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OEA/Ser.L/V/II.76 ANNUAL
REPORT OF THE INTER-AMERICAN COMMISSION NICARAGUA
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has continued monitoring
the human rights situation in Nicaragua. This section seeks to provide an
account of its observations, thereby supplementing the information supplied in
its 1981 Special Report on that country, the report on the status of human
rights of the Miskito population, and in the successive Annual Reports issued
since 1982.
The period covered by this Annual Report has been particularly rich in
events connected with the enforcement of human rights in Nicaragua. The
Inter-American Commission took part in the process that led to the partial
release of persons serving prison sentences imposed by Special Justice
Tribunals, in view of the importance of this issue—to which a definitive
solution has not yet been found—a detailed account is given in Chapter V of
this Annual Report.
This period, moreover, witnessed major international developments, such
as the talks held by the Central American Presidents, that had a bearing on the
human rights situation, even as Nicaraguan society itself underwent changes that
will doubtless affect the immediate future of those rights within the country.
This section will deal with these aspects.
As regards the right to life, the period covered by this Annual Report
registers several complaints of violations of the same, chargeable to members of
the Sandinista Popular Army and to the Ministry of the Interior's General Bureau
of State Security, which took the form of extrajudicial executions and forced
disappearances. According to the available information, these violations were
particularly serious in the Sixth Region.
The government later reported that as a result of investigations, members
of the Sandinista Popular Army had been sentenced to prison terms ranging from
five to thirty years for proven violations of the right to life. The Commission
hopes for continued investigation and vigorous punishment of these types of
violations of the right to life, so as to eradicate this evil practice.
Also during the period covered by this report, Nicaragua enacted a new
constitutional law regulating the application for habeas corpus [`Recurso de
Exhibición Personal]. The Commission is pleased to note that this legal action
will remain open during a State of Emergency, but believes that including the
terms “unlawful arrest” or “illegal detention” [“detención illegal”
o “privación illegal de la libertad”] in Article 45 mistakenly qualifies
the circumstances under which the application is admissible, for if this action
is meant to protect the personal safety of the individual, it should be allowed
to operate irrespective of the lawfulness of arrest. The Commission trust that
Nicaraguan court decisions will remedy this shortcoming.
During the period covered by this Annual Report, important developments
have also taken place in connection with the exercise of political rights, as
defined in Article 23 of the American Convention. The Government of Nicaragua
has supplied some information on the rules adopted during this period to
organize the current electoral process and insure the effectiveness of certain
conditions under which it is to take place.
In view of the complexity and importance of this point, the
Inter-American Commission will deal with it at length, by first addressing the
regulatory framework of the American Convention on Human Rights—whose
provisions on Political Rights are binding on Nicaragua—and then discussing
the legal provisions enacted in the period covered by this Annual Report that
have to do with the exercise of political rights or civil rights related
thereto. This account will include the manner in which the provisions were
adopted, as well as the subsequent political agreements that were worked out in
their connection. It will also describe the actual conditions under which such
rights have been in fact exercised over the period covered by this Report.
Article 23 of the American Convention on Human Rights, which closely
parallels the wording of Article 25 of the International Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights and is based on Article 21 of the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights, states that elections to express the “will of the people”—in
the words of the Universal Declaration—are to be “periodic, genuine, and
carried out by universal and equal suffrage and by secret ballot guaranteeing
the free expression of the will of the voters.”
Accordingly, the act of electing representatives must be genuine, which
means that there must be a correspondence between the will of the electors and
the outcome of the election. To put it negatively, this characteristic implies
an absence of coercion to distort the will of the people. The Inter-American
Commission has repeatedly referred to two types of factors affecting the
genuineness of elections: on the one hand, those connected with the general
conditions under which the electoral process takes place, and on the other,
those that have to do with the legal and institutional system that organizes and
runs the elections themselves, in order words, matters directly and immediately
connected with the casting of votes.
