Opposition Alliance for Nicaragua Fails to Unite

On Wednesday, May 12, the Citizens for Liberty Party (CxL) went ahead and registered their limited electoral alliance. They will present their candidates in conjunction with the Movimiento Unidad Costena [Coastal Unity Movement]. Negotiations with the Democratic Restoration Party (PRD), part of the National Coalition, failed to produce a united front.

Kitty Monterrey, the party’s legal representative, registered the CxL Alliance with the Supreme Electoral Council. Their inscription was seen as marking the end of a possible broad electoral alliance between the two large opposition blocs. However, CxL continued insisting that some kind of political agreement for unity could still be achieved in the upcoming weeks.

The final day was noteworthy for the mutual discrediting and denials being traded between the two blocs. The possibility of a last-ditch meeting to reach an agreement failed. Up until the last minute, there were hopes for negotiations that could open the way to an electoral alliance.

In the press conference that followed their registration, Monterrey stated: “the last few weeks have been very hard” for her and for her group. “We’ve had to confront vulgarities, low blows, lies, and slander,” during negotiations with the other opposition group, the National Coalition.

“We’ve preferred to remain silent. When you seek true unity, you put forth your best efforts to maintain all due discretion in your conversations. Not to convert them into a media circus,” she commented.

“No will” for true negotiation

The PRD, headed by Reverend Saturnino Cerrato, belongs to the National Coalition. Their group had proposed agreeing on one legal representative for all groups. They also proposed allocating the legislative candidates according to a formula for equitable distribution among alliances. That would mean giving each bloc 50% of the deputy candidates. The two large blocs would then agree on a method for selecting individual candidates that was satisfactory for all concerned.

Oscar Sobalvarro, the CxL vice president, confirmed the two main points of disagreement with the PRD. These involved managing the legal representation of the electoral alliance, and the quota of legislative candidates to be allotted to each participating group. Confidencial had predicted just such a problem.

“This isn’t the end of unity”

“We’ve never rejected unity. All the meetings we’ve participated in over the course of this week, are proof of those efforts,” said Monterrey. She noted that Denis Martinez, former pitcher with US Major League Baseball, has been a witness to these efforts.

Monterrey said the Citizens’ Alliance “has their doors open to anyone, because we know there’s a hard job ahead confronting Ortega.”

“At any rate,” she continued, “today is a day only for registering alliances between political parties. It’s not the end of unity.”

“Today begins a new stage. What we should all do is continue making efforts to incorporate the organizations and form this great opposition bloc,” Monterrey added.