Nicaragua tightens grip on universities to stifle dissent

By CHRISTOPHER SHERMAN
Associated Press

MEXICO CITY (AP) — Four years after university students led protests against Nicaragua President Daniel Ortega’s government, his administration is minimizing the chance of a reoccurrence by seizing a dozen private universities and closing them or shifting control to the state. A generation of students who participated in the April 2018 protests saw their education interrupted. Many were forced into hiding, jailed or exiled when Ortega’s police cracked down. Now others who managed to resume their studies worry they won’t be able to finish or have finished but can’t find work because the now state-run schools haven’t given them diplomas.