Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere O

Nicaragua's Democratic Collapse Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere O

Democracy has collapsed in Nicaragua. While Nicaragua does not suffer the same problems with citizen security, gang wars, or migration to the United States as the Northern Triangle countries, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador, have experienced, it is the poorest Central American country and second poorest in the Western Hemisphere, only after Haiti. Under President Daniel Ortega's multiple terms as President, he has taken increasingly blatant steps to concentrate political power into a single party [Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional/Sandinista National Liberation Front] FSLN-ruled system controlling the majority at executive, legislative, judicial, and electoral branches of government. In the 2011, 2012, and 2014 elections, the State Department and other observers found that fraud and other major irregularities had occurred. Since then, the State Department has documented in several reports that Nicaraguan Government agents have committed arbitrary or unlawful killings, used excessive force and torture in prisons, and limited the Nicaraguan people's freedom of speech, religion, and the press.