Violeta Chamorro

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Newspaper magnate, publicist, anti-Somoza leader, and titular head of the United National Opposition, Violeta Barrios de Chamorro (born 1930) was also the first woman president of Nicaragua (1990).

Violeta Barrios de Chamorro, known to friends and supporters as "Doña Violeta," was born in the rural southern Nicaraguan town of Rivas in 1930. One of seven children of a wealthy ranching family distinguished for its contributions to Nicaraguan politics, Violeta Barrios as a young girl lived an idyllic, protected life in the countryside where she early became an accomplished equestrian. In her childhood years Nicaragua was wracked by civil war, beset by United States military intervention, shocked by the murder of nationalist hero César Augusto Sandino, and crushed by the ascension of Anastacio Somoza to dictatorial power in 1936.

As a teenager, she was sent to the United States to broaden her education and learn English. She attended a Catholic girls' school in San Antonio, Texas, and a small college in Virginia before being called home in 1948 upon her father's unexpected death by heart attack.

Home less than a year, Violeta Barrios met the dynamic Pedro Joaquín Chamorro, young scion of another of Nicaragua's leading families and a journalist for La Prensa, the nation's leading opposition newspaper, which was owned by his father. That opposition had caused much of the Chamorro family to seek exile (1944-1948), but upon their return Pedro, now publisher of La Prensa, maintained its role as an anti-Somoza forum. In 1950 he and Violeta married.

Violeta Chamorro raised two girls and two boys in a tense political atmosphere. Her husband Pedro was jailed several times (once for two years), and several times threatened with death for his political views, which were thoroughly democratic. The Barrios and Chamorro clans joined many other Nicaraguans who cheered when dictator Somoza was assassinated in 1956, but democracy was not to be the outcome. Two of Somoza's sons maintained the family autocracy by force, and with La Prensa leading the way, a popular opposition movement grew apace - a revolution in the making. Pedro Chamorro, so vocal and visible a foe of the regime, was murdered by Somoza thugs in 1978, becoming one of the chief martyrs of the evolving Sandinista revolutionary movement.

Chamorro, undeterred by her husband's death, continued, with her newspaper, to help lead the opposition to Somoza, calling for a return to democracy. When Anastacio ("Tachito") Somoza, Jr., fled the country in 1979 in the face of a popular uprising, she was honored with membership in the powerful Sandinista Governing Junta. Dedicated as she was to the ideals and practice of democracy, Chamorro quit the Sandinista Junta within a year and began speaking out against its Marxist rhetoric and increasingly authoritarian rule.

Once again in opposition, she and La Prensa led the attack against the supposedly popular, but soon dictatorial and incompetent, regime, labeling Daniel Ortega and other Sandinista rulers as "Los Muchachos" ("The Boys"). Careful not to align herself openly with the anti-Sandinista guerrilla movement known as the "Contras" or with the United States, Violeta Chamorro achieved more with the pages of La Prensa than the rebels did with their bullets, and by 1988 she was the most prominent of the nation's opposition leaders. Around her figure rallied all those disturbed by the economic chaos (35,000 percent inflation in 1988!) and the Sandinistas' alignment with Cuba and the Soviet Union.

In 1989 she agreed to run for the presidency of Nicaragua when the Sandinistas, under pressure from world opinion, announced that they would permit free elections in 1990. Although hampered by lack of campaign financing and not-so-subtle Sandinista interference, Chamorro laboriously put together a loose coalition of 14 political parties and groupings under the banner of UNO (United National Opposition). This coalition, which embraced such disparate dissident factions as right-wing businessmen and ranchers and the nation's official Communist Party, was "united" by one single purpose - to remove the Sandinistas from power. There was no agreement on what policies to follow should they be successful.

The Chamorro family was itself far from united. While two children, Cristiana and Pedro Joaquín, helped their mother run La Prensa and worked for her election, Claudia and Carlos were avowed and active Sandinistas, Claudia serving in the government's foreign service and Pedro as editor of the regime's official newspaper, La Barricada.

With promised financial campaign aid from the United States trickling in, and with the Catholic Church's support, Chamorro and UNO became a force to be reckoned with by late 1989; all the more so as an unparalleled number of foreign observers arrived in Nicaragua to ensure an honest and open election on February 25, 1990. For the first time in its history, the United Nations sent a delegation to observe a member state's election.

