MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Nicaraguan electoral authorities ban opposition party altogether

Kitty Monterrey has dual citizenship, which is against the electoral law

After weeks of arresting individual politicians and candidates, Nicaraguan authorities Friday upped their ante and chose to fully outlaw an entire opposition party.

 The Supreme Electoral Council (CSE) disqualified the Citizens for Freedom (CxL), which posed a challenge to President Daniel Ortega in the November 7 elections.

The CSE, under control of the ruling Sandinistas, also stripped CxL Chairwoman Carmella Rogers Amburn of her ID card as she was served with the notice of the CSE's decision “to cancel the legal personhood of the political party Ciudadanos por la Libertad (CxL).”

The ruling renders CxL uneligible to run in November, thus clearing the path for the 75-year-old Ortega to seize a fourth successive term in office.

The CSE made the ruling at the request of the right-wing Constitutionalist Liberal Party (PLC), the country's second parliamentary force, which is believed to have been collaborating with the group of the former guerrilla leader who ousted dictator Anastasio Somoza in 1979.

According to the PLC, Carmella Rogers Amburn, politically known as Kitty Monterrey, “has dual nationality (US and Nicaraguan), [which is] in notorious violation of the law“ and therefore every action undertaken by CxL needs to be declared “null and void.”

According to María Haydeé Osuna of the PLC, CxL committed ”constant violations of the Electoral Law“ because it ”failed to comply with obligations” and because its president, Kitty Monterrey, has dual nationality (American-Nicaraguan).

The ruling Sandinista Front (FSLN) has already announced the candidacy of Ortega and his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, to a fourth successive term in the November 7 elections. “We are here to continue the fight against poverty,” Murillo had said.

The European Union (EU) had already sanctioned Murillo, her son Juan Carlos and six other government officials with migratory and financial restrictions for their responsibility in the “serious human rights violations” in Nicaragua.

The measure adds to others taken by the United States and Canada against officials of the Ortega government, in protest of the repression against political opponents since the 2018 revolt