In the 1970s, when Nicaragua was also under a dictatorship, a guerrilla command kidnapped some senior regime officials who were at a party at the US embassy in Managua. After days of negotiation, the hostages were released under one condition, they were to release 14 political prisoners who were being held illegally.
Who commanded this uprising was former general Hugo Torres, and one of the political prisoners who were freed in this operation was the then guerrilla Daniel Ortega.
This Saturday, the dictatorship, now owned by Ortega, left Hugo Torres, his former ally and responsible for his freedom, to die after suffering torture as a political prisoner in El Chipote prison, where the 47 political prisoners of the current regime are held last year. , before the facade elections that gave a new mandate to the dictator and his wife and vice-president, Rosario Murillo.
Torres was 73 years old. For a long time after the event described above, he had been Ortega’s political partner, serving as deputy interior minister and head of the Armed Forces. The differences arose in the 1990s, when Torres began to disagree with Ortega’s methods and with the authoritarian and dogmatic direction he had been giving to Sandinismo.
He then joined other dissidents, such as the current writer Sergio RamÃrez and Dora MarÃa Téllez, in the Sandinista Renovation Movement. For Ortega, these former allies are now seen as traitors, and those who are not imprisoned have either gone into exile or are being relentlessly pursued by the regime.
Torres’ relatives want to know what happened, as the former general, who had not even been tried, had entered the prison healthy. In recent visits, his relatives were prevented from seeing him. Witnesses inside the prison say he had wounds on his legs and back as a result of the torture, and that his health was deteriorating.
Several human rights organizations had already drawn attention to the unsanitary conditions in El Chipote prison. And also to the irregularity of the trials, also of facade, that have been taking place there.
What a generation of militants, activists and politicians who fought against the Somoza dictatorship cannot believe is that Ortega has put the spotlight on his former allies. In a first step, arresting them. Now, it seems, letting them wither and die in state custody.
Shortly before being taken to prison, Torres recorded a video and shared it on his social networks: “46 years ago, I risked my life to get Daniel Ortega and other companions out of prison. principles, today betray him”. And he added: “To the more sensible followers of what was Sandinismo, my message is to open your eyes, because we are being led to the abyss”.
Also asking for news of a loved one imprisoned in El Chipote are the family members of Dora MarÃa Téllez, 66, another veteran of the fight against Somoza and considered the most important Sandinista guerrilla of her time. Lawyers for her were able to see her once and report seeing blunt marks of torture.
Dora had been immortalized by Nobel Prize winner Gabriel GarcÃa Márquez in the chronicle “Asalto al Palacio”. The Colombian writer described her as “a very beautiful woman, shy and self-absorbed, with an intelligence and a good judgment that will serve her for anything great in life”.
Known as “commander number 2”, she led the assault on Nicaragua’s National Palace in 1978, one of the key episodes of the Sandinista Revolution (1979).
Dora is now sentenced to 15 years in prison for “betrayal to the motherland” and “conspiracy” for having also abandoned Ortega and joined the MRS. Initially detained in June last year, after the sentence she is without communication and prevented from receiving visits.
Unlike the seven candidates who thought about running against Ortega last year, Dora did not even think about returning to politics and was not running for any public office. Her condemnation, under these conditions, is only justified even as a pure desire for revenge.
How far will it be able to take this vengeful impetus, seems to be the macabre saga we are already witnessing.