Still, numerous polls showed as late as February 15 that the Sandinistas maintained a seemingly insurmountable lead (by as much as two-to-one) among voters, and Violeta Chamorro, with a kneecap broken in a fall, had difficulty campaigning fulltime. "In the macho culture of my country," Chamorro writes in her autobiography Dreams of the Heart: The Autobiography of President Violeta Barrios de Chamorro of Nicaragua, "few people believed that I, a woman and an invalid, would have the strength, energy and will to last through a punishing campaign." And indeed, she barely did. Between trips abroad, many for treatment of her ailments, and then recovery in seclusion at home, Chamorro spent more time off the stump than on during the most crucial phase of the campaign. In the end, it didn't matter.

The results of the election were electrifying, and almost totally unexpected; the polls proven wrong. Indeed, the actual ratios were almost the opposite of those predicted, with Chamorro and UNO swept to victory with 55 percent of the votes cast, to only 41 percent for the incumbent Sandinistas and a smattering for several minor parties. A similar phenomenon took place in Assembly (Congress) elections, with UNO winning 51 (of 92) seats and the Sandinistas 39.

Inaugurated April 25, Violeta de Barrios Chamorro was immediately confronted by a host of truly critical problems. She had to disarm the Contra revolutionaries and reintegrate them peacefully into Nicaraguan life; gain control of the ideologically Sandinista military (Central America's largest, by far) and radically reduce its size; diminish a still four-digit inflation; combat the nation's staggering unemployment problem; seek rescheduling of the hemisphere's highest per capita foreign debt; negotiate a substantial foreign aid package from the United States; and heal Nicaragua's deep and bitter social and political divisions. Few new chief executives have faced such daunting tasks.

As a person, Chamorro possessed an arrogance that was perfectly common in someone of her high aristocractic - and Spanish - lineage. "Pedro and I are the descendants of men who were in the top echelons of Nicaragua's social structure," she writes proudly. "Ours was a ruling class of European-blood criollos (children of Spaniards born in America in which birth determined status.)" A Sacasa by birth and a Chamorro by marriage (the rough equivalent, in the United States, of being a descendant of Washington married to a descendant of Jefferson), she never doubted her family's vocation to rule nor the uniftness of others less blessed by high birth. Like the rest of her class, she could barely hide her contempt for the arriviste Somozas or, in a different way, for the far humbler Ortegas.

Social position meant a great deal to Chamorro. When she first allied herself with the Sandinistas in 1979, it was in part because the revolutionary leaders had cleverly attracted to their side a small but distinguished group of Nicaraguan elites, men Chamarro related to socially.

Relying on a savvy team of advisers which included a number of her own trusted relatives, she tried to keep UNO truly unified to achieve her goals. Most who knew her or had followed her career believed that the 60-year-old, silver-haired grandmother, with her articulate love of democracy and belief in moderation, would change the course of her nation's history for the better.

Opting not to run for re-election, Chamorro handed over the presidency to Arnoldo Aleman after the October 1996 democractic election. She left him a country that was in better shape than when she took over as president. In 1996, the economy grew an estimated five percent, the third year of growth after a decade of contraction. Despite significant foreign debt relief negotiated during the year, the country continued to have a precarious balance of payments position and remained heavily dependent on foreign assistance. Although investment increased, the slow and complicated resolution of confiscated property claims continued to hinder private investment. The unemployment rate was officially estimated at 17 percent, while total unemployment and underemployment may have reached 50 percent. The inflation rate was about 11 percent and estimated per capita annual income was $470.

Chamorro will take a place in her nation's history, but it remains to be seen whether her reign of democracy was an aberration in Nicaraguan history rather than a harbinger of things to come.

Further Reading

The election of Violeta Chamorro and the problems she faced were described by Johanna McGeary, "But Will it Work?" TIME (March 12, 1990). An assessment of her first year in office was made by Edward Cody, The Washington Post (April 7, 1991). A book that deals with both Violeta Chamorro and her martyred husband is Patricia T. Edmisten, Nicaragua Divided: La Prensa and the Chamorro Legacy (1990). The Sandinista decade that ended with the election of Chamorro is described by Stephen Kinzer, Blood of Brothers: Life and War in Nicaragua (1991).

Violeta Barrios Torres de Chamorro
President of Nicaragua
In office April 25, 1990 – January 10, 1997
Preceded by	Daniel Ortega
Succeeded by	Arnoldo Alemán
Born	October 18, 1929 (1929-10-18) (age 80) Rivas, Nicaragua
Political party	National Opposition Union

Violeta Barrios Torres de Chamorro (born October 18, 1929) is a Nicaraguan political leader, former president and publisher. She became president of Nicaragua on April 25, 1990, when she unseated Daniel Ortega.^[1] She was supported by many, including a fourteen-party anti-Sandinista alliance known as the National Opposition Union (Unión Nacional Opositora, UNO), an alliance that ranged from conservatives and liberals to communists. She left office on January 10, 1997. Chamorro was the first, and to date only, woman to hold that position in Nicaragua, and furthermore was the first elected female head of government in Latin America and the second North American woman president, following only Ertha Pascal-Trouillot who took power in Haiti as an interim president only a few months before Chamorro's election. She was also the first and so far only woman to defeat an incumbent president.

