RETAILERS AMONG THE HARDEST HIT AS NICARAGUA’S POLITICAL CRISIS DEEPENS
4,000 delivery lorries were stranded on the country’s borders this week as protesters demanded Ortega’s resignation
In taking over his family’s shoe business in Nicaragua’s largest market, vendor Jose Miguel Gutierrez thought he was set for life – but as his country nosedives into sociopolitical crisis, one of his two stalls stands barren.
Situated in the heart of Nicaragua’s capital, the chaotic Mercado Oriental market – which sells everything from buttons to lizard meat – generates tens of thousands of jobs and hundreds of millions of dollars, providing a measure of Nicaragua’s economic pulse that vendors say is now beating at a snail’s pace.
Speaking from his empty shop there, Mr Gutierrez, 32, says he and other sellers are feeling a sharp economic pinch from the Central American country’s upheaval, which he says “is going to get worse every day”.
He is among those demanding President Daniel Ortega relinquish power, an objective fuelling protests and clashes with pro-government forces that have caused more than 130 deaths since April 18.
Some vendors at the market, which encompasses approximately 85 hectares, are opting not to accept imports. Instead they are selling only the inventory they have in stock to protest Mr Ortega’s leftist government.
But the political act is not actually much of a choice: even for people like Mr Gutierrez who want to restock, deliveries destined for the sprawling market are being thwarted by myriad road blockades aimed at fending off riot police – which is simultaneously bringing commerce to a standstill.
Some 4,000 delivery lorries were stranded on the country’s borders this week, according to local media, a calamity for Nicaragua as well as its regional trading partners including Honduras and Costa Rica.
Raul Alfaro, president of the Salvadoran Association of International Freight Carriers, called on protesters to let the lorries pass and urged countries in the region to not send more cargo vehicles through Nicaragua, which has seen a wave of anti-government demonstrations starting in mid-April.
Truckers “have nothing do to” with the “Nicaraguan problem”, Mr Alfaro says.
He says there have been about 70 blockades at key entry points connecting Nicaragua’s capital with the Caribbean coast, north and south of the country.
The Nicaraguan Foundation for Economic and Social Development, one of the country’s most respected think tanks, says the political crisis could cause serious economic problems in the short and medium term. The foundation warns that if the problems continue until the end of July, Nicaragua’s economy could lose $404 million (Dh1.45 billion) and 20,000 jobs. The rate of economic growth could also fall by 3.2 percentage points, it said.
The latest report by the non-governmental Nicaraguan Centre for Human Rights attributes more than 135 deaths to the protests and response by the government and Sandinista youth groups. The government has a lower death toll.
Protests began in response to changes to the social security system, but expanded to call for Mr Ortega’s exit from power.
Despite his support of the protesters and their blockades, Mr Gutierrez hangs his head in despair over the state of his business, where the plastic shelves that once featured rows of spotless Nike trainers now gather dust.
His remaining stall has dwindling inventory, and he fears the unrest’s evolution could shut him down all together.
Sandal vendor Veronica Samora, 33, goes to work every morning saddled with a similar burden.
A young couple peers at her shop, zeroing in on a pink pair of rubber moccasins – but they baulk after asking Ms Samora the price, the equivalent of about $5. She lowers it, and lowers it again, but the pair simply smile and move on.
“People don’t have money,” Ms Samora says.
“They can’t pay what goods are worth.”
Ms Samora – who at age 8 began helping her mother at the stand – says she’s selling at least 50 per cent less inventory than before the crisis, “and each day that goes by, the percentage drops lower and lower.
“The way we’re going with this war, at some point the day will come when we won’t sell anything.”
In recent years, Nicaragua had stood out as one of the fastest-developing economies in Central America, according to the World Bank, maintaining above-average growth compared to its neighbours and the Caribbean.
But the country remains plagued by inequality and is one of Latin America’s poorest.
Tensions came to a head over Mr Ortega’s controversial bid to reform the pension system, essentially reducing payouts while upping contributions.
According to economist Nestor Avendano, the volatile political situation in Nicaragua threatens to fell the country’s GDP by 1 per cent – an $800m dip – with respect to 2017.
The Mercado Oriental vendors are already feeling the economic strain.
“The situation here in the market is quite critical,” says Fausto Aguilar Espinosa, 53, a clothing vendor who has worked there for 23 years.
“There aren’t shoppers, we’re not selling,” he says, raising his voice over the shouts of other vendors hawking their wares in vain.
“More than anything we come to watch over the stalls, so that there won’t be looting,” Mr Espinosa says.
Some sellers have consolidated what few goods they have left with colleagues at other stands – or shuttered their metal roll-down gates completely.
But Mr Gutierrez vows to cling to his business: “We will continue here, always.
“I believe in God that the future will get better, and that all of this will end – that the economy will return to normal.
“We pay debt from here, it’s from here that I feed my mother and my child,” he says, pointing to his empty stall.
The way we’re going with this war, at some point the day will come when we won’t sell anything VERONICA SAMORA Sandal vendor