Nicaragua’s Ministry of the Interior (MIGOB) continued its crackdown on non-profit organizations (NPOs) by revoking the legal status of 169 entities, mostly evangelical and professional groups, according to Ministerial Agreement 40-2024-OSFL published in the Official Gazette on Thursday, August 29, 2024.
Among the affected organizations is the Moravian Church, one of the most prominent institutions on Nicaragua’s Caribbean Coast. Other entities on the list include associations of ranchers, small producers, equestrians, retirees, and social organizations.
According to the ministerial agreement signed by Interior Minister María Amelia Coronel Kinloch, the organizations were accused of having expired boards of directors and failing to report their financial statements for periods ranging from one to 30 years.
The document also stipulates that the disposition of the assets of the dissolved organizations will be managed by the Attorney General’s Office, which will transfer them to the Nicaraguan state.
This marks the third mass wave of NPO closures by MIGOB in two weeks. On August 19, the regime revoked the legal status of 1,500 NPOs, followed by the closure of another 151 associations, federations, and business chambers three days later. With the cancellation of these 169 organizations, the total number of entities shut down by the government of Daniel Ortega and Rosario Murillo since late 2018 has reached 5,552.
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