Nicaragua

...POPULAR MOBILIZATION Building on the close ties developed with the masses during the struggle against Somoza, the FSLN is now strengthening the organizations which incorporate the Nicaraguan people into the revolutionary process...

...The only complete program of the reconstruction government published to date was released last July 9, ten days before the Sandinista victory...

...By mid-September, actual U.S...

...Already, the expropriation of Somoza's lands as well as those belonging to former government officials and members of the National Guard have placed over 51 percent of Nicaragua's arable land under 42 government control...

...in addition, the latent conflict between the bourgeoisie and the popular forces will inevitably surface, eroding the alliance between Nicaragua's business sectors and the FSLN...

...The Northamericans," accused one FSLN commander, Eden Pastora, "are speculating with the hunger of the Nicaraguan people...

...The new government has also approached the United States for aid...

...Pictured from right to left are Bayardo Arce and Tomas Borge (members of the FSLN Directorate) and Eden Pastora (Comandante "Zero...

...The new U.S...

...It will incorporate the combat forces of the FSLN and also new draftees...

...The importance of consolidating the popular army is underscored by the threat of Somoza supporters launching a counter-revolutionary invasion from abroad...

...Also in early September the State Department received congressional approval for over $8 million in emergency funds for Nicaragua...

...While preserving a well-founded distrust of the United States, the Nicaraguans clearly intend to take all the assistance they can get from the United States...

...Nicaragua is seeking financial backing from social democratic governments in Europe, from Latin NACLA Reportupdate * update * update * update America, and from the socialist countries...

...Shortly after the Sandinista victory Carter himself was emphasizing his administration's "good relationship" with Nicaragua and refusing to blame the turn of events in Nicaragua on the old U.S...

...In the economic sphere, it provides for a "mixed economy," one composed of both state and private enterprises...

...The Administration has also announced it may make a request to Congress for $200 million in economic aid to Nicaragua over the next two years...

...At the same time a popular army has been established to replace the disbanded National Guard...

...THE INTERNATIONAL FRONT The new government's most pressing international concern is to procure financial assistance to rebuild the war-torn country...

...More traditional peasant plots will be included in a third type of organization called an "associate enterprise," through which peasants will receive both land and technical assistance...

...SeptiOct 1979 0 Voluntary work brigades are helping to reconstruct the war-torn country...

...The key organization in the countryside is the Asociacion de Trabajadores del Campo (ATC), which groups rural workers and peasants, many of whom will be the beneficiaries of the agrarian reform program...

...And those who stayed behind are reluctant to invest because they know there is little money to be made in the wartorn economy...

...The Frente Sandinista de Liberacion Nacional (FSLN) has also called on all Nicaraguan social classes, including the sectors of the bourgeoisie that participated in the anti-Somoza movement, to lend their support to the reconstruction effort...

...In the urban areas, block committees-called Comites de Defensa Sandinista (CDS)-have been formed...

...wishes that he resign...

...Hospitals and schools are to be built as part of these cooperative communities...

...Somoza and his cohorts had literally sacked the country before they left...

...The devastation is inevitably shaping the policies of the Sandinista government in this early stage...

...For the present, however, the FSLN's emphasis is on developing the political consciousness of the Nicaraguan masses, who for decades were deprived of exercising even the most miminal democratic rights...

...Sergio Ramirez, author and university professor...

...emergency aid amounted to only $7.9 million (including transportation costs)-far less than the massive flow of U.S...

...Already Venezuela is reported to have pressured the Sandinistas to include a Christian Democrat in the government as a condition for receiving aid from Venezuela, an attempt denounced by the Nicaraguans...

...The army is firmly under the control of three members of the Directorate of the FSLN with a representative of each of the three tendencies sharing joint command...

...The overriding objective of U.S...

...ruling circles carefully watching the new government as it defines itself politically, the danger of the U.S...

...The Carter Administration, for its part, has suddenly assumed a public posture of amicable relations with the new government...

...But the business community has been slow to respond...

...THE HURDLES AHEAD In the coming year the FSLN is likely to face some formidable hurdles in its determination to forge ahead in a revolutionary 44 direction...

...Thus far they have begun to forge some of the essential building blocks-an army under popular control and the political mobilization of the masses-that make a revolutionary restructuring of Nicaragua possible...

...Instead, they argue, the U.S...

...Plans for new agrarian organizations are just beginning to take shape...

