From: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu (Rich Winkel)
Subject: Nicanet Hotline 7/20/92
Followup-To: alt.activism.d
Originator: rich@pencil.cs.missouri.edu
Organization: PACH
Date: Wed, 22 Jul 1992 03:44:38 GMT

/** reg.nicaragua: 101.0 **/
** Topic: NICANET HOTLINE -- 07/20/92 **
** Written  2:31 pm  Jul 20, 1992 by nicanet in cdp:reg.nicaragua **
            NICARAGUA NETWORK HOTLINE ** 202-544-9360
 
                         July 20, 1992
 
You have reached the Nicaragua Network Hotline recorded Monday, 
July 20, 1992.   To reach our office, call: 202-544-9355.
 
Topics covered in this hotline include: Evictions of peasants in 
Matagalpa region continue; US aid still held up and Chamorro 
appears to be caving in to US demands; New anti-sodomy law still 
in limbo; Crisis in agriculture denied; and cholera continues to 
spread.
 
As the Chamorro government's review of claims for return of 
property confiscated by the Sandinista government draws to an 
end, we are seeing a dramatic increase in the number of court 
ordered returns of property.  It is alarming and discouraging 
that not only are properties being returned which were 
confiscated because their owners abandoned them, but properties 
of some of the most notorious Somocistas are being returned as 
well, in violation of the Constitution.  For instance, four farms 
have been returned to the family of Daniel Somarriba whose call 
to Somoza's National Guard in August 1978 resulted in the 
slaughter of 18 young people in San Dionisio, Matagalpa.  
According to the Farmworkers Union (ATC) 11 of the 21 farms 
recently returned in the Matagalpa area were previously owned by 
close collaborators of Somoza, and some of the other 10 former 
owners received compensation when their farms were confiscated.  
The Chamorro government has ignored the national dialogue 
agreement that workers are to receive at least 25% of privatized 
enterprises and in some cases peasants who hold legal title to 
their homes and garden plots are being evicted as well.  
Peasants, including ATC organizers who have opposed the evictions 
have been jailed.  As of last Friday, 13 were still being held.
     At the request of the Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights, 
the Nicaragua Network Education Fund has activated its Emergency 
Response Network to protest the evictions.  The demands are: 
Release of the remaining agriculture workers; Respect and enforce 
collective bargaining agreements with farmworkers on farms being 
privatized; Respect the laws forbidding return of property to 
close collaborators of Somoza; Respect the democratization of 
property ownership brought about under the Sandinista 
Revolution.; End the use of the police and army for forced 
evictions; Resolve land ownership problems by political means; 
and, Respect the collective property rights of agricultural 
workers including especially houses and family gardens.  You can 
fax your own letter to Chamorro at 011-505-2-627911.
     Orders to carry out the evictions put the police and army 
in a difficult position.  If they refuse they play into the hands 
of Jesse Helms and the right wing who want to purge Sandinistas 
from the army and police.  If they carry out the evictions they 
are committing human rights violations.  Daniel Ortega has called 
on people not to blame the police, but rather the judges who are 
ordering the property returns.  And National Police Chief Rene 

Vivas, at a meeting of Central American police chiefs said, "The 
police is not an armed band at the service of the landlords."  
However, there are fears that that is exactly what they may turn 
into.  Due to the failure of the government to provide an 
adequate police budget, the former owners are paying the cost of 
the evictions which certainly gives the police the appearance of 
a conflict of interest.
 
$116 million in already appropriated US aid to Nicaragua 
continues to be held up by Sen. Jesse Helms and other right-wing 
Senators.  Nicaraguan officials who met with Helms' staff last 
week failed to sway the Senator.  Violeta Chamorro is talking 
tough.  In Germany she said she "receives pressures from no 
one..." and that as president of Nicaragua she can do whatever 
she feels like doing.  However, it appears she is beginning to 
feel like doing what the right wing wants her to do.  Her 
Minister of Government has promised a restructuring of the police 
by August, land is being given back to Somocistas, and by 
presidential decree, she is revamping the central bank along the 
lines that US Aid for International Development (AID) has been 
demanding.
     Chamorro took everyone by surprise last week when by 
Presidential Decree she repealed the 1960 Organic Law of the 
Central Bank.  One of the things her decree accomplished was to 
remove the requirement that the political party which comes in 
second in an election, in this case the FSLN, will have seats on 
the Central Bank Board.  The Central Bank is also prohibited from 
making loans to the government.
 
We had reported previously that Chamorro had until July 11 to 
sign or veto Latin America's most repressive sodomy law which was 
passed by the National Assembly over the unanimous opposition of 
the FSLN on June 11.  According to the International Gay and 
Lesbian Human Rights Commission, for reasons unknown the National 
Assembly did not forward the law to Chamorro before it recessed 
until the end of July.  When they finally do forward the law to 
her, Chamorro will have 15 days to sign, veto, or let the law go 
into effect without her signature.  Unlike in the US, the 
Nicaraguan constitution allows a Presidential veto to be 
overridden with a simple majority, meaning that unless some UNO 
delegates change their vote, her veto would be overridden.
 
The "wake up and smell the coffee" award this week goes to 
Central Bank President Silvio de Franco who denied that there is 
a crisis in this year's agricultural cycle.  The National 
Federation of Cooperatives and the National Coffee Commission had 
issued a report that the area of land under cultivation has 
decreased drastically due to lack of credit.  De Franco said, 
"Effectively, there has been a slight fall in production because 
credit isn't what it was before."  He went on to claim that the 
reason there were fewer agricultural loans by the Central Bank 
was because of the growth of the informal credit market.  This 
so-called informal credit market is made up of spot lenders who 
charge usurious interest rates.  Agricultural producers are 

driven to these loan sharks because the Central Bank is not 
providing enough credit.  It is absurd to claim as de Franco does 
that it is the other way around. 
 
And finally, Ministry of Health authorities are taking special 
measures to combat cholera along the north shore of Lake 
Nicaragua where over the week-end of July 11 alone, 39 new cases 
of the disease were reported.  The national cholera count is now 
up to 382 and rising rapidly.
 
To become a supporter and receive our publications and mailings, 
please contact us.  The Nicaragua Network's address is: 1247 E 
St., SE, Washington, DC  20003; our phone: 202-544-9355.
** End of text from cdp:reg.nicaragua **

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