Contents 1 Personal life 2 Rise to Power 3 Presidency 4 Relations with the United States 5 Awards 6 References 7 External links

Personal life

Chamorro was born in 1929 to a wealthy family in Rivas, a small city near the Nicarguan border with Costa Rica. She was educated in private Catholic schools in Granada and Managua.^[2] Chamorro's parents wanted her to perfect her English and sent her to an American boarding school. She first attended Our Lady of the Lakes near Austin, Texas and then transferred to Blackston in Virginia. In June 1947, her father was diagnosed with terminal lung cancer and after her father's death she returned to Nicaragua, cutting her schooling in the United States short.^[3] She met Pedro Joaquín Chamorro in 1949 and they married in 1950, with whom she had five children. In 1952, Chamorro's husband, Pedro Joaquín Chamorro, took over the anti-Somoza newspaper La Prensa and was frequently jailed for its content. She took over the newspaper after her husband's assassination on Jan. 10th 1978.

Over the years, Chamorro's family has been split into feuding factions based upon political association. Two of her children, Pedro and Cristiana, worked at La Prensa (the press), although Pedro left Nicaragua in 1984 to join the contras. Her other children were active Sandinistas; Claudia was ambassador to Costa Rica and Carlos became the editor of the FSLN daily newspaper Barricada. In spite of the conflicting political views of her children, Chamorro encouraged and hosted family dinners during which she insisted political affiliations were temporarily forgotten in the interest of familial values.^[4]

Rise to Power

Violeta Chamorro’s rise to power began with the assassination of her husband when she took over as editor La Prensa. The paper was traditionally anti-Somoza, and initially backed the Sandinistas. As a result, she was invited to join the Sandinista First Coalition Junta, however she resigned in 1980 when she claimed to have felt slighted and manipulated by the junta, and shocked by their socialist agenda. She then turned to the opposition: the Contras.^[5] As a result La Prensa was temporarily shut down.^[6] During that time, Chamorro was appointed the presidential candidate for UNO.^[7]

Her rise to power can be attributed to more than her affiliation with La Prensa, and in part was the result of the lack of international support for the Sandinista regime, the tiring of the masses of civil war, the symbol she meant to the people, and her strong campaign focus on being the opposition rather than trying to convince people to accept a political program. Furthmore, Chamorro was portrayed as the mother figure, a hero, and a martyr whereas Ortega was depicted as a macho rooster.^[8]

President George H. Bush took office in the United States and demanded a democratic government in Nicaragua. The Sandinistas didn’t have strong international allies to help them anymore, so they were at the mercy of the United States.

The scheduled 1990 elections were about to take place, and opposition parties took advantage of this opportunity to run and the UNO was created, combining the fourteen most prominent political parties in the country. Violeta Chamorro was selected as their candidate.

At the beginning, no one thought she could win against the government-financed campaign Ortega was running, but in the final days, she was able to defeat the incumbent president. The United States Embassy spent more than $1 million on her behalf. A broad desire for an end to the 11- year long civil war led to her besting Ortega in the elections. Upon her election, the United States stopped funding the insurgents better known as "Contras."

Presidency

In 1990, after nearly a decade of civil warfare and economic sanctions, Chamorro became the presidential candidate of the National Opposition Union (UNO), a coalition of 14 political parties that ran against the Sandinistas in that year's national elections.^[9] Chamorro won the election with a 55% victory over her opposition, the incumbent, Daniel Ortega.^[10] These elections were internationally monitored and provided a relatively smooth transition. Chamorro's presidency is primarily known for the peace she brought to the then war-ravaged Nicaragua, however her policies were not limited to peacemaking.

Cement-covered tank in Chamorro's Peace Park (Parque de Paz) symbolizing the wish of Nicaraguans that "never again" will their country be plagued by such violence.