As to the general conditions for the electoral process, the Commission
has pointed out that basically equivalent conditions must apply to the various
political groups participating in the electoral process; to put it negatively,
this means an absence of direct coercion or unwarranted advantages for one of
the participants. As for the institutional system responsible for organizing the
casting and counting of votes, the Inter-American Commission has stressed the
requirement of credibility that must characterize all decisions adopted under
that system; the Commission has also dealt with operational aspects, which must
exclude the possibility of influencing the will of the voter at the time the
vote is cast.
Another key factor is the universality of suffrage, as stipulated in
Article 23 of the American Convention. The Inter-American Commission has often
addressed this point, the object of which is to make certain that there are no
exclusions either based on ideological reasons or effectively barring a
significant number of those who support one of the contenders in the election.
The Commission will now turn to the conditions surrounding the present electoral
process in Nicaragua and the elements bearing on the universality of suffrage.
To do so, it must first describe the legal regulations adopted during this
period, underscoring the role played by political groups in this connection.
Electoral Law Nº 43 was promulgated on October 18, 1988 and subsequently
amended by Law Nº 57 of April 18, 1989 in order to fulfill the commitment made
by the President of Nicaragua at the meeting of Central American Presidents. On
both occasions, the proposals put forward by the opposition parties were not
included in the law, prompting the opposition to walk out of the Assembly when
the amendments were passed.
This led the parties grouped into the “Civic Opposition” to issue, on
April 25, 1989, a press release stating that the amendments of the Electoral Law
had been unilaterally approved by the Sandinista Front majority in the National
Assembly without considering the essence of the proposals made by the opposition
or the recommendations from the Electoral Commissions of Costa Rica and
Venezuela. The flaws they point to are: the subordination of the Supreme
Electoral Council to the dictates of the Executive, the absence of a reliable
system of voter registration, the absence of provision for absentee balloting by
Nicaraguan residents abroad, the fact that no moratorium was set for military
service recruitment, the failure to establish a fair system of funding for
political parties or to authorize them to receive donations from abroad, and the
failure to provide fair access to the media, to let mayors be elected by the
direct vote of the people, and to establish the electoral police.
Thereafter, on August 4, 1989, on the eve of his trip to the Tela meeting
with the other Central American Presidents, the President of Nicaragua reached
with the opposition parties a series of accords that supplemented the amendments
adopted by the Assembly and took account of many of the above points, which are
to be corrected through the proper legislative process.
On the subject of regulation of the media, the General Law on the Media
was enacted on April 21, 1989. It too failed to reflect concerns regarded as
fundamental by the opposition parties, for which reason the opposition boycotted
the voting on the law. This topic was also addressed in the agreements reached
after the talks of August 3 and 4, 1989, between the President of Nicaragua and
the opposition parties. For methodological reasons, these aspects will be
discussed when dealing with the exercise of the right to free expression.
Furthermore, and still in the area of regulatory action during the period
covered by this Annual Report, the Commission is also pleased to note that the
state of emergency has not been reintroduced in Nicaragua—except for a short
time last October, and this owing to hurricane Joan--, which in turn,
underscores the progress achieved in the Central American peace process.
Even so, the opposition parties have continued to press for amendment of
the Law on Preservation of Public Order and Security, on the grounds that it
grants excessive powers to the Nicaraguan authorities and has been, in practice,
the key instrument used by those authorities to control and curb its opponents.
This is a longstanding demand, as explained by the Commission in its previous
Annual Report (p. 330), where it was pointed out that some sectors of the
opposition did not attach great importance to the lifting of the state of
emergency so long as the law on Preservation of Public Order and Security
remained in effect.
During the period covered by this Annual Report, the demand to amend this
law continued to be heard. It was included, on April 5, 1989, in the document
addressed to the President of Nicaragua by the “Nicaraguan Civil
Opposition.” On August 4, 1989—the day before the Meeting of Central
American Presidents in Tela, Honduras—the opposition parties and the President
of Nicaragua signed a series of commitments, one of which calls for the
President to “place immediately before the National Assembly a bill to repeal
Decree 10-74 (Law on Preservation of Public Order and Security).” The
Commission hopes that the new law will be modified in such a way as to provide
effective protection for Nicaraguan citizens.
