Episode 35: In depth with former Sandinista senior official Alejandro Bendaña

In this in depth interview with Alejandro Bendaña, is noted professor and historian and the foremost expert on the modern history of Nicaragua, he walks US through the political,  social, cultural and economic history of Nicaragua from the time of Christopher Columbus landing there in 1502 through its centuries of Spanish colonial rule and and its independence in 1821. In the second half of the interview Dr. Bendaña gives us a fascinating insight into the turbulent political chaos, repression and struggles the ensues the fledgling republic throughout the 19th and 20th century all the way up to the  successful triumph of the Sandinista revolution on July 19, 1979.

Bendaña, who served as that Nicaragua's revolutionary Deputy Ambassador to the United Nations and Secretary General of the Foreign Ministry during the first Sandinista Government (1979-1990), points out the great achievements of the post Somoza government and its failures. He is harshly critical of the direction the current president of the ruling Ortega family has taken the fragile Central American republic and what needs to be done to restore the historic accomplishments of the revolution

Alejandro Bendaña is also the founder of the  Centro de Estudios Internacionales in Managua. Holding a Harvard university PhD, Dr. Bendaña was Tinker Professor of Latin America History at the University of Chicago. He worked for the United Nations and in peace-building programs in Africa, Asia, and Latin America and served as Senior Mediation Advisor in the UN Department of Political Affairs. Bendaña is the author of Power Lines: US Hegemony in the New Global Order (Interlink, New York, 1996); Sandino, Patria y Libertad (Anama, Managua, 2016), and most recently, Buenas al pleito, mujeres en la rebelión de Sandino (Anama, Managua, 2019)