...aid monies to Somoza immediately after the 1972 earthquake...

...Furthermore, some members of the bourgeoisie who left the country during the fighting have not returned...

...Only time will tell how successfully the Sandinistas can navigate the turbulent waters ahead...

...ambassador to Managua, Lawrence A. Pezzullo, went even further, declaring that "our relations are as cordial and as easy as I've ever witnessed with any government...

...bugaboo of Cuba...

...Also, three-quarters of Nicaragua's export earnings come from agriculture and half the population works in the rural sector, including a large agricultural proletariat...

...is undoubtedly hoping that some of the more anti-communist Latin American leaders who supported the struggle against Somoza will use their influence and their money to bolster the moderate forces in the Nicaraguan government...

...But according to Washington sources, State Department officials are now arguing that a policy of open hostility would only serve to further radicalize the new government...

...They siphoned over $500 million out of Nicaragua in the two years leading up to the Sandinista victory...

...Smaller farms of 300 to 400 acres will become cooperatives under the direct control of peasants and workers...

...In the opinion of one businessperson, "There's no private business in Nicaragua that's going to make a profit in the next few years...

...As Tomas Borge states, "We would prefer to die of hunger rather than accept aid with strings attached...

...Alfonso Robelo, an industrialist...

...The FSLN sets the political direction for the government, is organizing the mass movement, and controls the army The Junta takes care of the day to day administration of the country...

...In the words of Tomas Borge, one of the founders of the Sandinista movement and the new Minister of the Interior, "The most difficult task is yet before us...

...Pictured here is a neighborhood brigade in Managua replacing stones used by Sandinista sup- porters to build street barricades during the fighting, THE U.S...

...reverting to a more interventionist posture are very real...

...Plans are also being discussed for the formation of a Sandinista political party...

...In the final days of the regime, government ministeries were ransacked, state bank accounts were drained, and Somoza's son went from bank to bank with a squad of National Guardsmen, taking every cent of foreign currency that remained...

...The program guarantees "democratic rights" like freedom of the press, and allows all political parties-except for Somoza's Liberal Party-to resume their activities...

...Thus far, however, the Carter Administration has been long on promises of assistance but short on delivery...

...Plans are also being laid for taking control of the mines and other key natural resources...

...The government is encouraging the Nicaraguan private sector to invest-both to build up the country's productive capacity and to provide jobs to the estimated 70 percent of the urban work force now unemployed...

...and Daniel Ortega, a leader of the FSLN...

...In line with this strategy, the U.S...

...Thus far, the diverse government leaders have displayed a remarkable degree of unity in their public pronouncements...

...Over seventy-five Somoza enterprises, ranging from sugar mills and meat-packing plants to auto dealerships and transportation companies, have been taken over...

...Altogether, it is estimated that one-tenth of the country's labor force will be employed in the stateY0 03 C,) Throngs of supporters greeted FSLN leaders when they entered Matagalpa a few days after the victory...

...In late August the Administration announced it would release approximately $30 million in loans granted to the Somoza government last year, but frozen when Somoza refused to accede to U.S...

...Soon after taking office, the Junta nationalized all domesticallyowned banks, and prohibited foreign banks from accepting Nicaraguan deposits...

...A spokesperson for the FSLN has denounced the new party, calling it "counterrevolutionary...

...should accept the unpleasant reality of a Sandinista victory and try to push the government in a more moderate, social democratic direction...

...Summing up the government's foreign policy, Moises Hassan declared, "We are open to all and we don't want to block relations with anyone...

...In many of its early moves, the government is strengthening the new socialized sector by placing key economic functions under state control...

...Somoza did, however, leave one thing behind-a huge foreign debt of $1.3 billion...

...Just as their predecessors, the Comites de Defensa Civil (which were important in mobilizing the population for the popular war), the CDS's are a key avenue for mass participation in this period...

...AGRARIAN REFORM A major concern of the new government is agriculture...

...In cases of expropriation of large agro-industrial complexes (which include processing and marketing facilities as well as land), workers will participate in management decisions under the technical guidance of the state...

...Many factories were destroyed or severely damaged...

...As the FSLN is well aware, the Carter Administration had maneuvered to prevent the Sandinistas from taking power up to the last minute-by proposing an OAS peacekeeping force, and by pressuring for the inclusion of Somoza associates in the new government and for the preservation of the National Guard...

