Sandinistas claim election victory in Nicaragua

Nicaraguan law states that a candidate must have 35 percent of the vote and a lead of 5 percentage points to win the election outright and avoid a runoff. As early as Nov. 7, it was clear that Ortega was poised to become Nicaragua’s next president, 16 years after losing office. Monteleagre conceded the election that same day.

The Organization of American States (OAS) and Ethics and Transparency International, an independent electoral watchdog group, along with numerous other European and Latin American observers, commended the electoral process for its peacefulness, lawfulness and orderliness. Chief Nicaraguan election official Roberto Rivas noted, “We have promised the Nicaraguan people transparent elections, and that’s what we’ve done.”

However, the U.S. government, which has clearly signaled its opposition to a Sandinista return, attempted to present the election as “non-transparent” and fraught with “anomalies.” Together with Harvard-educated banker Montealegre, who said, “No one has won here — we are going to a second round,” the U.S. is trying to invalidate the proceedings or undermine the results through drawn-out legal battles.

Nicaragua has historically been a victim of U.S. imperial ambitions, from the neocolonialism of the Monroe Doctrine in the 19th century to the Bush administration’s “war on terror” and “free trade” agreements. It occupies a strategic position at the center of the hemisphere, extending out into the Caribbean Sea.

Notes Duncan Kennedy of the BBC, “From being a source of slaves in the 19th century, [to] the days they occupied Nicaragua in the 1930s, to the years of secretly helping the Contra rebels in the 1980s, they [the U.S.] cannot seem to take their minds off this tiny country.”

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