THURSDAY, JUNE 22, 2006
Election Interference Delegation Makes Statement to Press in Managua!
June 23, 2006The pre-election delegation organized by the Nicaragua Network, composed of academics and activists, has completed a week of meetings with members of Nicaraguan political parties and civil society organizations and with the United States Ambassador in Nicaragua Paul Trivelli.
This is a translation of the statement that was made by the delegation:
We have come as citizens of the United States of America to observe the progress of the electoral process and to see with our own eyes the role that the government of the United States is playing, hoping to find conditions that would be adequate to permit the Nicaraguan people to vote in November according to their own free will.
A. What we heard:
We listened to a variety of voices which included representatives of civil society, non-governmental organizations, democratic groups participating in the preparation of adequate conditions for the electoral process, and four of the five parties running candidates in the elections. We heard voices from the urban and rural grassroots; we heard the voice of Mr. Paul Trivelli, U.S. ambassador to Nicaragua. The most notable results of those conversations are:
1. The Nicaraguan people in general are able to analyze and explain the current political situation and the country's history in a very sophisticated, informed and coherent manner. This we applaud and proudly make it known to the world.
2. With the exception of U.S. Ambassador Trivelli, all the persons interviewed believed that the government of the United States had gone beyond what was appropriate and correct in its involvement in the electoral process, to the degree that its involvement is seen and felt as unacceptable intervention.
3. Nicaraguans expressed to us emphatically their desire for sovereignty, saying many times that they want to be able to resolve their affairs themselves and are capable of doing so.
4. We were concerned to hear the great majority express their belief that it is not possible to resolve the great social problems from which Nicaragua suffers with the systems that are brought to them from outside the country such as the present plans of structural adjustment.
5. We heard many times the concern that the inappropriate voice of the United States, because it is a country of such great power with a previous history of intervention in the internal affairs of Nicaragua during the elections of 1990, could distort the mentality of the people of Nicaragua, touching on their historical memory, keeping the elections from being an expression of the people's own will.
B. What we citizens of the United States promise to do:
1. We are committed to work to take to the people of the US the information we have gathered, presenting it in a way that will raise the consciousness of the people so that they will speak up to stop the intervention of the United States in the Nicaraguan electoral process. We feel that it is necessary to work to create a youth that will write a different history where all have the freedom to participate in the political process forging a world of justice and fraternity.
2. Given all that we have heard and understood from the men and women of Nicaragua, we feel strongly committed to work in the most energetic fashion to eradicate the interventionist presence and the misuse of power by our government that impedes the proper functioning of Nicaragua's electoral process. We will do all in our power and we hope that this will help the Nicaraguan people to do the same, given that they have expressed the strong desire to live in a true democracy.
3. We urge, we demand, as members of the civil society of the United States, that our government, represented especially by Ambassador Paul Trivelli, stop immediately its intervention and that it find a role that will truly help forge democracy in Nicaragua. This democracy faces great obstacles expressed in the powerful and interventionist policies that have formed the history between Nicaragua and the United States.
Read paid ad from Nicaraguan papers denouncing US interference!
Read press release of delegation!
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