Chamorro’s peace reforms are perhaps her most enduring. Most noteworthy was her official declaration of the end of the war; she maintained this peace by a reduction in the size and power of the military, an end to the national draft, and the demobilization of the military.^[11] This demobilization included the removal of the US-backed Contras thereby leaving the Sandinistas with no one to fight, and therefore creating a highly effective peace.^[12] Chamorro additionally allowed for the Sandinista’s agrarian reform movement’s redistribution of land to be maintained, and retained Daniel Ortega’s brother, Humberto Ortega, as a military leader. While Chamorro received criticism for this accusing her of supporting the Sandinistas, it proved to be a valuable political move.^[13] Chamorro also granted unconditional amnesties for political crimes, resulting in little room for protest from the Sandinistas, and creating a smooth transition of power. The only time the “recontras” attempted to resurface was in 1994, and Chamorro quickly suppressed the violence through a peace agreement. Chamorro’s fierce weapon-buying campaign eradicated the threat of persisting violence, and all weapons were covered in concrete at the Plaza de la Paz (Peace Square), specifically built in downtown Managua to symbolize “never again.”^[14]

Cement-covered AK-47s held by unknown boy in Chamorro's Peace Park in central Managua

The Nicaraguan civil war devastated the economy, and Chamorro did succeed in developing general economic stability.^[15] Chamorro controlled hyperinflation and attempted to turn to a neoliberal model outlined by the Mayorga Plan by attempting to re-integrate Nicaragua into the world market, increase foreign investment while reducing foreign backing, and increase privatization, however this plan was very unpopular in Nicaragua.^[16] The plan failed to solve the overwhelming economic devastation of Nicaragua and was coupled with a rise in unemployment and underemployment.^[17] Further aggravating the plight of the poor, in order to control inflation Chamorro was forced to cut government spending by eliminating social programs, particularly for females, though she did encourage the development of a strong educational system.^[18] Chamorro was also criticized for rejecting constitutional reforms that included a prohibition of nepotism, a requirement for legislative approval to tax and spend money, a decrease in the length of the presidential term from six to five years, and the expansion constitutional liberties.^[19]

Relations with the United States

The United States contributed to the 1990 election that brought Violeta Chamorro to power as they allocated $9 million to aid her party and create systems that monitored the electoral process.^[20] Additionally, when Chamorro was elected, George H.W. Bush removed the embargo that Ronald Reagan had imposed during Sandinista rule and promised economic aid to the country.^[21] Some people in Chamorro’s campaign team were hoping to get $1 billion worth of aid from the United States to help rebuild the country after years of civil war.^[22] However, the Bush administration instead gave $300 million to the country in the first year of Chamorro’s presidency, 1990, and $241 million the year after.^[23] Given the devastation that Nicaragua had faced, this amount of aid was not enough to make any serious improvement.^[24]

A plaque in Chamorro's Peace Park thanking US President George H. W. Bush for his contribution to the re-establishment of democracy in Nicaragua.

Chamorro’s presidency faced decreased US interest to the point where when Chamorro came to the US in April 1991 to ask Congress for more economic aid, few members even showed up to listen to her.^[23] Because the Sandinistas were defeated and peace talks were being established, U.S. foreign policy did not treat Nicaragua with as much importance anymore.

In 1992, Senator Jesse Helms worked to cut off financial aid to Nicaragua. Helms stated in his Senate report that the Sandinistas were still controlling much of the Nicaraguan government and suggested that the government replace all former Sandinista officers with ex-contras, replace all judges, and return all US property that was taken from US citizens during the revolution. Chamorro’s administration denied the allegations while still trying to meet Helms’ demands. Helms ended up winning and the US government denied Nicaragua the $104 million that they had been promised for that year.^[25]

Awards

• Isaiah Thomas Award in Publishing from the Rochester Institute of Technology.^[26]
• 1986 - Louis M. Lyons Award for Conscience and Integrity in Journalism.^[27]
• 1991 - Democracy Award from the National Endowment for Democracy.^[28]
• 1997 - Path to Peace Award from the Path to Peace Foundation.
• 2001 - Award for Leadership in Global Trade^[29]

