The NNP Office of Home Affairs, and to a lesser extent the Office of the Inspector General, is responsible for investigating police abuse; however,. For example, the president's 2011 extension of the term of the national police chief, Aminta. Under the law, defendants have the right to be fully informed of the charges against them and the right to a fair trial.
While the law prohibits such actions, several domestic NGOs, individual members of the Catholic Church, and opposition members alleged that the government seized minor private property such as laptops, cell phones, and vehicles without due process. While the law prohibits such actions, several domestic NGOs, individual members of the Catholic Church and opposition members accused the government. Eight of the 10 available grassroots channels were under direct FSLN influence or controlled by entrepreneurs with close ties to the government.
Additionally, owners of media outlets practiced self-censorship by choosing not to publish news that affected public perceptions of the government or the FSLN.
Respect for Political Rights: The Right of Citizens to Change Their Government
Recent elections: Regional elections on March 2 in the country's autonomous Caribbean coast were marred by allegations of institutional fraud and. Observers alleged that military and police officials, as well as citizens from other regions in the country, entered the region with the express purpose of casting additional votes for a particular party. Opposition party members also reported that across the Caribbean Coast government vehicles and other public resources were used to transport supporters of the ruling party to polling stations.
Political parties and political participation: The FSLN used state funds for political activities to increase its electoral advantage in recent elections. CPDH and FEDETRASEP reported that employees in various state institutions must connect with the FSLN and that a candidate for applying for a government position must receive a written recommendation from the FSLN. FEDETRASEP also received reports that the FSLN automatically deducted party contributions from the salaries of some state employees.
The FSLN also used its positions of authority to decide who could receive national identity cards (cedulas). People without identity cards had difficulty participating in the legal economy, conducting banking transactions or voting. Civil society organizations continued to express concern over the politicized distribution of identity cards, alleging that this was how the FSLN tried to manipulate past elections and that the CSE failed to provide identity cards to opposition members while distributing them. widely to party loyalists.
The cards mostly belonged to PLI members who were unable to vote in the March 2 regional elections. On August 21, in the northern town of Pantasma in Jinotega department, locals found 30 identity cards--. Participation of women and minorities: There were 42 women in the 92-seat National Assembly, 10 women in 29 cabinet-level positions, 66 female mayors and five women in the 16-member CSJ.
Corruption and Lack of Transparency in Government
As of late October, CSE had not delivered replacement cards to those affected. A 2012 law requires women to make up at least half of all candidates on political parties' candidate lists. Due to a lack of information on concession processes, protection of property rights, environmental impacts and cost analysis, many sectors expressed concern about the project.
Corruption: The courts remained particularly susceptible to bribery, manipulation and other forms of corruption, particularly from the FSLN and drug cartels, and there were reports that the FSLN had a strong influence on the CSJ's decisions. The law requires these statements to be made public and includes penalties for non-compliance. Since 2007, the comptroller had not investigated any government offices or imposed sanctions for non-compliance as required by law.
Public access to information: Although the law mandates public access to government information and statistics, there is a lack of transparency and access to. Delays and denial of information were common, while appeals mechanisms were too burdensome and slow. Control over government information is centralized by the Communications and Citizenship Council, headed by First Lady Rosario Murillo, but there is no.
The law provides for exceptions to disclosure in matters related to national security and trade secrets.
Governmental Attitude Regarding International and
Media and civil society organizations such as CINCO and the Violeta Barrios de Chamorro Foundation have repeatedly reported that requests for official information without express permission from the council were often denied. Tighter government restrictions on the ability of domestic NGOs to receive funding directly from international donors have seriously hampered the ability of NGOs to operate. NGOs reported difficulties in scheduling meetings with authorities and receiving official information due to the growing culture of secrecy.
NGOs reported encountering hostility or aggression when questioning or talking to officials about issues such as corruption and the rule of law. United Nations or other international bodies: During the 2014 UN Universal Periodic Review, Nicaragua received 209 recommendations, mostly related to human rights, access to information and protection of minority rights. During the special session of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights on 11-15 August, the commission expressed the importance of visiting the country.
The committee has submitted this request several times during its previous sessions and was promised by the government to consider its request. By the end of the year, the committee had not yet received a formal invitation to visit the country. Human rights bodies of the government: In April, the government appointed Omar Cabezas as head of the Office of the Human Rights Ombudsman (PDDH).
His mandate expired and was extended by presidential decree at a time when the National Assembly would have to approve the appointments. The constitutional amendments approved during the year allow for the automatic extension of the mandates of officials, if the National Assembly has not decided on this. Civil society organizations viewed the committee as a blind spot due to biased political forces and untrustworthy.
Discrimination, Societal Abuses, and Trafficking in Persons
NGOs argued that the president changed the law with these regulations without the legal authority to do so. In contrast, the law states that an interpersonal relationship is not required for a woman to die at the hands of a man to be considered femicide. Sexual harassment: The law prohibits sexual harassment, and those convicted face one to three years in prison, or three to five years if the victim is under 18.
Discrimination: the law guarantees the equality of both sexes, including in the family and in the workplace and in relation to property ownership, and enforcement is the responsibility of the NNP Office of the Supervisor of Women. No information was available on the government's efforts to address or prevent forced and early marriages, and some advocates argued that the government was not effectively implementing the law. Child sexual exploitation: The law prohibits adults from promoting or participating in child prostitution, and the government generally enforced the law.
The law also prohibits the promotion, filming, or sale of child pornography, and the government generally enforced the law. The law imposes a sentence of five to seven years in prison for convicted child sex tourism offenders. MiFamilia, the Ministry of Labor and PDDH are among the government agencies responsible for the protection and.
The government did not effectively implement the law regarding the protection of such individuals; did not request access to buildings, information and communications; and failed to provide information on efforts to improve respect for the rights of persons with disabilities. The law did not limit the voting rights of disabled people, although many polling stations were not accessible to disabled people. The indigenous population made up about 5 percent of the population and lived mainly in the RACN and RACS.
Some indigenous communities in RACN and RACS continued to report that authorities excluded them from meaningful participation in decisions affecting their lands and natural resources. Although sexual orientation is not specifically mentioned, the law states that all persons are equal before the law and provides for the right to equal protection.
Worker Rights
The law allows multiple unions to coexist within a single company, and the law allows management to enter into separate collective bargaining agreements with each union. The law does not set specific fines, and observers argued that the penalties were generally insufficient to deter violations. Although the law creates an arbitration procedure for labor courts, there were long waiting times and lengthy and complicated procedures, and many labor disputes were resolved out of court.
The law sets the minimum age for employment at 14 and limits the working day for any person between the ages of 14 and 18 to six hours and the working week to 30 hours. The law provides for eight years in prison and significant fines for those who employ children in hazardous work, and allows inspectors to close these facilities. The government used its limited resources to concentrate on child labor violations in selected sectors in narrow geographic areas, such as coffee growing areas, and gave only limited attention to the large informal sector.
The government continued Programa Amor, which aimed to eliminate child labor by reintegrating abandoned children into society. Nearly 320,000 children worked in some form of child labor, according to the National Institute of Development Information. A common feature of child labor was the prevalence of unpaid family work, and the institute stated that 80 percent of children and adolescents were unpaid workers.
Most child labor took place in forestry, fishing and the informal sector, including on coffee plantations and subsistence farms. See also the Department of Labor's findings on the worst forms of child labor at www.dol.gov/ilab/reports/child-labour/findings/. The law mandates overtime premiums, prohibits mandatory overtime, and sets a maximum of three hours of overtime per day, which may not exceed nine hours per week.