Nicaragua Elections 2021: Who are the opposition candidates imprisoned or in exile?

Christian Chamorro, the candidate for the presidency of Nicaragua who had the greatest probability of defeating the current president, the Sandinista Daniel Ortega, in the voting next Sunday, is the great absentee in that appointment, which has been questioned by the arrest of seven opposition candidates.

Chamorro, daughter of former President Violeta Barrios de Chamorro (1990-1997), tried to repeat the feat of her mother, who in 1990 defeated Ortega at the polls, when she was arrested for “treason” and alleged money laundering.

Under house arrest since last June, she is one of the seven candidates for the presidency of the opposition detained in the framework of the electoral process, which has paved the way for Ortega, in power since 2007, to his fifth and fourth consecutive term.

These are the seven arrested opponents who wanted to challenge Ortega by the Presidency.

CRISTIANA CHAMORRO

A journalist and independent candidate for the Presidency, the daughter of former president Barrios de Chamorro and the national hero Pedro Joaquín Chamorro Cardenal (1924-1978), she was the opposition figure most likely to win the elections, according to polls.

67 years old, she is vice president of the Managua newspaper La Prensa and directed the NGO Fundación Violeta Barrios de Chamorro, dedicated to the protection and promotion of freedom of the press and expression, which she closed last February to avoid submitting to a law that It obliges representatives of organizations that receive funds from abroad to register as a “foreign agent”.

She was arrested on June 2, accused of the crimes of money, property and asset laundering, misappropriation and retention, and ideological falsehood.

She was disqualified at the request of the Public Ministry, led by former Sandinista guerrilla Ana Julia Guido.

Before his arrest, he affirmed that Ortega was “dead of horror” from losing power in the elections and that he was disabling candidates and dynamiting the opposition unit because “he is afraid of the Nicaraguan people.”

Widow of the former Minister of the Presidency Antonio Lacayo, she was known as “first lady” under the government of her mother, for her work supporting the Executive.

ARTURO CRUZ

He was a presidential candidate for the opposition Citizens for Freedom Alliance (CxL), which was removed from the competition three months before the elections.

Cruz, 67, was the Ortega government’s ambassador to the United States between (2007-2009), from whom he distanced himself.

He was detained by agents of the National Police at the Managua International Airport when he was returning from a tour of Washington and became the second opposition candidate for the Presidency to be arrested.

He is the son of the former member of the National Reconstruction Board and anti-Somoza fighter, the late Arturo Cruz Porras, who was also Nicaraguan ambassador to Washington during the first Sandinista regime (1979-1990).

He has a doctorate in history, an academic from the Central American Institute of Business Administration (INCAE), and a political analyst.

FÉLIX MARADIAGA

Leader of the Blue and White National Unity, he became the third opposition candidate for the Presidency to be arrested.

Born in 1976, he is an academic and activist with liberal roots who was arrested after appearing to testify before the Prosecutor’s Office, where they confirmed that they had opened an investigation.

He grew up in exile in the United States and was Secretary General of the Ministry of Defense under the Government of Enrique Bolaños (2002-2007).

He directed the Institute for Strategic Studies and Public Policies (Ieepp) and was accused of allegedly causing the social outbreak against the Ortega government in April 2018.

He denounced Ortega before the Security Council of the United Nations (UN) for human rights violations.

JUAN SEBASTIÁN CHAMORRO

An economist and political nephew of former President Barrios de Chamorro, he was a pre-candidate for the Presidency for the CxL (center-right) alliance.

He was Vice Minister of Finance and Public Credit and Secretary of Coordination and Strategy in the Government of Bolaños.

Last January he resigned from his position as executive director of the Civic Alliance for Justice and Democracy, which was the executive’s counterpart at a negotiating table with which a peaceful solution to the crisis that Nicaragua has been experiencing since 2018 was sought.

He holds a BA in Economics from the University of San Francisco, an MA in Economics from Georgetown University, and a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Wisconsin, Madison, all in the United States.

From 2014 to 2019 he directed the non-governmental Nicaraguan Foundation for Economic and Social Development (Funides), an independent think tank, and was also director of the US program Millennium Challenge Account in Nicaragua.

MIGUEL MORA

He is a journalist and was imprisoned for the first time in the framework of the anti-government demonstrations that broke out in April 2018.

He is the founder, owner and former director of the television channel 100% Noticias, which has been closed down by the authorities.

The building where 100% Noticias worked was confiscated in December 2018 and turned into a center for at-risk youth, according to the complaint.

He launched his candidacy for the Presidency by the Democratic Restoration Party (PRD), which was later outlawed by the authorities.

He apologized for his Sandinista past, and blamed Ortega for an attack that nearly killed his wife, journalist Verónica Chávez.

MEDARDO MAIRENA

The peasant leader was also in prison in the framework of the protests against the Government.

A judge related to Ortega sentenced Mairena to 216 years in prison for allegedly killing four policemen. He was later amnestied.

He formally presented his candidacy for the Campesino Movement, which belongs to the opposition National Coalition.

As part of the Peasant Movement, he began his protests against the Government in 2013, when he rejected the project of the interoceanic canal of the Chinese company HKND, and in 2018 he joined the demands for the resignation of the president after the death of the first protesters.

NOEL VIDAURRE

He is a lawyer and conservative politician who aspired to the presidency in the 1996 elections, in which he obtained 3% of the votes and remained as a deputy in the National Assembly, under the provisions of the Electoral Law of that time.

In the 2001 elections, he resigned the presidential candidacy for the Conservative Party (PC), along with his running mate, the Nicaraguan academic and ambassador to the United States during the first Sandinista regime (1979-1990) Carlos Tunnermann, due to discrepancies with the rest of the conservative leaders.

He also resigned the presidential candidacy for an alliance led by the Constitutional Liberal Party (PLC) in the 2016 elections, due to differences with former President Arnoldo Alemán (1997-2002).