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FOCUS ON THE AMERICAS - International Press Institute

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Central America<br />

Nicaragua<br />

By María Haydée Brenes Flores and Mariela Hoyer Guerrero<br />

Nicaragua is sharply divided into<br />

two factions: one blindly supporting President<br />

Daniel Ortega and the other radically<br />

opposing him. The polarization of society is<br />

also evident in the press, and Ortega has<br />

branded some media outlets as the country’s<br />

enemies. He has admitted that his<br />

party, the Sandinista National Liberation<br />

Front (FSLN), is planning a battle against<br />

the independent news media and, as a result,<br />

press freedom suffers more every year.<br />

According to Freedom House, the press has<br />

seen increasing political and judicial harassment<br />

since 2007, after the Ortega administration’s<br />

efforts to obstruct and discredit<br />

critics in the media. Journalists have<br />

received death threats and some have been<br />

killed in recent years, with a number of attacks<br />

attributed to FSLN sympathizers. Although<br />

the 2007 Law on Access to Public<br />

Information requires public entities and<br />

private companies doing business with the<br />

state to disclose certain information, it preserves<br />

the government’s right to protect information<br />

related to state security. “The<br />

constitution calls for a free press but allows<br />

some censorship”, Freedom House notes.<br />

At the beginning of<br />

2010, privately owned<br />

Telenica Canal 8, one<br />

of Nicaragua’s most<br />

popular broadcasters, was purchased.<br />

Shrouded in mystery, the transaction details<br />

and the sum paid remains unknown. It finally<br />

came to light that the new owners have<br />

connections with the presidential family and<br />

Ortega’s son represents the new channel,<br />

now an affiliate of the Telesur consortium. It<br />

is now the third television channel related to<br />

the governing family.<br />

Carlos Fernando Chamorro, one of<br />

Nicaragua’s most influential journalists<br />

and a critic of Ortega, hosted two investigative<br />

programs for Canal 8, but he canceled<br />

them for ethical reasons. “We will never legitimate<br />

a sham in this television channel<br />

now controlled by Ortega”, he stressed. The<br />

Nicaraguan Center for Human Rights<br />

(CENIDH) and the Inter American <strong>Press</strong><br />

Association (IAPA) warned that with more<br />

broadcasters under the government’s control<br />

and the Sandinist faction, independent<br />

journalism is being affected.<br />

In Nicaragua, if a journalist wants to enter<br />

a journalists’ association, he will find Sandinist<br />

and non-Sandinist factions. Independent<br />

reporters are respected, but they<br />

are normally not related to the different alliances.<br />

Because of this situation, the guild<br />

is not strong enough.<br />

At the creation of the Sandinist Journalists’<br />

Forum in 2009, Daysi Torres, a former<br />

reporter and now mayor of Managua,<br />

stated “There are two types of journalists in<br />

Nicaragua: those who are here and those<br />

who are not. All the ones committed to the<br />

people are here, and those who are not are<br />

with the oligarchs and imperialists”. While<br />

this group is constantly having meetings,<br />

the Journalists’ National College remains<br />

divided. As its president, Leonel Laguna, is<br />

close to the government, members of the<br />

board of directors resigned in 2010, and, in<br />

Many independent reporters fear that<br />

the guild implements censorship<br />

an extraordinary session in June, fresh<br />

elections took place. However, not all of<br />

the journalists were allowed to vote. Many<br />

independent reporters fear that the guild<br />

implements censorship, as a polemic<br />

Ethics Committee has announced that it<br />

looks forward to journalism converging<br />

with national interests. It suggests that<br />

journalists who resist such a development<br />

could find their right to work in the profession,<br />

or to remain registered with the association,<br />

terminated.<br />

In Managua, according to IAPA, the closure<br />

of nearly 20 news radio stations was<br />

reported; and further inland the situation<br />

is worse. “News radio stations are disap-<br />

Above: A university student with his face painted with national colors holds the Nicaraguan national flag during a march in Managua for the defense of national sovereignty,<br />

