Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega. [Reuters]
Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega. [Reuters]

Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega has declared that his country will hold no more elections.

Speaking at a ceremony Monday marking the 47th anniversary of the 1979 Sandinista Revolution, Ortega said "there will be no more elections for the opposition to try to seize power," according to the Guardian and Reuters. Local media reported that thousands of civil servants were compelled to attend the event.

Ortega, 80, has held power since 2007, having also served as president in the 1980s. His current term was set to expire next year, when an election had also been scheduled.

Ortega was among those who helped topple the Anastasio Somoza dictatorship during the 1979 revolution. In 2018, he ordered a violent crackdown on nationwide anti-government protests, claiming coup forces were behind the unrest.

The UN and other bodies estimated that the crackdown killed more than 350 people, wounded hundreds more and forced nearly 1 million Nicaraguans to flee the country.

The last election, held in 2021, was widely disputed. The Ortega government banned opposition parties, jailed all presidential candidates, detained business figures and criminalized dissent.

The UN Human Rights Council said the Ortega government had transformed the country into an authoritarian state and systematically violated human rights.

More recently, the UN, the United States and human rights groups have held Ortega and his wife responsible for the death of Brooklyn Rivera, 73, a four-term lawmaker and indigenous leader. The Department of State said Rivera had been unjustly imprisoned for nearly three years.

About 50 political prisoners remain detained in Nicaragua, according to Human Rights Watch and other groups. The Ortega government has stripped 546 people of their citizenship and shuttered more than 5,600 nongovernmental organizations, 29 universities and 58 media outlets.

Nicaragua is one of the poorest countries in Latin America, with a population of about 7 million and a per capita GDP of roughly $3,000.

In the same speech, Ortega also criticized the United States over its operation last January to remove Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro. "The United States raided the presidential palace, killed his security personnel and took Maduro and his wife to the United States and imprisoned them," Ortega said, calling it "a horrific act."


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