Mention of this law leads to one of the general requirements that tend to
insure the genuineness of electoral processes, namely the crucial aspect of the
right to personal liberty. In Nicaragua, two kinds of persons are in jail in
connection with political situations: those sentenced by the Special Justice
Tribunals and those sentenced or tried by the Anti-Somoza Popular Tribunals.
The Inter-American Commission has long insisted on the need to settle the
status of persons jailed for reasons originating in situations of a political
nature, emphasizing that this solution must come about within the framework of
the American Convention on Human Rights, the international instrument by which
Nicaragua is bound as a Contracting State. The opposition parties and major
figures and institutions of Nicaraguan society have all along insisted on the
need to resolve these problems through a general amnesty, whereas the
government, while accepting the need for such a measure, has made it subject to
various political conditions.
The situation of persons sentenced by Special Justice Tribunals, as well
as the role played in that matter by the Commission, is dealt with in a special
chapter of this Annual Report. Here, it is enough to note that although the
pardon of the 1.894 individuals released last March 17 is a step in the right
direction, the process through which this measure was adopted was not based on
legal considerations; accordingly, by denying a pardon to 39 persons, the
Government of Nicaragua continues to be in violation of the provisions of the
American Convention on Human Rights. It should be pointed out, furthermore, that
Decree Nº 44 of March 14, 1989 granting the pardon was issued over the
objections of the opposition parties. At this stage, and considering how the
process has been conducted by the Government of Nicaragua, the only reasonable
solution, in the eyes of the Commission, is to release those 39 persons
immediately.
The other category of persons jailed in Nicaragua for reasons originating
in political situations is that of individuals sentenced by the Anti-Somoza
Popular Tribunals under the provisions of the Law on Preservation of Public
Order and Security. The Inter-American Commission has repeatedly called
attention to the absence of procedural safeguards in the trials conducted by
those Tribunals. The Government of Nicaragua itself has acknowledged the need to
resolve these situations and has enacted amnesty laws at various times.
Thus, on November 19, 1987, the National Assembly passed an Amnesty Law
whose entry into force was made contingent on an end to the use of the territory
of Central American countries for the purpose of attacking other countries, as
well as end to the aid from the United States to the Nicaraguan resistance. On
March 26, 1988 a new Amnesty Law was passed by the Assembly in the wake of the
Sapoa Agreements. This time the release of persons sentenced or tried under the
Law on Preservation of Public Order and Security was made subject to completion
of the operative stages established in those agreements, the removal of
resistance forces to specific areas, and the signing of a definitive cease-fire.
As mentioned, on August 4, 1989 the President of the Republic of
Nicaragua and the opposition parties reached a series of political agreements.
Concerning the release of persons tried or sentenced under the Law on
Preservation of Public Order and Security, the Government of Nicaragua made
three commitments. First, it undertook to enact a broad and unconditional
Amnesty Law “which will take effect upon execution of the Voluntary
Demobilization, Relocation or Repatriation Plan” for the Nicaraguan resistance
forces. Secondly, it bound itself immediately to release those persons tried
under that Law “who are in a valetudinarian state, upon a finding from the
Human Rights and Peace Commission of the National Assembly or in the manner
established by the Criminal Code.” Lastly, it was agreed that the
“Government of Nicaragua shall consider releases based on a list supplied by
the undersigned political parties showing that the prisoners are members of
those political parties and are in jail for political activities.”
The encouraging presence of the peace process now under way in Central
America and the beneficial effect of that process on Nicaraguan society justify
the assertion that the political stipulations conditioning the entry into force
of the amnesty are no longer warranted. This is the more true considering the
electoral process now actively in progress, the fact that many individuals have
been in jail for a long time, and that some of them are seriously ill. Such are
the cases, for instance, of Jorge Ramírez Zelaya and Eliécer Rivera Ubeda,
both suffering from serious physical handicaps as a result of the wounds they
sustained when captured, the former in 1985 and the latter in 1988. It must not
be forgotten, moreover, that the 1987 amnesty was granted within the framework
of the Esquipulas agreements and was complied with by countries such as El
Salvador, which are racked by internal armed strife; Nicaragua, on the other
hand, despite persistent pleas from Nicaraguan public figures, continues to make
the granting of amnesty contingent on new political conditions, without
resolving the problem in the end.
