Nicaragua: A New Absolutist Constitution Tailor-Made for an Authoritarian Couple

Ushered in by a regime-controlled legislature, Nicaragua’s new constitution institutionalizes an absolutist regime under Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo as co-presidents with dynastic ambitions. Eliminating judicial independence, political pluralism, and fundamental rights, this constitution seeks to present an appearance of legal formality to the regime’s ever-decreasing followers - writes Juan Sebastian Chamorro.

Introduction

Nicaragua is, according to various sources, one of the most repressive countries in the Western Hemisphere, often compared to North Korea and Iran. With its new constitution, the abuses committed over the last decade are now being formally legalized. The brutality of the regime led by Daniel Ortega and his wife Rosario Murillo has been boundless. Now, their abuses will be protected by an absolutist constitution approved in January 2025.

Through these reforms, Ortega has eliminated the position of President. Instead, the new constitution establishes a power-sharing system in which Ortega and Murillo will both serve as "Co-Presidents." This unprecedented system creates a government where executive power is equally shared by two individuals who are also husband and wife, legally transforming Nicaragua into a family dictatorship, stripping away fundamental rights, and legalizing irregular and repressive paramilitary forces.

The Context

During the first Ortega regime (1979 to 1990), the Sandinista government approved a constitution in 1987. It was subject to various reforms, most notably by Ortega, who eliminated the prohibition of reelection in 2014 during his second presidency.

In 2018, Daniel Ortega reformed Social Security, igniting a wave of massive protests throughout the country. Initially led by the elderly, the protests were joined by university students and the general population. Ortega responded with lethal force, with security forces killing more than 350 people and injuring thousands. Two fruitless negotiation processes, led by the Catholic Church and the international community, failed to halt the ongoing violations of human rights and civil liberties.

Leading up to the 2021 general elections, Ortega jailed all six presidential candidates (including this author) and sentenced them to 13 years in prison. They spent nearly two years in prison before being banished from the country and stripped of their nationality, along with 216 other political prisoners. Independent media outlets were silenced and confiscated. Priests, nuns, and entire religious orders were expelled. Twenty-seven universities were closed or seized, more than 5000 NGOs were closed, and over 450 opposition leaders were stripped of their nationality and banished from the country.

Ortega wielded his absolute control over the legislature to “reform” the Constitution in 2025. He manipulated the constitutional reform process: instead of pursuing a total reform, which would require an elected constituent assembly under Article 193, he opted for the partial reform path requiring just parliamentary approval. Out of the 198 articles, the so-called reform changed 148 articles and eliminated 37 outright. This overhaul has therefore produced a completely new constitution, not only due to the scope of the changes but, more importantly, because of their nature.

The New Constitution

The new constitution eliminates the separation of powers. According to Article 8, ‘The people exercise the power of the state through the Presidency of the Republic, which directs the Government, and coordinates the Legislative, Judicial and Electoral organs […].’ The judiciary and legislature, once independent, are no longer branches of government but made subordinate to the two-headed executive branch, along with all oversight institutions. This fundamentally undermines any democratic checks and balances, placing the authoritarian co-Presidents (or co-dictators) above the law.

Article 133 establishes that the Presidency will be composed of, specifically, a male Co-President and a female Co-President. The creation of a two-headed presidency is clearly aimed at consolidating a dynastic regime, with the co-dictators empowered to appoint an undetermined number of vice presidents according to Article 138.  One of the couple’s children, Laureano Ortega Murillo, is likely to be named third in line of succession by being appointed Vice President, and thus a candidate for future elections (presumably with Murillo as co-president). Ortega and Murillo’s terms as President and Vice President, elected in 2021 through fraudulent elections, have also been retroactively extended from five to six years as co-presidents.

Nicaragua has not been a democracy for years, but with this new constitution, it is no longer even pretending.

Nicaragua has not been a democracy for years, but with this new constitution, it is no longer even pretending. Article 6 of the new constitution declares Nicaragua a "revolutionary state", and any political party not declaring its revolutionary nature will be unable to exist. This effectively entrenches the one-party system already in place following the banning of political parties since Ortega returned to power. Article 13 further elevates the flag of the Sandinista Party to a national symbol, equal in status to the country’s flag,  a symbolic codification and fusion of the party with the state.

The Constitution eliminates any pretense of the rule of law or impartiality, establishing authoritarian rule as the governing principle. International treaties and commitments, once explicitly mentioned in the old constitution, have now been excluded from the new one. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, previously cited in Article 46, has been removed, showing the regime’s intent to ignore its obligations under human rights and international law. The regime has also removed many human rights, and civil and political protections, including eliminating prohibitions on wage discrimination based on gender, social status, or religious affiliation. With these regressions, the new constitution violates the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and International Labor Organization conventions. Further, any fundamental political, civil, and human rights that are still present in the new constitution have been eliminated in practice through the loss of independence of the judiciary. For example, the habeas corpus provisions that remain in the Constitution are effectively useless in a legal system that must obey a dictatorial couple.

