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.