In the judgment of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, and in
view of the current status of the peace process and the desire to land
credibility to the electoral process now under way, and for reasons of justice
and equity, the Government of Nicaragua should set free all persons now jailed
for reasons originating in situations of a political nature, in other words,
those sentenced and tried under the Law on Preservation of Public Order and
Security as well as the 39 individuals sentenced by the Special Justice
Tribunals. Indeed, if the genuineness of the elections is to be gauged by the
establishment of conditions allowing for equal participation by the various
groups vying for office, this requirement cannot be met so long as many members
of some groups remain jailed and all others are menaced by the use of that Law
at any time.
The Inter-American Commission therefore feels that the genuineness of the
forthcoming elections hinges largely on the prior settlement of the problem of
persons jailed for political reasons. Owing to the seriousness of problems that
have beset Nicaragua, the only way to settle this issue and lend credibility to
the current electoral process is by releasing all those persons, including the
39 who were arbitrarily excluded from the pardon last March.
Another element regarded as essential to the credibility of the electoral
process and the genuineness of elections is the exercise of the right to freedom
of expression. This condition presupposes the existence of not only a regulatory
structure adequately protecting that right, but also practices that do not
entail unfair advantages in the use of the media, particularly the media
available to the governing party.
It bears noting that on October 13, 1988—during the period covered by
this Annual Report—the news program of the Consejo Superior de la Empresa
Privada (COSEP) [Private Enterprise High Council] known as the “El Nicaragüense”
[The Nicaraguan] on Radio Mundial, was ordered off the air for broadcasting an
interview with Wilfredo Montalbán, a leader of the Resistance, who made
statements about high Nicaraguan authorities that were considered libelous by
officials of the Media Bureau of the Ministry of the Interior. The order was
issued under the provisions of the Media Law.
Also during the period covered by this Report, on November 2, 1988, the
news program “Seis en punto” [Six o'clock sharp] broadcast by Radio
Corporation was suspended until further notice, under Article 46 of the Media
Law then in effect, for airing—according to the Ministry of the Interior
responsible for the measure—false news reports contrary to national security.
It is worth mentioning, moreover, that during the first part of the
period covered by this Annual Report the news programming of Radio Católica
remained suspended; broadcasting resumed on March 27, 1989, pursuant to the
agreements signed by the Central American Presidents, as reported by the
Nicaraguan Government to the Inter-American Commission.
Bearing in mind this recent record as well as a long practice by the
Government of Nicaragua, it is not to be wondered at that the opposition has
long and persistently asked for the amendment of the Media Law. The Law has been
often denounced for leaving it to the Ministry of the Interior, through its
General Bureau of the Media, to decide how freedom of expression will be
exercised, to impose such penalties as it sees fit, and to review such measures
at the request of the affected parties.
As a result of persistent complaints from opposition parties, on February
14, 1989, in the El Salvador Declaration of the Central American Presidents, the
Government of Nicaragua undertook to guarantee:
… the free operation of means of communication by reviewing and
amending the Media Law, and equal access-as to hours and length of
broadcasting—to State television and radio by all political parties. The
Government of Nicaragua will authorize all media to obtain either within the
country or abroad, as may suit their convenience, all materials, articles and
equipment needed to fully discharge their task.
In response to repeated requests from opposition sectors and consistently
with above commitment, on April 15, 1989, the Government of Nicaragua sent to
the National Assembly a bill to amend the Media Law. Law Number 56, the General
Media Law was passed on April 21, 1989 by the governing party's majority in the
National Assembly. The law was challenged by the opposition parties, the
newspaper La Prensa—which described the new law as “Nazi-Fascist”—the
Association of Nicaraguan Journalists, and other independent entities of the
Government. Furthermore, by a communiqué issued on April 25, 1989, fifteen
opposition parties registered their disapproval of the new General Media Law,
which they described as “totalitarian in nature”.
