NICARAGUA: The socialist leaders of Cuba and Venezuela celebrated Daniel Ortega's return to Nicaragua's presidency, but rivals at home said they would do everything possible to keep the former revolutionary from cutting ties with the US.
Cuban president Fidel Castro, a key backer of Mr Ortega's radical Sandinista government in the 1980s, sent congratulations. published yesterday on the front page of the Communist Party daily Granma, saying the Nicaraguan election "fills our people with joy, at the same time filling the terrorist and genocidal government of the US with opprobrium".
Yesterday, Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez said his country and Nicaragua would be "uniting as never before" to construct a socialist future following Mr Ortega's election victory.
Mr Ortega, however, has so far held to his campaign theme of reconciliation, indicating that he hopes to avoid conflict with the US and the flight of local businessmen that marked the 11 years of Soviet-backed Sandinista rule after the left-wing rebels overthrew a dictator in 1979. Radical economic policies and the US-financed Contra insurrection created economic chaos and killed 30,000 people during the 1980s.
Speaking with defeated candidate Eduardo Montealegre, who conceded defeat last night, Mr Ortega talked of promoting stability while working to eliminate poverty in the western hemisphere's second poorest country.
Now a balding 60-year-old, Ortega reassured investors he was open to business and promised to "create a new political culture" that would "set aside our differences and put the Nicaraguan people, the poor first.
"We are showing the country that things are stable, that we can set aside our political positions and put first our commitment to pull Nicaragua out of poverty," he said in a brief speech.
Mr Ortega has also promised to try to maintain relations with Washington, while building a friendship with Venezuela and Cuba.
Mr Montealegre told a local television show yesterday that he would use his party's strength in congress - second only to the Sandinistas - to ensure that Mr Ortega did not reject the US and turn towards Mr Chavez and Mr Castro during his five-year term. - (AP)