Moreover, Article 17 of the Constitution legalizes the arbitrary stripping of nationality from anyone deemed a "traitor to the homeland," violating Article 15 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Arbitrary deprivation of nationality on political grounds leads to violations of all fundamental rights associated with citizenship, with the added burden of state repression, persecution, and violence. This is not a passive denial of citizenship, but a consistent, deliberate action by the Ortega-Murillo regime to eliminate legal bonds and inflict brutal suffering on opponents and critics. Just as in medieval times, arbitrary deprivation of nationality and banishment is used as political repression to legally eliminate anyone who opposes the regime. Victims bear these consequences—loss of civil registry, identification, travel documents, social security contributions, confiscation of property, and the destruction of marriages and family separation—wherever they go.

The erosion of the rule of law extends far beyond individual rights. Regarding the economy, references to the state’s obligation to facilitate trade within a framework of democratic governance and full legal security has been removed from Article 98, along with all references to private sector development and collaboration. The responsibility to protect and promote private economic property and management, the encouragement of healthy competition among economic actors, and references to free enterprise and the free market have been removed from Article 99. Meanwhile, Article 100 removes the possibility of promoting public-private projects aimed at facilitating, regulating, and stimulating investments for infrastructure development. With these changes, the new constitution diminishes the state’s protection of private property and the role of the state in promoting a market-friendly environment. Contracts and property rights are therefore no longer secure in Nicaragua, as the administration of law and property rights has become completely politicized and often used as a political weapon.

The new constitution also legalizes the paramilitary forces that inflicted grave violence during the 2018 protests, institutionalizing repression.

The new constitution also legalizes the paramilitary forces that inflicted grave violence during the 2018 protests, institutionalizing repression.  Article 97 ter establishes the ‘Voluntary Police as an auxiliary body of the National Police.’ Even before this promulgation, thousands of hooded paramilitaries have taken an oath of obedience to Ortega and Murillo in various parts of the country, with the purpose of intimidating the population. This addition is also intended to provide impunity to perpetrators of crimes during the 2018 crisis.

Religious persecution has been exerted in practice for years by prohibiting religious activities such as processions and other public events. Furthermore, Article 14 of the new constitution states, ‘Religious organizations must be kept free of all foreign control,’ suggesting a legally enforceable way to cut the ties of the Nicaraguan Catholic Church to the Vatican. With this move, Ortega and Murillo seek to appoint leaders of the clergy, further consolidating their repression against the Catholic Church, which has been critical of the regime.

The international community has condemned this maneuver, which clearly destroys the last legal remnants of the rule of law. The European Parliament, even before the new constitution was proclaimed, called on the Nicaraguan regime to reverse the constitutional reform and all repressive laws, urging full respect for international human rights obligations. Similar statements were made by U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio during his first international visit to Central America in February 2025.

Conclusion

The new Nicaraguan Constitution is a tailor-made legal instrument to enshrine Ortega and Murillo’s quest for absolutist power and a dynastic succession plan. It rejects fundamental principles like the separation of powers and the democratic requirement that nobody is above the law. Under this new constitution, they are above the law and can continue repressing the Nicaraguan people with impunity, now bolstered by a constitution designed to shield their abuses.

Imposed without any public input and rubber-stamped by a regime-controlled legislature, this illegitimate constitution embodies a dictatorship seeking to present an appearance of legal formality to its ever-decreasing followers. With no opposition in the country, Nicaraguans, deprived of opposing arguments, face renewed risks that this new constitution represents.

The regime has legally cemented the death of the rule of law and liberties in Nicaragua. A new constitution must be drafted in a democratic Nicaragua, with proper consultation of the Nicaraguan people and, more importantly, the re-establishment of the fundamental principles that this constitution is arbitrarily demolishing.

Juan Sebastian Chamorro Ph.D. is a Nicaraguan economist, businessman and politician.  Previously, he served as Vice Minister of Finance and Minister of Planning of Nicaragua. He was a candidate for president in the 2021 Nicaraguan general election.  He is currently a Visiting Fellow at the Kellogg Institute at the University of Notre Dame.

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Suggested citation: Juan Sebastian Chamorro, ‘Nicaragua: A New Absolutist Constitution Tailor-Made for an Authoritarian Couple’, ConstitutionNet, International IDEA, 5 March 2025, https://constitutionnet.org/news/voices/nicaragua-new-absolutist-constitution-tailor-made

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