Fernando Cardenal, Nicaraguan priest and politician, Died at 82

  Politician

Fernando Cardenal Martínez was born on January 26, 1934, in Granada, Nicaragua and died on February 20, 2016, in Managua.
He was a Nicaraguan Jesuit and liberation theologian.
Cardenal served as the Minister of Education from 1984 to 1990, during the Sandinista era.
He had a brother who was a poet Ernesto Cardenal, a Catholic priest and served as Minister of Culture from 1979 to 1987.
As he had ties to the Sandinista movement and liberation theology, he was obliged to leave the Society of Jesus, on the grounds that his roles as priest and government minister were incompatible.
After completing his government post, the Society of Jesus reinstated him.
Fernando Cardenal led the Nicaraguan Literacy Campaign, in 1980, a Sandinista effort that succeeded in teaching basic literacy to more than half a million people.
Fernando Cardenal Martínez passed away at 82 yrs old.