ardenal, speaks necessary for an ecology policy and save our lake, Ronald Reagan has made us spend it to save the country and the revolution. But we have not given up this project.
Q The most important product in
Ernesto Cardenal, the Nicaraguan minister of culture, ary took part in the big national demonstration against US intervention in Central
America that drew more than 6,000 people to Bern in Switzerland on June 4.
Cardenal also took part in public meetings in Geneva, Bern and Zurich, each of which was attended by more than one thousand people.
Cardenal gave several press conferences, including an interview to the comrades of the Parti Socialiste Ourier, Swiss section of the Fourth International, for their newspaper, La Breche, which we publish below.
Question. What has been the impact and not the rich. They could always, beof the counter-revolutionary Somocista invasion, supported and led by the United
States, on the social climate in Nicaragua?
Are the people afraid?
Answer.
The invasion has reinforced the unity of the people, of the government and of the Sandinista National Liberation Front.
The determination to defend the country and the revolution is growing.
In the north, the region which borders on Honduras, the invasion has naturally had a big impact on the daily life of the population. There one lives in permanent danger of getting killed. The Somocistas only through ambushes, firing on act everyone in range of their weapons, whether it's people in civilian vehicles or peasants at work.
Q.
Is the whole population really behind the government?
A. The poor certainly, the rich probably not.
We have introduced a free health system, which benefits the poor
Nicaraguan May Day demonstration (DR)
writer, priest and revolutionDuring this tour Ernesto fore this, get treatment in Miami, in the US. Nor do the free schools benefit the rich; they had very good schools before. And also the redistribution of the land has been carried out only in favour of the
Q. What are the effects of the war on the economic situation and the social gains of the revolution?
A. Because of this war we have had to devote a lot of money to military needs. But I should emphasise that our defence spending is a lot smaller than the media often claims. For example, we do not buy weapons. They are given to us, unconditionally of course. Nicaragua only has defensive weapons. Thus, we have only a weak and poor-quality airforce, but a very good system of anti-aircraft defence. We have a few bad tanks, but a very good anti-tank defence system.
Despite the war we are continuing with our literacy programme, and cultural development. Basic food stuffs have not
Nicaragua is cotton. Are you trying to get away from this dependence on a single crop?
A. Yes, absolutely, for ecological and economic reasons. Because we depend heavily on cotton we are tossed on the world market like a boat on the waves of a storm. In addition, we have to import a lot of technical means for its cultivation, cultivation, which is beginning to become expensive.
To that is added another fact. Cotton plantations require huge ares of cleared land, cutting down all the trees. Then there is erosion, the earth is ravaged, the topsoil swept up and blown away by the wind. Therefore we are now working on a programme of tree planting.
Q. In Nicaragua there are obviously two churches. On one side five priests, as ministers, form part of the government. On the other side the archbishop of Managua, Obando y Bravo, is one of the most determined adversaries of the Sandinista revolution.
A. In Nicaragua there are not two churches. There is one church but it is divided. It is the divide between poor and rich, which has always existed, as St Paul's statements criticising the Corinthians demonstrate. During the revolution, when the poor rose up against the wealthy, this division thus simply became continued on page 27