in nicaragua there is a sleepy town of fifty thousand people by the name of bluefields. at first glance it seems to be like any other central american/carribean town. but then there are the mansions fully stocked with the latest electronics, the new school, the renovated churches, the fully stocked liquor shelves and the generally high standard of living for a place with a 85% unemployment rate and no large foreign community. violent crime is unheard of, police deemed unnecessary, poverty ameliorated, federal taxes and government non existent, and nightly parties are hosted by the town elders. the source of all this wealth and prosperity in a town where none of it is created? cocaine thrown overboard by busted drug runners washed by the gulf currents to this locale, sold by the townspeople on the black market.
how does such a town exist without constant harrassment from the nicaraguan government, the dea, the cia, and the colombian kingpins, you ask? why it is a hold over from the last nicaraguan civil war which left the area surrounding occupied by the heavily armed and fiercely independent miskito natives. not only do they keep would be authorities away, but also support the salvaging of cocaine which they see as a blessing.
is it a paradise or a decadent wasteland where the pursuit pleasure trumps morality? you decide
Actually, we have the very same problem in my country, Costa Rica, which happens to be Nicaragua’s closest neighbor. The difference here is that the authorities and the media are more concerned with the situation so you can read almost everyday about new captures made by Costa Rican police. Last year the Costa Rican Minister of the Presidency and the Minister of Security received death threats by these groups and a few days later some 10 Colombians were captured. Bluefields is a tropical paradise with some of the most beautiful women you would ever see (I had one girlfriend from there actually) and I think it’s nice they are using the money to build infrastructure and in general to better their standard of living. Nicaragua is the second poorest country in the Americas (the first one is Haiti) so I would say they are just taking advantage of the situation for their own good. Now, the sad and undeniable fact is that a lot of that drug also stays there, destroying the life of young people and causing lot of problems which I’m not sure if they will be able to solve by themselves…