• Central America. Forty years of Sandinismo: "Nicaragua has fallen into another dictatorship like Somoza's"

The death of former guerrilla fighter Edén Pastora, the mythical "Comandante Cero", caused mixed reactions this Tuesday in Nicaragua, where some admired him for his guerrilla actions, and others rejected him for his alliance with the country's president, Daniel Ortega .

Ortega's wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, praised Pastora, 83, hours after Channel 6, a state television station, announced the death.

The "Comandante Cero" as a mythical character became internationally known in August 1978, when Pastora, under that pseudonym, led the assault on the Nicaraguan Parliament in the so-called "Operation Chanchera", which served to free a group of political prisoners , and that accelerated the fall of the Somoza dictatorship.

Four years after that operation, and already with Nicaragua ruled by Ortega, Pastora distanced himself from the Sandinistas with the argument that they did not follow the precepts of the national hero Augusto C. Sandino, but 25 years later he returned to the Sandinista Front for National Liberation ( FSLN).

In a note of condolences, the Government of Venezuela described Pastora as "testimony to anti-imperialism, loyalty, reconciliation, and the supreme sacrifice for the defense of the homeland and the revolution."

The former guerrilla and retired brigadier general, Hugo Torres, who led the assault on Parliament together with Pastora under the alias "Commander One", stated that "one of the most important apologists of the dictatorial regime of Ortega and Murillo disappears".

"It is a sad ending for a figure who at the time was recognized as a hero, when the assault on the National Palace, which at one time enjoyed the appreciation of broad sectors of the citizenry, but who of his own volition trashed the trash that legacy turned it into ignominy, "added Torres, currently a dissident.

The disparate reactions continued on social media. On the one hand, the Sandinistas praised the figure of "Comandante Cero", with phrases like "here we are and here is your enlightened people", or "Edén Pastora, the legend grows."

On the other, there were Nicaraguans who affirmed that Pastora had been dead for days, and that his death was announced until today, to cover the second anniversary of the murder of six members of a family , including two children, who were burned to death, allegedly by hands. of Sandinista paramilitaries, according to various human rights organizations.

The debate also revolved around the reasons for death. While the Sandinistas defended various complications to their health, dissidents such as Torres leaned towards the COVID-19 pandemic.

Pastora, born in 1936 in Ciudad Darío, a municipality in northern Nicaragua, died at the age of 83, occupying the position of delegate in the commission for the development of the San Juan river, bordering Costa Rica.

In accordance with the criteria of The Trust Project

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