Humberto Belli | |
|---|---|
 Belli in 2018 | |
| Born | September 7, 1945 |
| Alma mater | Central American University University of Madrid University of Pennsylvania |
| Title | Minister of Education |
| Relatives | Gioconda Belli (sister) |
Humberto Belli Pereira [1] (born September 7, 1945) is a Nicaraguan politician and writer. The former Minister of Education in Nicaragua during the presidency of conservative Violeta Chamorro, Belli is also the author of five books.
Humberto Belli Pereira was born September 7, 1945, in Managua) [2] to Humberto Belli Zapata and Gloria Pereira Salazar. [3] His sister is the author and former Sandinista revolutionary Gioconda Belli. [4]
Humberto Belli was educated at the Central American University, the University of Madrid, and University of Pennsylvania, where he studied sociology. [5] He joined the Sandinista student group, the Revolutionary Student Front (FER) in 1965, but broke with the FSLN and Marxism in 1975 while continuing to oppose the Somoza rule. [2]
He converted to Catholicism in 1977 [2] and is a member of Opus Dei. [3] He is the author of Breaking Faith: The Sandinista Revolution and its Impact on Freedom and Christian Faith in Nicaragua (1984; also released as Christians Under Fire) [6] and Buscando La Tierra Prometida, Historia de Nicaragua 1492-2019 (Searching for the Promised Land, 2019). [7] He is on the editorial board of La Prensa. [8]
Belli became Minister of Education in Nicaragua during the presidency of conservative Violeta Barrios de Chamorro [9] and also worked in the administration of her successor, Arnoldo Alemán of the Constitutionalist Liberal Party. [3]
He is a critic of the FSLN, alleging fraud in the 2011 Nicaraguan general election (particularly as regards the National Assembly composition) and harshly criticizing his once-close friend of Cardinal Miguel Obando y Bravo for Obando y Bravo’s close relationship with the FSLN. [3] In a 2012 interview, Belli said, “I regret that a member of the Church who should distance himself from power and especially from powers that disrespect the Constitution and commit fraud, is continually blessing it.” [3]
In June 2021, Bellí was among a wave of arrest warrants for civic figures that began with four opposition pre-candidates for president in the November general election. [10] On June 16, Bellí and 12 other former directors of Nicaraguan Foundation for Economic and Social Development (FUNIDES) had their bank accounts frozen in an investigation for alleged violations by the Foundation of the controversial Law 1040, the “Law on the Regulation of Foreign Agents”. [10] The next day, arrest warrants were issued for two of them—Bellí and Gerardo José Baltodano Cantarero—for allegedly failing to respond to a summons. [10]
José Daniel Ortega Saavedra is a Nicaraguan politician and the 58th president of Nicaragua since 10 January 2007. Previously, he was leader of Nicaragua from 18 July 1979 to 25 April 1990, first as Coordinator of the Junta of National Reconstruction from 19 July 1979 to 10 January 1985, and then as the 54th president from 10 January 1985 to 25 April 1990. During his first term, he implemented policies to achieve leftist reforms across Nicaragua. In later years, Ortega's left-wing radical politics cooled significantly, leading him to pursue pro-business policies and even rapprochement with the Catholic Church. However, in 2022, Ortega resumed repression of the Church, and has imprisoned prelate Rolando José Álvarez Lagos.
The Sandinista National Liberation Front is a Christian socialist political party in Nicaragua. Its members are called Sandinistas in both English and Spanish. The party is named after Augusto César Sandino, who led the Nicaraguan resistance against the United States occupation of Nicaragua in the 1930s.
Violeta Barrios Torres de Chamorro is a Nicaraguan former politician who served as the 55th President of Nicaragua from 1990 to 1997. She was the first and, to date, only woman to hold the position of president of Nicaragua. Previously, she was a member of the Junta of National Reconstruction from 1979 to 1980.
Gioconda Belli is a Nicaraguan-born novelist and poet known for her contributions to Nicaraguan literature.
The Junta of National Reconstruction was the provisional government of Nicaragua from the fall of the Somoza family dictatorship in July 1979 until January 1985, with the election of Daniel Ortega (FSLN) as president of Nicaragua.
La Prensa is a Nicaraguan newspaper, with offices in the capital Managua. Its current daily circulation is placed at 42,000. Founded in 1926, in 1932 it was bought by Pedro Joaquín Chamorro Zelaya, who had become editor-in-chief. He promoted the Conservative Party of Nicaragua and became a voice of opposition to Juan Bautista Sacasa, for which the paper was censored. He continued to be critical of dictator Anastasio Somoza García, who came to power in a coup d'état.
General Humberto Ortega Saavedra was a Nicaraguan revolutionary, military leader, writer and businessman. One of the nine members of the National Directorate of the Sandinista National Liberation Front, he co-founded the Tercerista tendency and was the "major theorist" of the urban insurrection strategy that toppled the Somoza family dictatorship. A four-star general, Ortega was minister of defense from 1980 to 1995, between the victory of the Sandinista revolution in 1979 under the National Reconstruction Government, through the first presidency of his brother Daniel Ortega, and into the presidency of Violeta Chamorro who defeated Daniel Ortega in 1990. He was also chief of the army, overseeing its transformation from the partisan Sandinista Popular Army (EPS) to the professionalized Nicaraguan Armed Forces under civilian control. Later in life he spoke out against repression by his brother's government. Hours after a May 2024 interview in which he sharply criticized his brother, Humberto Ortega was placed under house arrest. The following month, he was transferred to a military hospital where he died in September 2024.