The main objections to the law have to do with the government monopoly on
television, the ambiguity of certain expressions such as “national
interest,” and the direct subordination of Nicaraguan Media to the General
Bureau of the Media under the Ministry of the Interior, which is responsible for
issuing licenses and imposing penalties.
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights believes, in regard to this
point, that the new law grants excessive and counterproductive powers to the
Ministry of the Interior, for it removes a matter as sensitive as freedom of
expression from the jurisdiction of the civil court and places it under a
ministry, which is a political agency. Not surprisingly, therefore, on the
following August 4 the President of Nicaragua promised the opposition parties
to:
Immediately lay before the National Assembly a bill to amend the Media
Law, so that during the electoral process the application of the law may be
directly supervised by the Supreme Electoral Council in all matters within its
purview.
It is the view of the Inter-American Commission that, in light of
Nicaragua's history, freedom of expression safeguards must be made a part of the
legal framework and must be enforced by the country's courts. Political
commitments on the eve of international meetings are not sufficient to guarantee
the effectiveness of a human right as fundamental as freedom of expression.
Bearing in mind the control exercised over the media by the Ministry of
the Interior and the close ties between the machinery of government and the
political party in power, it is scarcely encouraging to find that the new Media
Law preserves the government monopoly over television. The Commission trusts
that the conduct of the Government of Nicaragua shall be guided by the
agreements it signed with the opposition parties as to times and ways in which
their viewpoints may be aired, and that no unfair advantage will be gained from
news coverage or such other means as government management of the news media can
procure wherever the media are subject to a government monopoly.
The Inter-American Commission is pleased to find that the provisions of
the new law reflect those of the American Convention on Human Rights as regards
the prohibition of prior censorship. Also praiseworthy are the provisions on
women, the role of the family, and the education of children and the young, as
well as those concerning participation by ethnic groups on the Atlantic Coast.
Another fundamental element found by the Inter-American Commission to
have a bearing on equal participation in the electoral process is the use of
government resources and monies to benefit one of the contenders in the
election. As regards Nicaragua, heated debate was focused on two elements: the
campaign use of government resources by the ruling party, and the channeling of
resources from abroad.
As background to the first aspect, it is interesting to recall that the
Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, in its Annual Report for 1983-1984,
did itself note that:
… it has verified that during the electoral process now under way
(1984), the Sandinista National Liberation Front has made wide use of all
resources placed at its disposal by the power of the State, which gives it an
advantage over the other contenders.
It comes as no surprise, therefore, that the opposition parties have
repeatedly asked for a specific provision on this matter to be included in the
amendments to the Electoral Law. This demand, in the form of a new provision to
follow Article 115, found its way into the proposals made by those parties to
the President of Nicaragua on April 9, 1989, but it was not considered when the
amendments to the Electoral Law were enacted on April 18, 1989.
The following August 4, on the eve of President Ortega's trip to the
Meeting of Presidents, an agreement was concluded to bar “the use of public
buildings for electoral campaigning” and “to effectively enforce the
prohibition of using government property and resources in partisan electoral
campaigning.” It was also agreed at that time that there was a need to
guarantee “that public employees do not carry on partisan activities during
working hours. No public or private employee may force its employees to take
part in political campaigning.” Again, the Inter-American Commission on Human
Rights points out that these kinds of provisions should be made a part of
Nicaraguan law rather than be left to impermanent political agreements.
The use of government resources encompasses not only the allocation of
goods and services in favor of one participant in the campaign but also the
absence of pressures applied against opponents. Nicaragua's history is very rich
in this kind of government behavior inconsistent with democratic requirements.
Prominent opponents of the government have repeatedly charged, and the
Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has had occasion to observe, that
groups of militants from the governing party openly harassed those who did not
share the official position. The Inter-American Commission has repeatedly
indicated the need for the government to prevent this type of behavior, in
keeping with the duty prescribed by Article 1.1 of the American Convention,
according to which governments have a duty not only to respect the rights and
freedoms defined therein but to guarantee their exercise.
