Word: nicaragua
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...same process has taken place at Nicaragua's Jesuit-run University of Central America. The social sciences are dominated by the Marxist disciplines of historical and dialectical materialism. There are also ugly signs of political intimidation on campus. A philosophy professor was recently expelled from the university after members of the so-called Sandinista Youth held protests outside her office. Her crime: in an interview she said, "If a university professor is not in agreement with the Sandinista Front, the Sandinista Youth consider you a counterrevolutionary...
...most bizarre Sandinista double standards seem to apply to the media. Nicaragua's two Sandinista-owned television stations offer a cultural hodgepodge without seeming to be ideologically biased: everything from documentaries on Cuban classical dancers to delayed showings of U.S. major league baseball games to reruns of Lou Grant. Print is another matter. The Sandinistas own or control two daily newspapers, the pro-government Nuevo Diario and the official Sandinista paper Barricada. Both provide a predictable medley of government propaganda, while the only opposition newspaper, La Prensa, is subject to strict censorship...
Nicaraguan human rights observers tell a different story. According to the Managua-based Permanent Commission on Human Rights, private ownership in Nicaragua, as codified in Articles 27 and 31 of the Statute on the Rights and Guarantees of the Nicaraguan People, now means only the "right to the use of the land" and to "receive the fruits of some thing not belonging to oneself." The regime has also reneged on promises to respect "responsible" private ownership by passing new decrees allowing the confiscation of property with government-determined compensation for reasons of "public utility." Says a prosperous Nicaraguan cotton farmer...
...Sandinistas are concerned, the problem is simply being called "distribution," meaning a chronic short supply of operating buses and trucks in the country due to a lack of imported spare parts. The government blames that shortage on the U.S. for leading a campaign to cut off Nicaragua's international credit at a time when the country is staggering beneath an estimated $3 billion in foreign debt. "If we do not have oil, bread and soap, it is the fault of aggressor imperialism," declares a typically hostile sign outside a low-income housing project in Managua...
...analyst in the region agrees. "I don't see how the revolution can be dislodged or pre-empted," he asserts. But, in his view, the pressures in favor of maintaining some semblance of pluralism are still strong enough to prevent Nicaragua from becoming another Cuba soon. The analyst adds: "My guess is that Nicaragua will remain a relatively pluralistic Marxist state for some time...