Yes, people say I’m crazy. Everyone in this damn country thinks I’m crazy.
Rosario Murillo smiles at the journalist who stares at her with those blue eyes that she sees as two spotlights for an interrogator who wants to torture her.
“The truth is I don’t care if they think I’m crazy. Maybe I am, but I’ve chosen to live my life with no strings attached. I have long been under Daniel’s shadow, subject to the rigors of government, subservient, bound, locked in suffocating demands dictated by power. No, I’m not that Rosario anymore.
– What is the reason for this personal change, Ms. Murillo? – The journalist looks at the recorder he left on the table and carefully observes that the small red light keeps blinking. He’s wearing a light blue linen shirt, the armpits of which are squishy from the heat, he’s sweating, it’s barely ten o’clock in the morning. He is tall and blond, with a bushy, sensuous beard, also blond. His shirt is unbuttoned at chest level and shows shapely chest muscles. Rosario Murillo thinks he’s a handsome man, although she hates his Galician accent.
“Call me Rosary. Look, Ignatius…
“Call me Nacho,” the journalist interrupted with a smile.
-Hahaha. Good, Nacho. Look, Nacho. The loss of the elections was a heavy blow to everyone in the Sandinista Front. We never thought the Nicaraguans would inflict this blow on us. We always thought that people admired us, that they loved the revolution. But obviously we are wrong. They were all wrong, drunk on their delusions of power. I realized that we were actually being hijacked by a dream that only existed in our minds and that we had to make sacrifices for that dream. I soon decided I couldn’t continue in the role of a submissive woman who was always up for the record. Maybe that’s why I made the revolution! No. I understood that the role of women in the revolution was not one of submission. So I decided to do my thing, to make a mark, because women like power too. We had to get up. Yes, go crazy. And I did it from my area, the culture.
“Which also caused a lot of headaches.” His enmity with the poet Cardenal is well known.
– That’s in the past, Nacho. We must build a new Sandinista front. Times are different.
– You talk about the role of women, but Sandinista feminists don’t seem to agree with Rosario Murillo. I’ve spoken to several of them here in Managua and they show resentment towards you. You say, and I quote my notes, that you are arrogant, unstable and dangerous – the journalist closes his notebook and stares at you. Rosario Murillo smiles at him.
– These people you call Sandinista feminists are actually backward, fundamentalist women. Do you know what they say about me? That I spent the years of the revolution in a horizontal position and with my legs open. It bothers her that with Daniel I raised a healthy and beautiful family of our nine children. Daniel adopted my two oldest children, gave them his last name and we were all happy. They represent false feminism. In fact, Nacho, they have deformed feminism, they have manipulated its flags and its postulates. It is an insidious and cruel act of betrayal. The real interests of these women are personal interests, petty and with perverse political intentions.
“What intentions?” – The journalist approaches the recorder towards Rosario Murillo.
-The power. They are interested in increasing their control of the Sandinista Front and designing a party to sell them to the right, because they are being sold to the right, to the gringo capital that funds their organizations. They destroyed the organizations of beautiful women set up by the revolution, appropriated them and are now using them as political weapons in a struggle for power.
The cover of the book “I am the commander’s wife!” (Grijalbo, 2023).Courtesy (Grijalbo)
– I am interested in what feminism is for you – the journalist opens his notebook, ready to take notes.
-Is love. With love, Nacho. Feminism as I understand it is inclusive and promotes human values. False feminism is beating the drums of war against all human values. It is an instrument of penetration and of political and cultural occupation. Deprived of its liberating mission, false feminism in Nicaragua has reached the extreme of marching in favor of social oppression, shoulder to shoulder with the phalanxes of capital and the most notorious exponents of a contentious and brutal machismo. These women are frustrated, confused, choked with hate, with no peace of mind. But I’ll tell you something, Nacho, love is stronger than hate.
You are in La Luna, the old revolutionary bar, now also converted into a cultural center where actors, poets, writers and the old cultural guard of the defeated revolution continue to meet every night. But at this time of the morning the store is empty of customers. The waiters clean and arrange the tables and arrange everything for the opening of the evening. The feline Raúl, Rosario Murillo’s faithful adviser, follows the interview closely from a corner, sipping a cup of coffee and looking at his watch, ready to end the conversation when the time agreed with this insolent journalist has passed.
“You’re talking about your family, but I understand that you don’t have a good relationship with your daughter Zoilamérica.” Again the journalist buried his blue eyes in the face of his interlocutor.
Rosario Murillo, in turn, fixes him with a fiery gaze. Go to the recorder and I want to destroy it.
—Zoilamérica is ungrateful. Daniel and I gave him a dream life. The daughter of privilege in a war-torn country. We have done everything to protect our children. It’s true that at some point we might fail, be absent, but the revolution took a long time. If she has a complaint, that may be it, nothing more.
—There are rumors within the Sandinista Front about certain inappropriate behavior by Comandante Ortega…
Rosario Murillo interrupts the journalist. The cat twitches, attentive to every command.
—I didn’t know that journalism is based on rumors and more in your newspaper, which is so important and respected.
— Sometimes rumors need to be heard when they come from politics. It is up to us journalists to confirm them, to check their veracity.
But I won’t talk about rumours.
– You must have heard what is being said. I myself have spoken to frontline sources that…
– If you continue from there, the interview is over. I won’t talk about rumours.
“Okay Rosario. So let’s focus on the relationship with Comandante Ortega. How are you feeling now after experiencing so many intense things together?
—Now we have a strained relationship, very difficult. I knew from the day Daniel was a member of the board, after the triumph of the revolution, that our lives would change forever. Our relationship as a couple, husband and wife, went to another level. It was very complicated for me, difficult to accept. Most of the time he devoted himself to his work with the vocation of a priest and did not realize that I needed him. But we love each other. He loves me, but most of all he needs me. What happened is that I decided to find myself after the defeat of the revolution. I wanted to break the chains that had been imposed for so long, to return to my roots. And yes, I found myself again, it’s me again. I’ve always wondered what became of that young rebel who dedicated herself to fighting Somoza, who conspired, who gave her poetry to the guerrillas. And I realized that this woman wasn’t dead. That it rested in me and that I had to get out again. And I decided to set myself free, to be happy. I even changed my appearance, although a lot of people don’t like it because they don’t understand me. That’s why I’m telling you, people in this country think I’m crazy.
– Perhaps seeing Rosario Murillo walking barefoot in a shopping center in the capital, as the newspapers recently reported, helps with this idea.
-Hahaha. Yes, maybe I’m crazy.
The cat makes a sign from the corner where he is squatting, marks his watch with the fingers of his left hand. Rosario Murillo winks at him and nods. The journalist realizes that time is up. Before turning off the recorder, ask one last question.
“Do you think the Sandinista Front will come back to power and rule Nicaragua again?
– Look, Nacho, sooner rather than later he’ll do it. Listen carefully to what I’m telling you: stay in Nicaragua and you’ll see the frontline come back into power. And this time forever. hahaha
Carlos Salinas Maldonado, Nicaraguan journalist, he writes for EL PAÍS in Mexico.
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