This use of resources against opponents also prompted the opposition to
repeatedly ask the government to stop recruiting youths for the Patriotic
Military Service. This was one of the general conditions mentioned in the letter
of April 5, 1989 from the opposition parties to President Ortega, which led to
the agreement of August 4. The Commission hopes that this agreement will be put
into practice so as to include reserve troops of voting age.
The Commission must express its profound concern for the reiterated
complaints regarding the harassment of persons who have been released from
prison by means of a pardon last March. The Commission hopes that such behavior
ceases immediately and reminds the Government of Nicaragua of the commitment it
made to grant a broad pardon to fully restore the exercise of civil and
political rights to hose benefited by the pardon.
In a similar effort to curb the use of government resources by the party
in power, the opposition asked for the repeal of the Law on Jurisdictional
Functions of the Sandinista Police, about which the Inter-American Commission
stated in its previous Annual Report that proceedings before the police judges
established by that Law “do not adequately safeguard due process.” Again,
this very sensitive aspect of Nicaraguan political practice was covered by the
agreement of August 4, 1989, under which the President of Nicaragua undertook to
“immediately place before the National Assembly a bill to amend the Law on the
Jurisdictional Functions of the Sandinista Police, repealing the sections that
grant it jurisdiction.”
Sectors of the opposition have also asked the Government of Nicaragua to
cease confiscating property. This demand was included in the letter of April 5,
1989 sent by the “Civic Opposition” to President Ortega. On June 22, 1989
the government proceeded to expropriate the land of three major coffee producers
connected with the Private Enterprise High Council, arguing that the three were
sabotaging production plans. Members of the opposition, on the other hand, have
labeled this an intimidating maneuver of the part of the government. The
agreements of August 4, 1989 between the President of Nicaragua and opposition
leaders state that:
The Government reaffirms the guarantees covering the various forms of
property established by the Political Constitution, which shall not be subject
to confiscation, expropriation or seizure for purely political reasons.
Another problem had to do with the financing of campaign activities and,
in particular, resources obtained abroad. The proposal from the opposition
parties was to allow such aid without limitation, whereas the government
preferred to bar it altogether, and it was so enacted in Electoral Law Nº 43 of
October 18, 1988. When amendments to this law were discussed in April of this
year, it was decided to establish a system according to which fifty per cent of
any amount originating in a donation abroad is to go to the recipient, while the
other fifty per cent is credited to a common fund for the use of the Supreme
Electoral Council.
It should be noted, moreover, that the agreement between the opposition
parties and the President of Nicaragua appealed to governments with interests in
the region to refrain from carrying out covert activities in the electoral
process, including funding, which is to be channeled in accordance with
Nicaraguan law. The Inter-American Commission attaches special importance to the
strict heeding of this appeal.
The other element mentioned by the Inter-American Commission as bearing
on the genuineness of elections has to do with the agency responsible for
organizing the electoral process and conducting the elections themselves.
Various formulas were proposed by the opposition camp and by the governing party
to set up the Supreme Electoral Council, which is the fourth branch of
government under the Nicaraguan Constitution.
It must be borne in mind, in this regard, that because of the importance
of the functions assigned to the Supreme Electoral Council, the opposition
wanted the Council to be made up of very qualified and independent individuals.
In the Declaration issued by the Central American Presidents in El Salvador on
February 14, 1989, the President of Nicaragua expressed his government's
willingness to set up “the Supreme Electoral Council with balanced
participation from representatives of opposition political parties.”
The appointment of members of the Electoral Council and its chairman is
in the hands of the National Assembly, from three-name slates put forward by the
President of the Republic in accordance with Article 6 (as amended) of the
Electoral Law. In June 7, 1989 the Assembly made the following appointments to
the Supreme Council: two members of the Sandinista National Liberation Front,
Messrs. Mariano Fiallos Oyanguren and Leonel Arguello Ramírez; two members of
the opposition parties, Messrs. Aman Sandino Muñoz—from the Democratic
Conservative Party—and Guillermo Selva Arguello—from the Independent Liberal
Party--; Mr. Rodolfo Sandino Arguello was appointed as a “notable.” As
alternate members the Council appointed Julian Corrales Munguia, Rosa Marina
Zelaya, Julio Ruiz Quezada, Nidia Reyes Castañeda and Ernesto Salazar Elizondo.
