Nicaragua: A Dictatorship How-To By: Jessica Boeve
Daniel Ortega, the current president of Nicaragua, has achieved what many leaders of so-called democratic countries across the globe aspire to – a pseudo dictatorship.[1] Ortega’s rise to power and gradual government transformation has followed an all too familiar path and could studied as a step-by-step guide for turning a democracy into a dictatorship.[2]
Step 1: Create a Movement and/or Invoke an External Threat
In 1893, following the British ceding control of Nicaragua, General Jose Santos Zelaya seized power and established a dictatorship.[3] The United States stepped in to “depose” Zelaya in 1909 and subsequently established multiple military bases across the country.[4] A guerilla force led by Augusto Cesar Sandino rose up against the US occupation and military presence, but Sandino was killed within seven years of leadership.[5] With support from the US, the Nicaraguan National Guard commander, General Anastasio Somaza Garcia was elected president and began a forty-four year Somoza family dictatorship.[6] Following a devastating earthquake in 1972 and the assassination of the Democratic opposition leader in 1978, the Sandinista National Liberation Front (the “Sandinistas”) gained extensive support and ousted the Somoza regime in 1980.[7] Daniel Ortega, the leader of the Sandinistas, was elected president in 1984, but a set of three natural disasters preceded power hand offs in the Nicaraguan government.[8] The 1988 hurricane that left 180,000 Nicaraguans homeless preceded Ortega’s 1990 bid for presidential reelection; a 1992 earthquake that left 16,000 Nicarguans homeless shifted presidential power again to Arnoldo Aleman; and finally the liberal party was reelected in 2001 following a devastating hurricane in 1998.[9] Before Aleman left the presidential office, he struck a deal with Ortega that lowered the threshold to win the presidential elections, which led to Ortega’s win in 2006 despite historically low polling numbers.[10] Ortega created shifts in political ideology within Nicaragua by capitalizing on fear and poverty following natural disasters and invoking the threat of the outsider – the US government.
Step 2: Consolidate Power
Ortega appeared to be following through on his promises to eliminate hunger and illiteracy within Nicaragua in his first few months of presidency, but in 2008, Ortega began denying journalists access to government reports and aligned himself heavily with Venezuelan president, Hugo Chávez.[11] Ortega leveraged this partnership with Venezuela and the connection to discounted oil to garner support from those in poverty.[12] Between 2009 and 2014, general poverty rate in Nicaraguan dropped from forty-two percent to thirty percent and Ortega used the majority of the oil profits to feed into social programs.[13] With this backdrop, Ortega announced his intention to amend the constitution and allow himself the ability to run for a second consecutive term as president.[14] By 2016, and backed by a supermajority, Ortega ran for a third presidential term with his wife, Rosario Murilla, as his vice president.[15] Though he captured seventy-two percent of the vote, these elections were boycotted by many opposition members and were not witnessed or verified by international observers.[16] Since being reelected as president, Ortega has jailed hundreds of opponents, whether these individuals posed actual political threats, or simply were perceived as threats.[17]
3. Remove Checks and Balances and Manipulate Information
In 2018, university students and civil activists staged protests across Nicaraguan calling for Ortega to step down in response to his proposed Social Security reforms.[18] Dozens were killed in the conflict, but the government suppressed media coverage and Ortega minimized the casualties publicly.[19] Throughout the weeks following the protests, Ortega withdrew his proposed reforms, but unleashed police to violently crack down on the unrest and dissent.[20] Ortega convinced the Sandinistas in political power that the unrest was “an assault . . . on the legacy of the Sandinista revolution.”[21] By 2020, with the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, Ortega capitalized on the fractured government and downplayed the dangers of the Covid-19.[22] He refused to close schools, businesses, or the Nicaraguan border; instead Ortega threw a mass parade called “Love in the Time of Covid-19.”[23] Ortega manipulated “official statistics” and claimed that fewer than 200 Nicaraguans had died of Covid-19 when in reality more than 3,300 deaths between January 2020 and June 2021 could be attributed to the disease.[24] By 2020, the Nicaraguan legislature was dominated by Ortega loyalists who passed numerous laws to limit the freedom and equality in the election process as well as laws that made it illegal to disseminate news that had not been authorized by the government.[25] Ortega and his wife, the co-president, referred to this unauthorized news as “fake news.”[26] One of the most dangerous of these new laws was a law passed in December 2020 that prohibited undefined “traitors” from holding public office.[27] Uncoincidentally, by June 2021, the Ortega government used these laws to justify the arrest of dozens of opposition figures and the Ortega-Murillo ticket won a fourth consecutive presidential term.[28]
4. Restrict Civil Liberties and Rights
Despite international condemnation for sham elections and human rights violations, Ortega and the Sandinista-controlled congress maintains power in Nicaragua.[29] Since the protests in 2018, Ortega and his wife have shut down more than 5,000 NGOs across Nicaragua.[30] Thousands of Nicaraguans have been forced into exile due to the recent constitutional amendment that allows “traitors to the homeland” to be stripped of their Nicaraguan citizenship.[31] Ortega and Murillo have already used this amendment against hundreds of journalists, activists, professors, and oppositional politicians as well as church and media leaders who the government watches closely to ensure are not “subject to ‘foreign interests.’”[32]
Democracies are fragile. Democracy requires protection. Ortega has followed a playbook that has worked for many leaders across the years to turn democracy into dictatorship. When any government or leader attempts to capitalize on a common enemy, consolidate power, remove checks and balances while manipulating information, and restrict civil liberties all citizens should be alarmed. This is red flag behavior.
[1] See generally Christopher Sabatini, Explainer: Nicaragua’s Descent into Dictatorship, Chatham House (Oct. 26, 2023), https://www.chathamhouse.org/publications/the-world-today/2023-04/explainer-nicaraguas-descent-dictatorship.
[2] Id.
[3] Nicaragua Profile – Timeline, BBC (May 31, 2018), https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-19909695.
[4] Id.
[5] Id.
[6] Id.
[7] Id.
[8] Id.
[9] Id.
[10] Sabatini, supra note 1.
[11] Daniel Ortega, Britannica, https://www.britannica.com/biography/Daniel-Ortega (last visited Feb. 16, 2025).
[12] Id.
[13] Id.
[14] Id.
[15] Id.
[16] Id.
[17] Betsy Reed, Nicaragua: Ortega and Wife to Assume Absolute Power After Changes Approved, Guardian (Nov. 22, 2024), https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/nov/22/nicaragua-ortega-wife-absolute-power.
[18] Alexia Diao, Nicaragua’s President Withdraws Social Security Reforms That Sparked Violent Unrest, NPR (Apr. 22, 2018), https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/04/22/604762080/violent-unrest-continues-in-nicaragua-over-social-security-reforms.
[19] Daniel Ortega, supra note 11.
[20] Daniel Ortega, supra note 11.
[21] Daniel Ortega, supra note 11.
[22] Daniel Ortega, supra note 11.
[23] Daniel Ortega, supra note 11.
[24] Daniel Ortega, supra note 11.
[25] Daniel Ortega, supra note 11.
[26] Daniel Ortega, supra note 11.
[27] Daniel Ortega, supra note 11.
[28] Daniel Ortega, supra note 11.
[29] See generally Reed, supra note 17.
[30] Reed, supra note 17.
[31] Reed, supra note 17.
[32] Reed, supra note 17.