EL DIARIO NUEVO (Nicaragua)

MANAGUA - Is Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega the "Ho Chi Minh of Latin America?"

That's apparently what Surinam's new ambassador in Nicaragua believes. During a televised swearing in ceremony in Managua this week, the ambassador, Subhas Chandra Mungra, said that Ortega, like the deceased Vietnamese leader Ho Chi Minh, stands out for his commitment to defending the poor, El Diario Nuevo reported.

"We in Suriname have heard and are following with close attention and are learning from the great transformation that is happening here in Nicaragua, where the people of Nicaragua no longer stick out their hands for begging for help, but instead put their hands to the earth to work the land with their own resources," said Chandra Mungra.

Ortega, the veteran leader of Nicaragua's left-wing Sandinista party, has been in power on and off for more than three decades. He led the country's post-revolutionary junta government before being elected president in 1984. He was voted out of office in 1990, but returned to power in 2007. Last November Ortega was reelected in a landslide – despite the fact that his candidacy openly violated the country's term limit laws.

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