The Sham Elections in Honduras

You should be ashamed of your article. If elections are not he answer to the crisis, then caos and bloodshed would be your solution.

Presidents do not have a "divine right" to rule. Our institutions, Congress and Supreme Court, duly appointed by law, removed a President for exceding his authority and the law.

Shame on you, for regurgitating spurious facts and propaganda. Zelaya on his own signed an agreement to recognize the elections and to let Congress determine his fate. He even celebrated on TV the accords. Later, he saw he would lose and again, changed his mind. Congress will decide his fate on Dec. 2, but as Zelaya has expressed, " he is not interested in returning to office".

Take him at his world, and leave the rest of Hondurans alone.

As a resident of Honduras, I can tell you there has been far less "repression, violence, and fear," since Zelaya was constitutionally removed. People are fleeing Venezuela like rats leaving a sinking ship because of the crime and poor governmental management. We didn't want that situation or a president for life here in Honduras.

The station that was blocked, Radio Globo, has been calling for armed insurrection for months. How long would that sort of station stay on the air in the USA?

Costa Rican President Oscar Arias is supposed to be mediating the process, not deciding whose constitution is the worst in the world. It's what we have here and based on the constitution and the crimes committed, Zelaya was no longer the acting president.

The only pearl of truth in this article was the fact that the poor in Honduras do need help. That could be accomplished through legally changing the constitution, reorganizing the education system and a variety of other methods. Whether Pepe Lobo or Elvin Santos win the presidency, let's hope they take the job of organizing the government and don't fall into the same self serving path as Manuel Zelaya.

Mr. GEORGE VICKERS is a big fat liar and should be banned from writing opinions based on falsities. Who do you think you are .. Mr So called Expert on Latin American Issues? Why don't you take your crappy theories some place else and leave US Hondurans alone. We are sick and tired of your blasphemy and misconstrued truths.... We are going to have elections, they are going to be free and we are happily going to have ANOTHER presidential term on January 29th...No Thanks to ignorant rug-rats like yourself!!!

I'm still amazed at some of the American responses to the removal of a man who tried to subvert his countries constitution and become a despot, sorry 'president for life', when the parliament of Honduras including members of Zelaya's own party asked Honduras' Independent Judiciary to look at changes Zelaya was trying to make they found them illegal and order him to be removed from office their parliament agreed and signed the order this was Hondurans protecting their democracy,granted they should not have had the military send him out of the country but this should not be used to damage the integrity of Honduras' interim government as Micheletti has done what he has said he would and is holding elections if this was a power grab he would have instituted Marshal law and would not even have allowed Zelaya back into the country.America is trying to build democracy in both Iraq and Afghanistan yet won't support one in it's backyard that has attempted to retain it.

I can not believe FP gives this man a forum. Like we should back a known US hater like Zelaya. George Soros is the man behind Open Society who uses this platform to hurt the US. Vickers is considered a less-then-truthful person and his article proves it. FP should consider the source before letting a man like Soros use their platform for his brand of American bashing.

The relentless ignorance of the coup's supporters is astonishing, but understandable given the one-sided coverage within Honduras. The comments here have compelled me to dismantle their main arguments one by one:

"Zelaya sought to become president for life"

Simple chronology disputes this point. The non-binding opinion poll scheduled for June 28 asked if voters wanted a binding vote on the creation of a Constitutional Assembly included in the November 29 elections. Assuming the Assembly enjoyed a plurality of support in the June 28 poll (ironically, Gallup data from July indicated that it would not have), Zelaya would have still had to wrangle support in Congress to put the measure to a vote in November. If we make the further assumptions that the vote would have gone through in both Congress and the electorate, it would have necessitated 3 further layers of voting – one to select delegates to the assembly, one to decide the issue of term limits, and a final vote on the constitutional revision. By this point, probably years down the line, Zelaya’s term would have long expired.

Also, if Zelaya wanted to continue to push his “socialist” agenda amongst his “hard left” supporters, he could have easily backed the candidacy of his wife (who’s more popular than the coup government, according to polling data from the summer) without facing any constitutional barriers.