November 16, 2010. (REUTERS)<br />

pearing little by little. However, while a<br />

group of stations is struggling to survive,<br />

the official broadcasters are enjoying<br />

huge investments and their programs are<br />

aired full of official announcements”,<br />

stated IAPA. With the suffocation of the<br />

media by economic means, the diversity<br />

of news is diminishing.<br />

The 22-year-old program Revista Informativa<br />

y Musical, hosted by the journalist<br />

Celso Martínez, from Matagalpa, was one of<br />

those affected by the lack of official advertising.<br />

The program had to cease transmitting<br />

in September because the pro-government<br />

media was absorbing all the advertising.<br />

Radio Gueguense, Cultural Heritage of<br />

the Nation since 2009, had to close in October<br />

after 53 years of broadcasting, since the<br />

resources promised by the government<br />

were not included in the official budget.<br />

A representative of the World Association of<br />

Community Radio Broadcasters (AMARC)<br />

for Nicaragua confirmed to IPI that during<br />

2010 licenses for broadcasting were not renewed.<br />

“It is true that the government has<br />

encouraged the creation of many community<br />

radio stations, even supplying the equipment,<br />

but no broadcaster, pre-Ortega or new,<br />

has a transmission license,” the source, who<br />

asked to remain anonymous, said. “Without<br />

that, press freedom is impossible, because at<br />

any moment, as a result of any form of criticism,<br />

the broadcaster could be closed.”<br />

An example of this occurred in the North<br />

Atlantic Autonomous Region, inhabited by<br />

the Misquitos ethnic group. Hector<br />

Williams’ radio program had to be taken off<br />

the air in February because the indigenous<br />

Wihta Tara used that airtime to urge the<br />

tribe to avoid participation in pro-government<br />

activities. After being threatened<br />

with the possibility of the station’s closure,<br />

its director decided to end the program. Television<br />

channels with expired licenses<br />

have also decided not to contradict Ortega<br />

in order to stay on the air.<br />

One of the most severe obstructions of press<br />

freedom in Nicaragua is the denial of access<br />

to information. Since March 2010, it has become<br />

common practice not to invite independent<br />

media to the state institutions’<br />

press conferences or, if invited, they are not<br />

allowed to enter the event. Only pro-government<br />

outlets receive information about<br />

sensitive subjects - such as health and education<br />

- over which the president’s wife,<br />

Rosario Murillo, has control. Without her<br />

authorization, no official in the executive<br />

branch will talk to the media.<br />

During the announcement of the Autonomous<br />

Regional Authorities of the<br />

Caribbean Coast election results in March<br />

2010, the Supreme Electoral Council did<br />

not allow the entry of accredited journalists<br />

from La Prensa, El Nuevo Diario and Canal 2<br />

television into the National Vote-Counting<br />

Center. The censorship extended to the<br />

coverage of a press conference held by the<br />

Health Ministry and officials of the United<br />

States Embassy about the vaccination campaign<br />

against swine flu, and, among other<br />

events, also to the press conference in<br />

which presidential and National Assembly<br />

general elections for 2011 were called.<br />

A similar situation occurred during an<br />

opera presentation in the National Theater,<br />

in which Ortega’s son participated. Even the<br />

patron saint’s day parties, celebrated in August,<br />

were affected by censorship. Daysi Torres,<br />

mayor of Managua, only allowed access<br />

to some events to pro-government media.<br />

IAPA reported that in October there was a<br />

very slight opening up of official information<br />

about the Leptospirosis epidemic,<br />

which had cost the lives of 16 people. “The<br />

government continues to try to strangle the<br />

independent media, discriminating against<br />

them in the placement of official advertising,<br />

and intimidating reporters, editors, executives<br />

and owners of media with constant<br />

verbal attacks, threats and discrediting remarks;<br />

it sets up forums of paid journalists<br />

One of the most severe obstructions of press freedom in<br />

Nicaragua is the denial of access to information.<br />

to defame democratic and independent<br />

news men and women. The government is<br />

continuing to expand its own news media<br />

using not very clear methods. All this added<br />

to the economic and financial crisis that has<br />

brought a falloff in commercial advertising,<br />

resulting in a general loss of quality in news<br />

coverage and worsening the overall state of<br />

press freedom”, the organization stated. The<br />

problem is not new. The Committee to Protect<br />

Journalists (CPJ) dedicated a 2009- special<br />

report to the president’s media war. “Ortega<br />

has made himself an isolated and secre-<br />

44 IPI REVIEW<br />

IPI REVIEW 45

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