National Opposition Union was a Nicaraguan wide-range coalition of opposition parties formed to oppose president Daniel Ortega's Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) in the 1990 election. Its candidate Violeta Chamorro eventually won the race. UNO traced its origins back to the Nicaraguan Democratic Coordinating Group, which was formed in 1982 by different opposition groups. At the time of the election, of the UNO coalition's fourteen political parties, four were considered conservative, seven could be characterised as centrist parties, and three – including Nicaragua's Communists – had traditionally been on the far left of the political spectrum.
The mass media in Nicaragua consist of several different types of communications media: television, radio, cinema, newspapers, magazines, and Internet-based Web sites.
Pablo Antonio Cuadra was a Nicaraguan essayist, art and literary critic, playwright, graphic artist and one of the most famous poets of Nicaragua.
General elections were held in Nicaragua on 25 February 1990 to elect the President and the members of the National Assembly. The result was a victory for the National Opposition Union (UNO), whose presidential candidate Violeta Chamorro surprisingly defeated incumbent president Daniel Ortega of the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN). This led to a historic peaceful and democratic transfer of power in Nicaragua.
Confidencial is a weekly newspaper in Nicaragua, with offices in the capital Managua. It was founded in 1996 by Carlos Fernando Chamorro Barrios. Chamorro is the former director of the Sandinista National Liberation Front newspaper Barricada and the son of Pedro Joaquín Chamorro Cardenal, Nicaraguan journalist and former editor of La Prensa whose murder in the last year of the rule of the Somoza family influenced public sympathy for the FSLN rebels.
In 1979, the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) overthrew Anastasio Somoza Debayle, ending the Somoza dynasty, and established a revolutionary government in Nicaragua. Following their seizure of power, the Sandinistas ruled the country first as part of a Junta of National Reconstruction. Following the resignation of centrist members from this Junta, the FSLN took exclusive power in March 1981.
Miriam Argüello Morales was a politician from Nicaragua. A lawyer by training, she was the first woman to become president of the National Assembly of Nicaragua, where she served as a deputy for 22 years. She was elected Assembly president in 1990, defeating Alfredo César Aguirre though he had the support of Nicaraguan President Violeta Chamorro. However, César prevailed the following year, replacing Argüello in 1991.
Claudia Lucía Chamorro Barrios is a Nicaraguan writer, public health official, and former ambassador of Nicaragua to Cuba and Costa Rica. She served as a diplomat on behalf of the Sandinista government in the 1980s. She later became a critic of the FSLN. She is the author of a memoir, Tiempo de Vivir.
Antonio Lacayo Oyanguren was a Nicaraguan politician who served as Minister of the Presidency from 1990 to 1996, during the government of Violeta Barrios de Chamorro. He was a central figure in the country’s transition to democracy. He was campaign manager for Chamorro’s 1990 run for the presidency that defeated FSLN incumbent Daniel Ortega. In 1991, he created the Nicaraguan currency, the Cordoba Oro.
Mariano Fiallos Oyanguren was a Nicaraguan judge and academic. He was rector of National Autonomous University of Nicaragua at León (UNAN-León) from 1974 to 1980 and President of the Supreme Electoral Council from 1984 to 1996, overseeing the country’s first democratic transfer of power in 1990.
Pedro Joaquín Chamorro Barrios is a Nicaraguan journalist and politician. He began his career in journalism working at La Prensa, following the 1978 assassination of its editor, his father, Pedro Joaquín Chamorro Cardenal. Working on the side of the Contras in exile in the 1980s, he returned to the country in 1989 when his mother Violeta Barrios de Chamorro ran for president, and following her election, served as a Nicaraguan ambassador. He later became defense minister. In the 21st century, Chamorro has been a city councilor for Managua and deputy in the National Assembly, also for Managua. On 25 June 2021, he became part of a wave of arrests of opposition and civic figures in Nicaragua.
Jaime Chamorro Cardenal was a Nicaraguan newspaper editor and publisher. A civil engineer by training, journalism was the family business, as his father owned the newspaper La Prensa. Chamorro joined La Prensa in 1974, where he worked for 47 years and served as publisher for 28, from 1993 until his death in 2021.
The Piñata sandinista is a case of corruption and appropriation of public and private property by Nicaraguan Sandinista leaders before leaving power in 1990. In the period between the electoral defeat of 25 February 1990 and the inauguration of their adversary Violeta Chamorro on 27 April of the same year, the Sandinistas transferred the ownership of a large amount of real estate and public property, some previously expropriated, to their related organizations and, mostly, personally to their leaders such as President Daniel Ortega himself, his brother Humberto and the leader Tomás Borge. Other assets were nominally taken over by the FSLN but later passed into the private hands of Ortega's relatives and collaborators. The two main laws that implemented the piñata were those known as Law 85 and Law 86.
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