It's Chávez, er, Ortega vs. the US in Nicaragua

Sitting in his office next to Ortega's home, Bayardo Arce, a top FSLN party member, says that ties with the US won't be severed if his party wins. He says the US will continue to be Nicaragua's principal trading market, but that its US ties shouldn't overshadow ties with the rest of Latin America. "That's not to say that we are going to turn into Republicans, or that Bush is going to become a Sandinista," he cautions.

The FSLN has also been the target of US criticism, particularly because of an oil plan by Venezuela, which shipped cheap fuel to Nicaraguan mayors last month. It has been condemned as a vote-generator for Ortega.

Dionisio Marenco, the mayor of Managua, a staunch Ortega ally and a leader of the fuel program, denies that politics are a factor. "Our country needs this, and if the same offer were given on these terms by [President] Bush or by [Mexico's President Vicente] Fox or anyone in Saudi Arabia or the Sultan of Brunei, I'd take it."

The Organization of American States has issued two statements slapping the wrists of "other countries" interfering in Nicaragua's electoral process.

Michael Shifter, the US vice president for policy at the Inter-American Dialogue in Washington, says the US's heavy-handedness could backfire. "Unlike Chávez, who has a lot of money and has huge regional ambitions and appetites, Ortega's agenda is to accumulate and maintain as much power as he can in Nicaragua," he says. "It's not good for Nicaragua, but it's not necessarily a reason for the US to get so worked up."

The US may be undermining Mr. Montealegre, a more conservative candidate. "Should he win," Mr. Shifter adds, "he'll be seen as the candidate of the gringos."

At a press breakfast Wednesday, Montealegre said that anti-Ortega sentiment expressed by US officials is mere freedom of expression, and that this election is a decision between "receding or advancing."

But others say the interference has been harmful. "In general, the population feels that no other country should get involved in our elections," says Alejandro Serrano Caldera, a political analyst in Managua.

The country remains deeply divided after nearly a decade of civil war. Some Contras have come to the side of Ortega – his running mate is his former Contra rival – but some former Sandinistas are disillusioned with Ortega.

"Ortega? Never again," says Mario Romero, a taxi driver who has Montealegre bumper stickers all over his car. He fought in the Sandinista Army with his brother, who was killed during the conflict.

Ortega's supporters speak of finding jobs and say 16 years of pro-market reform in one of the poorest countries in the Western hemisphere has left them worse off. Oscar-Rene Vargas, a political analyst in Managua, says US threats of economic repercussions are empty – that the US economy is as vested in free-trade agreements and the immigrants who send remittances home as is Nicaragua.

Such geopolitics means nothing to Blandon. She, like many of her generation, is faithful to Ortega. He gave her the land where her house now stands. Her granddaughter, Yuri Massiel, says she'll vote for Ortega in her first election Sunday, because she wants to go to college and become an accountant. "I don't want to rupture ties with the US," she says. "But I want a better youth."

• Ms. Llana is Latin America correspondent for the Monitor and USA Today.

Page: 1 | 2