Even more germane to the debate is that while Zelaya has consistently denied that he sought another term, no source has produced a fully contextualized quote, video, or document to prove otherwise. I’ve commented on a number of threads here and elsewhere and asked if anyone could provide that, and no one has. I’ve also e-mailed some journalists ranging from highly credible to less-than-spurious and received a similar dearth of proof to this claim. The closest thing I’ve seen is a short clip embedded in early coverage of the coup in which Zelaya says something to the effect of “why shouldn’t citizens be able to vote for whoever they want?” I have not been able to contextualize this quote or find the original source. However, it’s possible that he was responding to questions about the referendum held in Venezuela earlier this year. Either way, it does not directly demonstrate an intention to run for another presidential term.

“Zelaya was trying to install a socialist dictatorship in Honduras”

Zelaya was raised in the higher echelons of Honduran society, and was elected as a mainstream liberal. His record upholds this; recent data from the Millennium Challenge Corporation, a neo-liberal development group chaired by Hillary Clinton, suggests that Zelaya’s presidency has been pretty conducive to capitalist development – Honduras performed above the average in most economic and political indicators.

His mainstream approach is precisely why he reached out first to Bush and the Western capitalist world when the commodities bubble started to amplify the enduring issues among poor Hondurans. He only reached out to Chavez because Bush rebuked him, not because he’s naturally aligned with Chavez. Joining ALBA gave Honduras more reasonable access to credit and oil, loosening constraints on the federal budget and allowing more resources to flow to the poor, reeling masses. His other “socialist” measures were similarly designed to counteract a budget deficit and the inflated prices caused by Western banking schemes: raising the minimum wage, replacing expensive American medicine with far cheaper Cuban meds, and taxing banana exports (which are a significant part of the Honduran economy). Call it socialism if you will, but it’s hard to call it a dictatorship when he managed to do it through a hostile congress.

“Zelaya was removed constitutionally for well-justified reasons”

This argument does not even require further debate – it has already been debunked by sources ranging from TeleSur to Forbes. It’s worth pre-empting those who would cite the “Schock Report” by pointing out that said document is in the minority of informed legal opinion; we shouldn’t treat it as unique or paramount among constitutional analyses just because it’s the only one the mainstream US media cared to report on.

“It’s the resistance, not the government forces, that are perpetuating violence”

No one in the resistance is seriously calling for the use of weapons and violence; it’s possible that outside agitators have tried to push for this, but the position of Zelaya and the National Resistance against the Coup organization is clearly one of non-violent resistance. Also, it’s worth pointing out the Honduran Constitution itself calls for “insurrection” against illicit governments.

There’s no need to detail the abuses that have happened on the other side, which include murder, rape, beatings, and illegal detentions – in addition to a more insidious militarization of public life and political discourse. These have been reported on by both local and major international human rights organizations and were recently confirmed by US Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky in a visit earlier this month. Previous visits by Republican members of congress produced photo-ops with Micheletti and some darling op-ed’s in the WSJ, but these members of congress refused to meet with any human rights groups or representatives from the resistance, undermining their appraisal of the crisis.

For those of you who insist that the repression “isn’t that bad”, there are three answers. First, you should not content yourselves, especially as you tout the strength of your democracy, with any amount of repression. Second, the repression would almost certainly have been considerably worse if the international community had not been so quick to condemn the coup; a tacit acceptance by the US and other governments would have closed the media door enough to permit more egregious trespasses of human rights. Third, for many of those engaged in resistance, it IS “that bad”. For women who have been raped by police (feminist groups in Honduras report a 60% increase since the coup), for students who have been beaten and tortured, for families that have been terrorized, their homes occupied and tear gassed – for them, it has been “that bad”.

“The elections are the only way out of this crisis”

Elections are little more than a façade without authentically democratic conditions for their occurrence. This is evident if we study the history of electoral politics in Latin America. There were “elections” in Central America during long decades of what can effectively be called dictatorships. These sham elections are not what the people of Honduras want; they want fundamental changes to their constitution.

It would be totally valid to say I’m out of line to speak of what the people of Honduras want, as I’m not Honduran – except my statements are based on methodologically-sound polling from GQR and COIMER & OP. Many of the “Hondurans” [e.g. American ex-pats and rich Hondurans] who comment on these and other threads have nothing to say to polling data that flies in the face of their ignorant notions about “what Hondurans want”. The GQR data released in October shows in very explicit wording that more Hondurans support constitutional changes than elections as a solution to the crisis.

Also, Micheletti, not Zelaya, has broken the accord signed a few weeks ago. This has been attested to even by the “Verification Committee” that it established! At this point, I think George Vickers is basically right – the only way this crisis can be solved at this point is through a wide-ranging re-imagination of the Honduran Constitution, which can be accomplished in the most thoroughly democratic way only through the sort of
“Constituyente” that Zelaya was proposing in the first place.