References

1. ^ Chamorro, Violeta. Dreams of the Heart. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1996
2. ^ Beckman, Peter R., and Francine D’Amico. eds. Women in World Politics Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing Group, 1995. 34
3. ^ Chamorro, Violeta Dreams of the Heart 38, 40.
4. ^ Beckman, Peter R., and Francine D’Amico, eds., Women in World Politics, 34-36
5. ^ Guillermoprieto, Alma. The Heart that Bleeds: Latin American Now. New York: Random House Inc.,1995. 40
6. ^ Beckman, Peter R., and Francine D’Amico.eds., Women in World Politics 37
7. ^ Guillermoprieto, Alma The Heart That Bleeds, 40
8. ^ Beckman, Peter R., and Francine D’Amico.eds., Women in World Politics 37-39
9. ^ Beckman, Peter R., and Francine D’Amico.eds., Women in World Politics, 31
10. ^ Guillermoprieto, Alma. The Heart that Bleeds, 39.
11. ^ Beckman, Peter R., and Francine D’Amico.eds., Women in World Politics, 40-41
12. ^ Guillermoprieto, Alma. The Heart that Bleeds 40
13. ^ Walker, Thomas W., ed. Nicaragua Without Illusions. Wilmington, DE: Scholarly Resources Inc., 1997, 49
14. ^ Skidmore, Thomas E., and Peter H. Smith. Modern Latin America. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997 344-345
15. ^ Walker, Thomas W., ed. Nicaragua Without Illusions, 86
16. ^ Prevost, Gary and Henry E. Vanden. Poltics of Latin America. New York: Oxford University Press, 2002, 116
17. ^ Walker, Thomas W., ed. Nicaragua Without Illusions, 49
18. ^ Beckman, Peter R., and Francine D’Amico, eds., Women in World Politics," 40
19. ^ Prevost, Gary and Henry E. Vanden. Poltics of Latin America, 115
20. ^ Jauberth, H. Rodrigo, Gilberto Castaneda, Jesus Hernandez, and Pedro Vuskovic. 1992. The Difficult Triangle: Mexico, Central America, and the United States. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 34
21. ^ LeoGrande, William M. 1998. Our Own Backyard: The United States in Central America, 1977-1992. Chapel Hill, NC: University of North Carolina Press, 563
22. ^ Close, David. 1999. Nicaragua: The Chamorro Years. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 136
23. ^ ^{a b} Our Own Backyard: The United States in Central America, 1977-1992, 563
24. ^ Coerver, Don M., and Linda B. Hall. 1999. Tangled Destinies: Latin America and the United States. Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 169
25. ^ Nicaragua: The Chamorro Years, 136
26. ^ "Arthur Sulzberger Jr. to Receive RIT Isaiah Thomas Award in Publishing". Rochester Institute of Technology. http://www.rit.edu/news/?r=44884. Retrieved 2007-10-23. 
27. ^ "1986 Louis Lyons Award: Violeta Chamorro". The Nieman Foundation for Journalism (Harvard University). http://www.nieman.harvard.edu/events/honors/lyons/lyonswinners/lyons86.html. Retrieved 2007-10-23. 
28. ^ "1991 Democracy Award". National Endowment for Democracy. http://www.ned.org/events/demaward/demaward1991.html. Retrieved 2007-10-23. 
29. ^ "http://www.abicc.org/awards.htm". Association of Bi-National Chambers of Commerce in Florida. http://www.abicc.org/awards.htm. Retrieved 2007-10-23. 

External links

• Violeta de Chamorro Foundation

Preceded by Daniel Ortega

President of Nicaragua 1990–1997

Succeeded by Arnoldo Alemán

v • d • e Presidents and heads of state of Nicaragua Fruto Chamorro · Francisco Castellón1 · Nazario Escoto1 · José María Estrada · Patricio Rivas · William Walker · Patricio Rivas · Tomás Martínez and Máximo Jerez Junta · Fernando Guzmán · José Vicente Cuadra · Pedro Joaquín Chamorro · Joaquín Zavala · Adán Cárdenas · Evaristo Carazo · Nicolás Osorno · Roberto Sacasa · Ignacio Chávez · Roberto Sacasa · Junta · Salvador Machado · Joaquín Zavala · José Santos Zelaya · José Madriz · José Dolores Estrada · Luis Mena · Juan José Estrada · Adolfo Díaz · Emiliano Chamorro · Diego Manuel Chamorro · Rosendo Chamorro · Bartolomé Martínez · Carlos José Solórzano · Emiliano Chamorro · Sebastián Uriza · Adolfo Díaz · José María Moncada · Juan Bautista Sacasa · Carlos Alberto Brenes · Anastasio Somoza García · Leonardo Argüello · Benjamín Lacayo · Víctor Manuel Román · Manuel Fernando Zurita · Anastasio Somoza García · Luis Somoza · René Schick · Orlando Montenegro · Lorenzo Guerrero · Anastasio Somoza Debayle · Liberal-Conservative Junta · Anastasio Somoza Debayle · Francisco Urcuyo · Junta of National Reconstruction · Daniel Ortega · Violeta Chamorro · Arnoldo Alemán · Enrique Bolaños · Daniel Ortega 1 in León.

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