...Thousands of exNational Guardsmen are still encamped in neighboring Honduras where they fled after the Sandinista victory...

...THE NEW GOVERNMENT The composition of the Junta of National Reconstruction, the Sandinista government's executive body, reflects the FSLN's decision to create a broad-based government...

...With hunger threatening hundreds of thousands of Nicaraguans, it is crucial to get food production underway...

...should take a hard-line position in response to the Sandinista victory...

...In so doing, however, they have adamently refused to cave in to political pressure from Washington or any other source...

...Already, according to the Washington Post, the CIA and the Pentagon have argued that the U.S...

...The war is only beginning...

...Headed by elected representatives, the committees are responsible for food distribution, community housing and health needs, and political education...

...The nationalization of the holdings of the Somoza clan have made the state the largest single economic power in the country...

...The fighting and aerial bombings by the National Guard during the final, eight-week Sandinista insurrection left much of the country's economic infrastructure in ruins...

...The following day, 50,000 cheering people thronged the newly renamed Plaza of the Revolution in Managua to welcome the rebel government...

...The program, while recognizing the right of private property, also calls for agrarian reform and the nationalization of all property belonging to Somoza and his allies...

...Couched in very general language, it is designed to encompass the interests of the full range of anti-Somoza forces, ranging from sectors of the bourgeoisie to the working class and the peasantry...

...Ultimately, the new government's policies will not be determined as SeptlOct 1979 much by this program as by the ability of the FSLN to shape the direction of the revolutionary process in the interest of the popular classes...

...Standing behind the junta is the nine-member Directorate of the FSLN, where three seats are held by each of the three tendencies within the FSLN (the Terceristas, the Prolonged People's War, or GPP, and the Proletarians...

...STRATEGY What accounts for this aboutface in the Carter Administration's policy...

...economic assistance as a lever of influence...

...In addition, the Carter Administration is clearly hoping to use U.S...

...Said one businessperson, "The poor people are talking about 'our revolution', and I'm afraid of what they mean by that...

...Already a group of social democrats who claim to have the backing of former Venezuelan President Carlos Andres Perez have formed a new political party (Partido Social Democratica Sandinista) under the slogan, "Sandinismo, si, Comunismo, no...

...The country's export trade has also been taken over by the government, with special state enterprises set up to export coffee, cotton and sugar...

...A flurry of visits by State Department officials to various Latin capitals in the aftermath of the Sandinista victory gave the Carter Administration ample opportunity to coordinate its 43update * update update* update strategy with leaders there...

...On July 19 the revolutionary army of the Sandinista National Liberation Front entered Managua, victorious after a sixteen year struggle against the dictatorial regime of Anastasio Somoza...

...Most of the cotton crop (a major foreign exchange earner) as well as staple food crops for the local population went unplanted...

...41update * update * update * update owned enterprises...

...footdragging has brought sharp denunciations from the Nicaraguans...

...To rebuild the country, the new leaders are appealing to all governments, including the United States, for massive relief assistance...

...Moises NACLA Reportupdate . update . update update Hassan, leader of the United Peo- ple's Movement, a Sandinista mass organization...

...According to a September 1979 report prepared by the Economic Commission on Latin America (ECLA), well over half a billion dollars in direct physical destruction occurred before Somoza departed...

...imperialism is still to contain the revolutionary process in Nicaragua and prevent "another Cuba...

...One million people (out of Nicaragua's total population of 2.3 million) will need emergency food supplies and assistance to survive the next several months...

...When the massive celebration had ended, however, the Sandinistas began to confront what is perhaps an even more difficult task-the reconstruction of the war-torn country and the definition of the Nicaraguan revolutionary process...

...In response, the social democratic Second International sent a mission to Managua, the Andean Bloc countries set up an office in Managua to coordinate aid, and Cuba (which has warmly welcomed several Junta delegations to Havana) is sending educational and medical teams...

...With U.S...

...Under the direction of Agrarian Reform Minister Jaime Wheelock-a Marxist who is a member of the FSLN Directorate-the government has launched a far-reaching agrarian reform program...

...The agrarian reform ministry is also empowered to expropriate large estates that are not farmed efficiently by their owners, but Wheelock says, "For now we are going to limit ourselves to the Somoza lands, because we don't need anymore...

...The five Junta members are Violeta de Chomorro, wife of the slain publisher of La Prensa, the leading organ of the bourgeois opposition to Somoza...