Nicaragua’s President Daniel Ortega on Wednesday proposed a constitutional reform that would officially make him and his wife, current Vice-President Rosario Murillo, “co-presidents” of the Central American nation.
While the initiative has to pass through the country’s legislature, Ortega and Murillo’s Sandinista party control the Congress and all government institutions, so it is likely to be approved.
The proposal also looks to expand the presidential term to six years from five.
Ortega is an ex-guerilla icon who first served as president from 1985 to 1990, returned to power in 2007, and has since engaged in increasingly authoritarian practices, seizing control of all branches of the state.
Murillo, married to Ortega since 2005 and made vice-president in 2017, has become the face of the government as Ortega rarely makes public appearances. For years rumours have circulated that 78-year-old Ortega is in poor health.
Ortega’s government has increasingly targeted critics, shutting down more than 5,000 NGOs since 2018 mass protests in which the UN estimates some 300 people died.
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