The Guardian highlights accusations that the Nicaraguan election was rigged (Report, 8 November), but provides no evidence except for predictable slurs from defeated opposition candidates. A variety of independent opinion polls over the past year have put Daniel Ortega and the FSLN (Sandinista National Liberation Front) at around 60%-65% support, so the actual result is entirely consistent with the polls.
You also report suggestions that Ortega “used his power over the courts” to remove leading opposition candidates, notably Eduardo Montealegre, whose disputed leadership of the PLI (Independent Liberal Party) was overturned by the supreme electoral council in July. The council is an independent body, and is not “controlled” by Ortega or the FSLN. It acted to restore long-standing PLI politician Pedro Reyes to the leadership, rather than Montealegre, who has spent most of his career as a member and sometime minister for the rival PLC (Constitutional Liberal Party). And the PLI’s election result was also better than their opinion poll ratings under Montealegre.
Perhaps instead you should be celebrating the success of a leftwing government in a deeply impoverished country that has managed in 10 years to almost double GDP, increase foreign investment by 450%, eliminate illiteracy, cut poverty by nearly 40%, massively increase its renewable energy generation, abolish fees for health and education, create the safest environment in Latin America, and which, according to the World Economic Forum, is 10th in the world in terms of gender equality.
James Poke
Dorking, Surrey
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