Miss Nicaragua’s win in the Miss Universe pageant led to widespread national pride and celebration, but it also sparked allegations of a coup attempt against President Daniel Ortega’s regime.
The regime’s response reflected a political miscalculation, as the beauty contest stirred up deep feelings of national pride and antagonism against Ortega’s government.
Despite Ortega’s attempts to suppress opposition, his popularity remains tremendously low, and the Miss Universe win had clear political consequences for him. (Trending: FBI Bribery Probe Caught Joe Biden’s Brother On Tape)
The pageant holds strong cultural relevance in Latin American identity, and its winners are celebrated as national heroes.
Pope Francis labeled the regime a “gross dictatorship.”
An Amnesty International report noted that “human rights defenders, journalists and other activists continued to be harassed and criminalized.”
“In these days of a new victory, we are seeing the evil, terrorist commentators making a clumsy and insulting attempt to turn what should be a beautiful and well-deserved moment of pride into destructive coup-mongering,” Nicaragua’s first lady and vice president Rosario Murillo said.
“The rewards for winners were dazzling, for careers opened up for them as models and television presenters, and even occasionally in politics,” Harvard Business School professor Geoffrey Jones wrote.
The story has shed light on the power of cultural phenomena like the Miss Universe contest, which can have significant political implications.
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