Nicaragua’s government-controlled National Assembly is debating whether to ban opposition parties from running in elections and will vote on the matter in the first week of August.

The measure comes a few days after President Daniel Ortega said that “there will be no more elections for them.” [the opposition] to try to take over the government, to take power.”

His comments were condemned by United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk, who said that “people of all political views must be allowed to vote and run for public office.”

Ortega, 80, has been in power since 2007. His government has become increasingly authoritarian, with political opponents jailed, sent into exile and stripped of their citizenship.

Ortega made the controversial comments Sunday in a speech marking the anniversary of the 1979 Sandinista revolution, when the leftist group he was a part of ousted U.S.-backed dictator Anastasio Somoza from power.

In his speech, Ortega accused the opposition, which he said was financed by the United States, of “conspiring, trying to organize parties to try to win elections.”

He said laws would be passed “to create a wall, to block the coup plotters,” which would ensure that “regardless of how much money the Yankees give them,” they will not take power.

Among those who condemned Ortega’s words was the US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio.

He said they exposed the “true authoritarian nature” of the Ortega government.

Rubio added that the Nicaraguan leader and his wife, Rosario Murillo, whom Ortega named his “co-president” in February 2025, had “abandoned even the pretense of popular consent.”

But the president of Nicaragua’s National Assembly, Gustavo Porras, dismissed the criticism in an interview with a government-aligned news site.

He said that the legislative body and Nicaragua’s highest electoral authority were debating how to “not leave even a crack” for the opposition to gain a foothold.

The last presidential elections in Nicaragua were held in November 2021.

Ortega won the unilateral contest after a brutal repression against the opposition.

Any potential rival candidate likely to win a significant number of votes was detained and disqualified from running for office or forced into exile. Dozens of other opposition members were also arrested.

Only a small handful of little-known candidates were allowed to run, and they were unlikely to gain much support.

In November 2025, as Ortega was four years into his five-year term, the National Assembly approved a constitutional reform extending the presidential term to six years.

Under the new system, approved unanimously in the National Assembly, Rosario Murillo also became “co-president.”

It paved the way for her to assume the role of president should Ortega, who is believed to be in failing health, be declared “permanently absent.”

Few Nicaraguans have dared to speak out publicly against Ortega and Murillo since more than 300 people died when security forces cracked down on anti-government protests in 2018.

However, Nicaraguan opposition politicians living in exile roundly condemned Ortega’s latest plans. Juan Sebastián Chamorro said it was proof of Ortega’s desire to “turn Nicaragua into a one-party country like China, North Korea and Cuba.”

Félix Maradiaga, a former opposition presidential candidate who was imprisoned during Ortega’s government, told the AFP news agency that this showed that the leader was afraid of dissent: “Ortega is admitting what worries him most: he has not neutralized the opposition, he knows that the desire for change is still alive and he continues to fight for the country.”