby borders, confiscated the properties of those who left, and deprived them of Nicaraguan citizenship.

Ortega and his wife have managed to gain control of every aspect of Nicaragua's government, including the National Assembly, the Supreme Court, the armed forces, the judiciary, the police and the prosecutor’s office. Many Ortega adult children have been given franchises in such lucrative enterprises as national television and the sale of gasoline. The Somozas were corrupt. Ortega/Murillo and their kin are all greater kleptocrats, fleecing what is left of one of the three poorest nations in the Western Hemisphere.

After renewed widespread protests again this spring, Ortega/Murillo again went on the offensive. The government tried to change the social security system, cutting benefit and increasing contributions from citizens, but much of the population, especially students, erupted. They took over college campuses and set up roadblocks. Government buildings were set afire, cars burned, and protesters and police fought pitched battles.

As a result, hundreds of civilians have been charged as terrorists, a popular television station has been closed, and international human rights observers have been expelled. Local human rights groups have been harassed and some shut. During the disturbances Nicaraguan police shot 322 civilians and wounded 1,400. More than 60,000 regime opponents have fled to Costa Rica and Honduras.

Internally, there were more arrests of critics. Externally, Nicaragua's intelligence service has been tracking and harassing opponents. The death of Samcam is but another desperate response by leaders who are reviled by most Nicaraguans.

Costa Rica is no longer, given Samcam's killing -- presumably by Nicaraguan intelligence officers or assassins hired by Ortega -- anything like a safe haven for outspoken critics of Ortega/Murillo. And other nearby countries are even more dangerous. Nor, given Trump's immigration policies, can Nicaraguan freedom strugglers find refuge in the United States.

Costa Rica trades extensively with Nicaragua and so its president has been slow to pin Samcam's murder on Ortega's government. Washington has responded surprisingly strongly however. Last week, Trump signed the Nicaraguan Investment Conditionality Act, a law aimed at crippling Nicaragua economically by ceasing lending from international development banks.

Although Costa Rica is still Central America's least corrupt and best governed state, and tourism and tourists are not being targeted so far either by Nicaragua or by the Colombian drug smugglers who are establishing their cocaine trafficking trails in southwestern Costa Rica and in and near San Jose, Costa Rica is more at risk from actions to its north and south than ever before. Washington needs to help the Organization of American States (OAS) to curtail Ortega/Murillo or (easier than in Iran) sponsor a campaign leading to regime change.