For Now, Calm

Following the drama described in my last post, circumstances here in Carazo have returned largely to normal, as before the mid-April uprising and the ensuing tranques and defenses against the dreaded caminetas. The streets are again open to traffic and commerce, albeit a heavily-armed police presence, especially around banks, is now in evidence. The shops are full of people, street vendors are hard at it, and save for some blackened patches on the road surface from car fires, there is little testimony to the privation and terror of the preceding weeks.

The buses and microbuses are back to their original routes, although the fares have risen. It now costs 40 cordobas to Managua from Diriamba, a 33% increase; 15 from Las Esquinas to Jinotepe, up 50% from 10. The passengers seem not to be interested in discussing the absence of the tranques or the general return to apparent normalcy. What, I wonder, was the point of the struggles, the deaths, the sheer loss of jobs and income from the now devastated tourist economy?

There have been subsequent demonstrations elsewhere. Ortega is now blaming the paramilitaries for the violence toward the populace. He’s been studying Trump’s playbook. But nobody doubts that Ortega’s regime and the Sandinista party are bankrolling the camionetas and the snipers. The people’s representatives at the “Dialogo” table, set up by the bishops to negotiate a peaceful resolution with Ortega back in May, are suddenly being charged with terroristic crimes by a justice system tainted by and beholden to the Ortega regime. Brave individuals who stepped forward to articulate the people’s discontent, to assert their demands for an end to corruption and official thievery, are now sitting in jail awaiting trial for treason. It seems there is no tactic too ignoble to employ in Ortega’s shameless efforts to stamp out opposition to his tyranny.

And here in Carazo, there is little evidence that ignoble tactics are not effective. Todo está  tranquilo.

Pagada

Travel to Toronto was less than convenient. My flight was canceled, a later flight left much later, and the 22-hour trip resulted in a somewhat blurry first few days. Somehow, the fish in Lake Ontario got over their not unreasonable fear of my famed piscatorial talents, and the local wineries survived the Beatty invasion, and a very good time was too soon relegated to the past tense. My return to Nicaragua was uneventful, thankfully.

During my absence, the violence continued. Within five days of my return, the government-paid paramilitaries and National Police forces descended on the Carazo district with deadly intent. The popular tranques in Diriamba and Jinotepe were besieged and dismantled, with more than 20 deaths, mainly of young men defending their towns. A dozen people, including journalists, sought sanctuary in the Basilica of Saint Sebastian in Diriamba.  A Catholic cardinal and the bishops of Managua and other dioceses traveled to Diriamba to liberate them, but a mob of masked Orteguistas and paramilitaries, armed with guns and machetes, attacked them viciously. The monsignor and priest of St. Sebastian were beaten. Journalists were attacked and their equipment destroyed.

Mrs. Daniel Ortega, also called vice president Rosario Murillo, described the incident as thoroughly "Christian." She is, unsurprisingly, the most hated woman in Nicaragua.

Pope John Paul II visited that Basilica. Christmas, 2016, my sister Mary Mary and I attended a beautiful midnight Mass there. I asked Maria José if there were Ortega supporters in Diriamba. She shrugged and said, "Pagada." Paid.  The local Sandinista party apparatchiks pay people to oppose the popular uprising. And beat elderly monsignors.

This is a very dirty civil war.