Nicaraguan General Strike (1978)

Mon Jan 23, 1978

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On this day in 1978, more than 80% of businesses across Nicaragua closed as part of a general strike that demanded an end to the repressive Somoza regime.

Two weeks earlier, on January 10th, the editor of the Managua newspaper “La Prensa” and founder of the Union for Democratic Liberation (UDEL), Pedro Joaquín Chamorro Cardenal, was murdered by suspected elements of the Somoza dictatorship, causing riots to break out in the capital city, Managua.

The strike lasted for two and a half weeks, but widespread resistance and anti-Somoza revolutionary activity persisted for more than a year afterward, resulting in many deaths, state abuses of power, and atrocities committed both by the Somoza regime.

After Somoza resigned in June of 1979, the FSLN took control of the state capital, however widespread fighting continued between the Sandinistas and the U.S.-backed Contras continued for years afterward.