The chairman selected by the National Assembly of Nicaragua was Dr. Mariano
Fiallos, who had held the same post in previous elections for President, Vice
President and Representatives to the 1984 Assembly. This appointment, over which
voting split along government and opposition party lines, was considered a poor
choice by those who would have preferred to see the chair held by the
“notable.” It was further objected that the make-up was not balanced,
because there were two representatives from the Sandinista Front.
In light of these objections, the matter was dealt with in the agreements
of August 4, 1989 between the President of Nicaragua and the opposition parties,
who agree that “the Supreme Electoral Council shall establish an advisory body
composed of seven members selected on a pluralistic basis in accordance with
Article 202 of the Electoral Law.”
Another characteristic of elections under the American Convention is
their universality. Article 23(2) regulates political rights according to
residency, but because of the peculiarities of recent Nicaraguan history, a
significant portion of the country's voting-age population is abroad. It is for
this reason that the opposition has been asking for a provision enabling
citizens abroad to vote. No such provision was included in the law of October
18, 1988, but an article in the Amendment Law of April 18, 1989 partly reflects
this demand from the opposition by providing that Nicaraguans who reside abroad
may register at the proper Consulate but must vote in Nicaragua.
Another matter connected with the universality of elections, and of
special importance to the electoral process now in progress in Nicaragua, is the
return of major leaders from abroad. The Inter-American Commission takes the
view that this return is a positive development, and hopes that the Government
of Nicaragua will extend all facilities to make that return as positive as
possible.
The universality of elections takes on a special significance for the
region of the Atlantic Coast of Nicaragua. In that region, the turmoil that
affected the population until 1981—and which led the Inter-American Commission
to intervene as a friendly mediator—has caused a significant proportion of the
population to move to areas adjoining Nicaragua. Some major leaders have taken
up residence abroad but have indicated their desire to return.
On June 27, 1989, Brooklin Rivera and other Miskito leaders tried to
return to Nicaragua in order to participate in the current process. According to
statements he later made, the conditions that the Government of Nicaragua set
for their return were unacceptable. The Inter-American Commission on Human
Rights believes that the presence of the Miskito leaders in Nicaragua should
contribute to peace, national reconciliation and democracy in that country, and
therefore hopes that they will be given facilities to return as soon as
possible.
It is worth mentioning that the Unión Nicaragüense Opositora (UNO)
appointed Mrs. Violeta Barrios de Chamorro, the Director of the newspaper La
Prensa, as its candidate for the presidency, and Mr. Virgilio Godoy as its
candidate for Vice President. Subsequently, the Sandinista Liberation Front (FSLN)
designated Commander Daniel Ortega Saavedra as its candidate for the presidency
and Mr. Sergio Ramírez Mercado, its candidate for Vice President.
In sum, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights hopes, in regards
to the right to life, that the Government of Nicaragua will continue
investigating and punishing those responsible for the violations reported and
will refine current law with a view to protecting the personal safety of
detainees.
As for the exercise of political rights in the current electoral process,
the Commission believes that it is imperative for the Government of Nicaragua to
settle the status of individuals jailed for reasons originating in political
situations by releasing them all, including, of course, the 39 persons
arbitrarily excluded from the benefit of the pardon granted last March. The
Inter-American Commission further believes that guaranteeing the exercise of
political rights under conditions insuring the genuineness of elections requires
the inclusion of such safeguards in the Nicaraguan legal system rather than in
transitory political agreements. For this reason, the Commission hopes that the
legal amendments envisaged by the agreements of August 4, 1989 between the
President of Nicaragua and the opposition parties will be made a part of
Nicaraguan law, thereby helping to establish favorable conditions for the
current electoral process and improving the system of protection of human rights
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