20 de agosto 2024
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On August 16, the National Police, controlled by the Daniel Ortega-Rosario Murillo dictatorship, arrested six relatives of Lesbia Gutierrez, the administrator of the Matagalpa Diocesan Caritas Association, as well as the priest Danny Garcia, pastor of the parish of San Juan Bautista in Muy Muy, Matagalpa.
Gutiérrez has been held since August 10, along with Carmen Saénz, a lay worker of the Matagalpa Diocese. Two days after Gutierrez' arrest, the dictatorship ordered the closure of Caritas Matagalpa for allegedly “not reporting” its financial statements for the period 2020-2023, and for having an “expired Board of Directors since September 27, 2022.”
Caritas Matagalpa operated as a social assistance center administered by the Catholic Church. The Association, registered in March 2009, promoted “the development of the most remote communities of the Matagalpa province, prioritizing the poorest sectors of the population that lack basic infrastructure, health and education,” according to information on the organization's official Facebook page.
On the morning of August 16, police agents carried out an operation at Gutierrez' family home, resulting in the arrest of her family members. It is known that one of the sisters was transferred to Managua, according to the lawyer and researcher, Martha Patricia Molina.
Another priest arrested in Matagalpa
That same day, the priest Danny García of the San Juan Bautista parish in the municipality of Muy Muy, Matagalpa, was arrested. The cleric was arrested in the morning hours after it was denounced on social media that the church he directs was under police siege, according to Molina, author of the study 'Nicaragua: A persecuted Church?' who follows up on these cases.
The previous weekend, Nicaraguan priests Leonel Balmaceda, from the Diocese of Esteli, and Denis Martinez, from the Diocese of Matagalpa –both in northern Nicaragua– were arrested. On August 18, both priests were expelled from Nicaragua and sent to the Vatican, as the Ortega regime has done with dozens of other religious figures. To date, the regime has banished 48 priests and bishops from Nicaragua.
So far, neither the Nicaraguan government nor the National Police have offered their versions of these arrests, and they generally do not issue statements.
The arrests continue the wave of repression by the Ortega dictatorship against the dioceses of Matagalpa and Esteli, both administered by Bishop Rolando Alvarez. Alvarez was a political prisoner until he was banished to the Vatican in January of this year.
Molina reported this week that in the Diocese of Matagalpa, only 13 of the 71 priests remain. The clerics have been victims of banishment, imprisonment and persecution.
Is Ortega pushing for the appointment of a new bishop?
According to Molina, “the Sandinista dictatorship has the intention of eliminating the presence of the Catholic Church in the Matagalpa diocese.”
On August 7, the Nicaraguan government banished to the Vatican a group of seven priests from the Diocese of Matagalpa. They had been illegally detained and held under police surveillance at the Interdiocesan Seminary of Our Lady of Fatima in Managua.
Political sources told EFE news agency that the Ortega government is pressuring the Vatican to appoint a new bishop in the dioceses of Matagalpa and Esteli.
The current relationship between the Ortega government and the Catholic Church is very tense, characterized by the expulsion and imprisonment of priests, the prohibition of religious activities, and the suspension of diplomatic relations.
**With information from EFE**
