Paul and I had rented a room "uphill" Sunday night, an area full of
conservative PLC supporters and VERY quiet during the vote count.
Nothing to celebrate from their perspective.
Nationally the Sandinista Party took at least 90 of the 152
municipalities, a truly amazing win. And this is in spite of the fact
that many do still fear the U.S. will again attack if the Sandinista
party wins national control again. Doralisa indicated this is a
common fear that is openly played on by the conservative PLC party.
Doralisa, 45, still single, still beautiful, sleep or no sleep, was her
usual high energy, though shy, self. We caught a 6 am bus,
traveled an hour, and then walked an hour through tropical forests,
fields, bogs, up, down and around hills to her mother's house.
It is here that 26-year-old Doralisa and her family hid
as the contra shot into the house in 1985 - a single bullet killing
her two little nieces as they hugged on the floor, other bullets
killing 2 sisters, a brother, and her father. Nineteen years later,
Doralisa's voice still cracks, her eyes still water up, as she retells
the story of the early morning attack. She points to the places
where the bodies fell, to the bullet holes in every door and wall. Such
horror in an absolutely gorgeous setting.
It is here that Doralisa's 80-year-old mother has continued to live,
cooking at the same open fire stove, light streaking into the kitchen
through the bullet holes of 1985.
The family had owned and farmed this land for generations and in the
early 1980s joined with others in the area to form a cooperative.
As a cooperative they became a prime contra target.
After the trauma of the contra slaughter they left their farm and were
afraid to return during the war years. Doralisa still gets frightened
when she visits her mother overnight.
But most of the family has returned. Brothers and cousins dot the
hills, all working the land. If they continue having local markets for
their beans, coffee, and honey they'll be fine. At least they will be
able to eat and send their children to school.
But many others aren't doing as well. Nicaragua, considered the "bread
basket" of Central America, has a malnutrition rate of 33% (UN figure)
and is still experiencing a bean crisis. The drought was only one
part of the cause of this crisis.
According to a recent LaPrensa article, Nicaragua produced 718,000
hundred-pound bags of beans last year, and by October 2004 795,000 bags
had been exported...more than produced! With the crop failure AND
the exportation of much of their harvest and reserves, prices have
skyrocketed. While a pound of red beans (their favorite) cost 5 1/2
Cordobas when we were here in 2003, they were 8 1/2 when we arrived
three weeks ago, and then rose to 16 C. Remember that many
workers only earn 16 C (one U.S. dollar) to 25 C a day! Hunger
for the poor majority is a very real result of prioritizing "Free
Trade" over "Fair Trade" or national "Food Security".
The next harvest will start coming into the markets soon, but many of
the poorest, most malnourished, will be forced to do without one of
their essential foods until the price drops significantly.
It's very likely these food scarcities will increase if CAFTA
(Central American Free Trade Agreement) passes in the U.S.
congress. According to Carlos Pacheco of the Center for International Studies
the food crises will be much worse than the coffee crisis Nicaragua has
been experiencing for the last few years.
With CAFTA the U.S. will have total access to Nicaragua's agricultural
markets within 10 years and pay zero tariffs. That means, for example,
highly subsidized ADM (Archer Daniels Midland) will be able to sell its
corn in Nicaragua for less than it costs a Nicaraguan farmer to produce
it.
On the Nicaraguan side of the agreement it lets Nicaragua sell its
industrial products in the U.S. This is a cruel joke. Nicaragua is an
agricultural country, not an industrial country.
Second, the agreement gives Nicaragua a peanut quota. Since only 120
Nicaraguan farmers produce peanuts in only two areas of
Nicaragua and only 2 companies warehouse, process and store peanuts
for export and since peanuts are NOT a labor intensive crop this "gift"
will again not increase wealth or jobs in Nicaragua.
And third, the agreement gives Nicaragua a small sugar quota, a quota
that.ends up being 4.4% of Nicaragua's national sugar production.
Again, this.will not increase wealth or jobs in Nicaragua.
The well subsidized, huge multinational U.S. agribusiness corporations
could.easily destroy Nicaragua's agricultural industry.
Consider corn. U.S. agribusiness corporations have nearly 80% of
their corn production costs.covered by your tax dollars. Small,
non-subsidized U.S. farmers were destroyed by these corporations and so
will small farmers in Nicaragua. Yes, other.countries do subsidize
farmers, but the U.S. subsidies are much more weighted.toward the
corporate farms, not the small, struggling family farm. Why should
subsidizing corporate profits take
priority over any country's food.security?
These are just a few examples of how CAFTA will devastate the
well-being of the poor majority. Add to this the required privatization
of everything from energy to water, the patents on micro-organisms and
plants, the drastic reduction of social services.
Please contact your senators and representatives and urge
them to vote NO on CAFTA.
It's on the fast track which means there can be no changes, just a vote
up or down. Tell them to vote it down and then rewrite it as a
Fair Trade agreement.
For more information about CAFTA and sample letters and talking points,
go to the following Web sites:
• Citizens Trade
Campaign
• Stop CAFTA
• American
Friends Service Committee
• Religious Task Force on Central America and Mexico (sample letter
to Congress)
Email your member of Congress directly from the Public Citizen Global Trade Watch website. A
sample message is provided.
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House of Representatives:
The Honorable ________
House Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20515
Senate:
The Honorable ________
Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510
Phone:
Capitol Switchboard
House and Senate: (202) 224-3121
Call your member of Congress tollfree at: 1-800-839-5276
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Donald Rumsfeld is in Nicaragua this weekend, evidently to discuss
matters of terrorism. There is general concern that public
demonstrations in opposition to CAFTA will be treated as acts of
terrorism.
And in today's paper we see that Dan Fisk, deputy
secretary of State for Central America, is coming to Nicaragua next
week to meet with the PLC, the main conservative party of Nicaragua.
You can be assured the U.S. government will do whatever they feel is
necessary to keep the Sandinistas from winning the 2006 presidential
election.
For now Doralisa
and her family have hope. They can pay for their children to go to
school (a school not built by the government but by a Spanish NGO),
they
have food, they feel optimistic. They survived the contra but
they
also need to survive CAFTA!
Tomorrow we're off to Somotillo, one of the hottest areas in Nicaragua,
looking forward to finding Marta or her family.
Thanks again for your interest! Feel free to write us at pamnpaul2@earthlink.net
and do please refer others to our web page NicaLetters.ppaponline.org
where we have a bit of history of our project and sometimes
(non-professional) photos to accompany the newsletters. It IS great to
be back in Nicaragua!
In appreciation!
Pam and Paul
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