By FILADELFO ALEMAN
 Associated Press Writer

 MANAGUA, Nicaragua -- (AP) -- Although Daniel Ortega failed three times to recapture Nicaragua's presidency for the Sandinistas, his party will forge ahead with a fourth attempt in 2006, party leaders said Wednesday.

 ``We are going to continue looking for new alliances,'' said Sandinista leader Edwin Castro in a television interview.

 Castro said the party would hold a convention in January to present its strategies to the nation.

 Ortega, the Sandinista leader who led the overthrow of dictator Anastasio Somoza in 1979, failed Sunday to recapture the presidency he lost in 1990 at the hands of opposition parties backed by the United States.

 But Castro noted that the latest electoral defeat would not set the party back any more than Ortega's past two losses did.

 The Sandinista National Liberation Front ``did not slide backward,'' he said. ``The Front isn't going backward now. It is not heading for extinction.''

 The Sandinistas had 37 of 92 representatives in the outgoing National Assembly, or congress, and are likely to have 40 in the incoming 90-member congress. The Liberal alliance had 42 deputies and is expected to have about 50. Voters chose new congressional representatives in Sunday's election, but final results were not yet in.

 Ortega formed alliances with members of parties backed by the United States during the Contra war in order to show that his socialist politics of the past had changed.

 But following his loss, some Sandinistas say it is time for a ``profound internal revision'' of the party.

 ``It needs new leaders, who have their own credentials, who shine with a light of their own,'' said dissident Sandinista congressman Jose Gonzalez, whom the party
 prohibited from running for re-election.

 ``It would be sheer madness if Ortega ran again as a candidate in 2006,'' said political analyst Oscar Rene Vargas. ``But neither should the party ignore him, because he could contribute to its renewal.''

 The party ``needs a new generation that can't be blamed for what happened in the past,'' Vargas said.

 Meanwhile, party sources said Wednesday that Ortega's brother, Humberto, ex-chief of the Sandinista Popular Army, kept his earlier promise to abstain from voting.

 In March, the retired general said he would not vote for Daniel because his candidacy was not a sure thing.

 At the time, Humberto Ortega said it was more important for Daniel ``to strengthen his leadership to consolidate and strengthen the party.''

 Daniel Ortega replied, ``Peter denied Christ three times and you see what happened.''

 Daniel Ortega also added that the conflicts with his brother were old ones that went back to 1990 when Ortega lost the election to Violeta Barrios de Chamorro.

                                    © 2001 The Miami Herald