Nicaraguan dictatorship eliminates income tax exemptions from the Catholic Church and evangelical groups

One day after canceling the legal personality of 1,500 NGOs in Nicaragua, the dictatorship of Daniel Ortega and his wife, Rosario Murillo, eliminated the income tax exemption for churches. This is a measure that researcher Martha Patricia Molina considers as a “fiscal blow” that will end up “financially suffocating the (Catholic) Church so that it falls under its own weight.”

This Thursday, August 22, the official newspaper The Gazette published Law 1212, which modifies three other laws: the law of regulation and control of non-profit organizations, the law of regulation of foreign agents, and law 822 of tax coordination. The newspaper reports that this decision comes from the National Assembly of the Republic of Nicaragua, at the initiative of Ortega.

The fifth article of Law 1212 orders: “Repeal numeral 3 of article 32 of the Tax Concertation Law” of 2012, as well as its reforms.

Numeral 3 of article 32 indicated that “Churches, denominations, confessions and religious foundations that have legal personality were exempt from income tax, regarding their income from activities and assets destined exclusively for religious purposes.”

A specialist cited, but not identified, by the newspaper The Pressexplains that with this decision of the dictatorship “all churches of any denomination will be subject to the fiscal terrorism that the dictatorship has subjected to the private sector and now to religious institutions,” and will have to pay between 10 and 30% in taxes. rent.

Regarding this decision, Martha Patricia Molina, author of the report Nicaragua: A persecuted Church? which accounts for 870 attacks by the dictatorship against the Catholic Church, denounced that the authorities have already been in parishes asking for documents about the accounts.

In “previous weeks, authorities of the regime had visited parishes to request information on how they keep their accounts, they asked to see the major and minor ledgers, income and expenses, which obviously is not done that way in the parish administration,” Molina wrote in the red social X.

“Now priests will have to hire a CPA (certified public accountant) to keep all these accounts and also say who their main donors are,” he added.

The specialist cited by La Prensa also indicated that now religious schools will also be subject to the tax regime. A “fiscal hell for churches” is coming, he warned.

Regarding this and other decisions of the dictatorship, Rosario Murillo, Ortega’s wife and vice president of Nicaragua, commented that they have been made as “an act of solidarity.”

“We have said in recent days that each organization, according to its nature or field of action, requests the subscription of Association Alliances to the Ministry of the Interior or the Foreign Ministry, to execute its programs or projects, whatever it intends to execute in the country, within the stipulated framework of respect for the laws of our country and above all knowing that its work is one of fraternity and solidarity, that, therefore, there are no other considerations that can be put forward around its operations, nor exonerations, nor special treatment, in fiscal terms,” Murillo said.

Félix Maradiaga, former presidential candidate and president of the Freedom for Nicaragua Foundation, said on August 20 in 100%News that “history has shown us that repression cannot indefinitely suffocate a people’s desire for freedom. Nicaragua, with its rich tradition of faith and resistance, will not be the exception.”

“Churches and civil society will continue to be bastions of dignity and courage, bravely confronting tyranny. And it is our responsibility, as defenders of human rights, to raise our voices and support those who, despite everything, continue to fight for a free and fair future for Nicaragua,” she assured.