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Nicaragua Producers' Groups
The two major groups of producers, the UNO-affiliated
Cosep
and the Sandinista-affiliated National Union of Farmers
and
Cattlemen (Unión Nacional de Agricultores y
Ganaderos--UNAG),
began distancing themselves from the political arena after
the
1990 election and concentrating more narrowly on serving
their
members' economic interests. On opposite sides of the
political
scene during the Sandinista years, both unions had played
important political and economic roles. Different
political
positions after 1990, however, brought them closer in
their
attitudes toward the country's economic situation.
Formed in 1978, COSEP acts as a coordinating council
for
commercial and agricultural organizations. Cosep was
viewed
during the early Sandinista years as the major force in
the anti-
-Sandinista opposition, trying in the early 1980s to
engage in
dialogues with the Sandinista government even as it
adopted a
highly confrontational stance. Cosep's position, however,
was
weakened in the mid-1980s by the flight of the middle
class and
by members' fears that their property would be
confiscated, and
in the late 1980s by pressure from the peace negotiations.
Although one Cosep leader, Enrique Bolanos Geyer, had been
a
potential presidential candidate for the 1990 elections,
Cosep
supported Chamorro in the electoral campaign after she won
internal elections within the UNO. Two Cosep members
refused
cabinet posts in the Chamorro government, however,
protesting
Chamorro's decision to maintain Humberto Ortega as chief
of the
army. The organization has continued to oppose decisions
that
allow the Sandinistas considerable influence in
government,
fearing that such a practice will produce an unfavorable
investment climate.
UNAG is one of the Sandinista mass organizations; it
was
founded in April 1981 to organize small- and medium-sized
farmers
in support of the FSLN. Although always pro-Sandinista),
UNAG
tried to downplay ideology in the countryside in the 1980s
and
fought for nondogmatic, inclusive policies that would not
alienate peasant property owners and would defend the
interests
of all efficient rural producers. After the Chamorro
government
took power, UNAG continued efforts to broaden its base. It
sought
to attract discontented, landless Contras to its ranks and
to
maintain its political influence by trying to develop
joint
positions on agricultural policy with Cosep and its large
agricultural producers.
The two producers' groups continued to represent very
different political, ideological, and economic positions.
These
differences were made clear during the Chamorro
government's 1990
attempt to negotiate the economic and social national
concertación. UNAG decided to participate in the
negotiations even before the Sandinista unions agreed to
do
so. Cosep participated only after expressing objections
that the
result had been predetermined in previous discussions
between the
Sandinistas and the government. Cosep later refused to
sign the
final document, charging that the final agreement was
unfair
because the government had agreed to union demands that
land and
other confiscated and expropriated property should not be
returned to former owners. The concertación opened
a
permanent breach between Cosep and the government.
Data as of December 1993
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