TIME: Almanac 1995

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<text id=93CT1804> <link 90TT0617> <link 89TT1917> <title> Nicaragua--History </title> <history> Compact ALMANAC--CIA Factbook Middle America Nicaragua </history> <article> <source>CIA World Factbook</source> <hdr> History </hdr> <body> Columbus sailed along the Nicaraguan coast on his last voyage in 1502. The colonial period in Nicaragua began 20 years later with the arrival from Panama of Spanish conquistadors under Gil Gonzalez Davila. The Indian tribe living around present-day Lake Nicaragua received them peacefully; the country takes its name from their chief, Nicarao. Colonial Nicaragua's two principal towns were founded in 1524: Granada on Lake Nicaragua and Leon near Lake Managua. The region was part of the Captaincy-General of Guatemala. Wars between the Spanish on the Pacific and Indians and British on the Caribbean (the British presence did not end until 1905) marked the colonial period. The Captaincy-General of Guatemala declared its independence from Spain in 1821, but Nicaragua did not become an independent republic until 1838. Rivalry between the Liberals of Leon and the Conservatives of Granada characterized 19th century politics. Governments were unstable and politicians prone to violence. This allowed an American, William Walker, and a group of about 100 "filibusters" to seize the presidency in 1856. The advent of a foreigner as president led the two parties to suspend their internecine conflict long enough to drive Walker out in 1857. Walker had been invited by the Liberals; his defeat discredited them and led to 40 years of Conservative rule. But by the start of the 20th century, the rivalry between Liberals and Conservatives had resumed. Hostility between President Jose Santos Zelaya and the United States over an isthmian canal led, in 1909, to intervention, and U.S. troops were present in Nicaragua from then until 1933. U.S. intervention in Nicaragua ended with Franklin Roosevelt's "Good Neighbor" policy. Despite U.S effort to create an apolitical constabulary prior to departing Nicaragua, in 1936 National Guard Commander Anastasio Somoza Garcia took over the presidency, initiating 43 years of Somoza family rule. Somoza Garcia was assassinated in 1956, and control passed to his elder son, Luis Somoza Debayle. In 1967--following the 4-year presidency of former Foreign Minister Rene Schick--the younger son, Anastasio Somoza Debayle, took office. The Somozas used their political power to dominate Nicaragua's economy and government, despite occasional challenges, armed or otherwise, from their opponents. On December 23, 1972, an earthquake devastated Managua, killing or injuring an estimated 10,000 people and leaving 300,000 homeless. Many key businesses and government offices were destroyed, along with most of the downtown. The government of Somoza Debayle proved unable to cope with the emergency, and family control began to erode. The Marxist Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) had been fighting a sporadic guerrilla war since 1963 to overthrow the Somoza regime. (The FSLN took its name from Augusto Sandino, a Liberal Party general who opposed both U.S. intervention and Somoza Garcia, and who was assassinated on Somoza Garcia's order in 1934.) Indications that Anastasio Somoza had embezzled aid donated after the 1972 disaster raised popular discontent with his government. By 1977, increasing reports of the government's torture and murder of opponents led to organized resistance by businesses, professional groups, and the church. The assassination of La Prensa editor Pedro Joaquin Chamorro in 1978 ignited a massive anti-Somoza uprising which the FSLN quickly dominated as the opposition's only organized military force. After a few weeks of heavy fighting, pressure from the Organization of American States (OAS) and U.S. withdrawal of all support for Somoza led to his departure from the country and transition of power to a Sandinista dominated coalition on July 19, 1979. Political Conditions Nicaragua is under virtually total control of the FSLN. The Sandinistas are well on the way to consolidating their power. The process began on July 19, 1979, when the Government of National Reconstruction (GRN in Spanish), as a coalition of FSLN and civic leaders, stepped into the vacuum left by the Somoza government's collapse. The GRN was organized into a 5-member junta, a 19-member Council of Ministers, and a 33-member quasilegislative National Council. The GRN's July 19 Declaration of San Jose, promising a democratically elected government, economic pluralism, and social justice, met with strong popular support. The FSLN, though its retention of exclusive control of police, internal security, and military forces and through its dominance of the junta (three of the five members were Sandinistas), moved to take control of the government and to force its own program for social change. The Declaration of San Jose was implemented only insofar as it fit with the FSLN's plans as a "vanguard party" to remake Nicaraguan Society. In the period between July 1979 and the declaration of a state of emergency in March 1982, the GRN changed from the pluralistic government installed by the revolution into a single-party dominated regime. Moderates were forced from the government, and the activities of other political parties, independent labor unions, private groups, and the Catholic and Protestant churches were increasingly restricted as the FSLN established its hegemony over the Nicaraguan Government. A crucial stage in the FSLN's efforts to consolidate its control was the 1984 presidential campaign. Stifled by FSLN manipulation, coercion, violence, and threats, most opposition parties withdrew from the contest. The FSLN, nevertheless, hailed the election of Daniel Ortega as a mandate from the Nicaraguan people to pursue its Marxist-Leninist program and has proceeded rapidly to restructure Nicaragua into a classic one-party communist society. Politics outside the FSLN can be divided into three categories of activity; the civic opposition; the parties participating in the National Assembly; and the armed external opposition. Among the leading opposition political parties in Nicaragua are the Liberal Independent Party (PLI). Social Christian Party (PSC), the Social Democratic Party (PSD), and the Conservative Party of Nicaragua (PCD). These parties vary in size, and some are hampered by internal division, often tormented by Sandinista infiltrators. The Nicaraguan Socialist party (PSN) and Marxist-Leninist Peoples Active Movement (MAP-ML), two radical-left Marxist parties, usually side with the FSLN. As the legal avenues for meaningful political opposition to the policies of the FSLN have diminished, many Nicaraguans have chosen to take up arms against the FSLN. The armed opponents of the regime had grown to around 20,000 by early 1986. FSLN efforts to silence all dissent, gross violation of human rights, and the refusal to consider compromise or even dialogue with the civic opposition have again turned Nicaraguan politics into an armed conflict. Source: U.S. Department of State, Bureau of Public Affairs, October 1986. </body> </article> </text>