It’s too bad Honduras is controlled by obstinate elite families – and that their pathetic ideology has seeped into the comment space of so much of the coverage of this crisis.

A few links to round out the argument:

A Good Resource for Spanish-language reports on the country:
http://www.cedoh.org/

MCC Data on Honduras:
http://www.mcc.gov/mcc/bm.doc/score-fy10-honduras.pdf

COIMER & OP Poll:
http://www.narconews.com/docs/encuesta_honduras_agosto_2009.pdf

GQR Poll:
http://www.gqrr.com/index.php?ID=2399

You have to wonder what the motivations of the author are... Clearly this is a foreign policy "expert" who has not spent any time recently in Honduras. It is always interesting to read the ideas of self annointed experts on any matter. This one is pretty close to my heart as I lived in Honduras for many years, I have friends who are there and I probably have signficantly better information than the "expert" who wrote this piece.

Elections in Honduras were not invented yesterday, they are part of the democratic process that we have been through the last 20 years. They were not scheduled yesterday, we ALL knew when they were coming, all the candidates of the main parties are present, so are the candidates of the smaller parties. The only candidates that arenot running are a few that never had a realistic chance as they have no support from anyone and have realistically no shot whatsoever at an office.

I have to say these elections are NOT as sham but they will be extremely special as Hondurans vote to defend their liberty and their institutions. There is very little doubt that Zelaya and his Chavez-funded supportes will try to prevent this from ocurring. There are many reports alreday of acttacks on the media and the courts... these guys are afraid of what the outcome may be... perhaps after all, democracy is in Honduras is much stronger than Zelaya, Chavez thought and that the author f this piece thinks. Then again, I doubt he has ever been in Honduras. You should visit.

It's clear that Vickers and the only Zelaya supporter that posted a rant have no idea of what is going on in Honduras(obviously they're not Honduran or have even visited)! If US is supporting the elections is because for the last five months, media have been defending Zelaya proclaiming that he was the democratically elected leader, regardless of how much public money he spent or how erratically and illegally he behaved defending his cuarta urna (which was deemed illiegal by all Honduran institution) . Now some countries and journalist, instead of supporting the opportunity for the Hondurans to democratically elect the future leaders and have a say, are to boicott our right. Shame on you! Support Hondurans and no its leaders. Todos los hondurenos a votar este Domingo!

If you want facts, visit:

http://lagringasblogicito.blogspot.com/

The fact Vickers never once mentions Zelaya's mentor and role model, Hugo Chavez, tells volumes about his politics. Hondurans narrowly escaped this Chavez clone's maneuver to keep himself in office permanently with his illegal referendum - exactly the way Chavez killed democracy and instituted his dictatorship in Venezuela.

You should be proud of your article. I will diffuse it everywhere to show here in Europe that in the US they are citizens with sincere democratic values. You should send it to senators John Kerry, John L. Burton and all the politicians in the Senate and in the HoR who condemned the Coup d'Etat and lobby for an urgent action and obtain the non-recognition of the elections from the Secertary of State. Thanks from France.

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Either Vickers or Arias are lying. The Honduran Constitution has been amended multiple times since 182, which would be rather difficult if there was "no recourse for amendment".

Next, the Obama team should work with the Organization of American States and other democracies -- the vast majority of which is reluctant to endorse these elections -- to find a way to bring Honduras back into the international community.

Here's a way - recognize the results. That would bring the government back into the international community.

As for the OAS, since when do they get to be the Great Saint of Democratic Legitimacy? They were only falling over themselves to re-admit Cuba months ago.

Moreover, the coup and the campaign have made utterly clear that the constitutional framework in one of Latin America's poorest countries may be insufficient for dealing with the vast array of social, political, and economic challenges facing Honduras -- with or without a new, democratically elected president.

That is a matter for the Hondurans and their government to decide.

On a side-note, does anyone find this presumption on the US and Latin America's part to determine whether or not democracy is being served in Honduras rather presumptuous? It is the Hondurans' right to determine what is constitutionally legitimate, first and foremost.

There are no unbiased people in this forum. If you support the coup,it is for a reason(wealthy, apathetic , politically naive,etc) . If a government arose from a valid election, it can only be substituted for another government coming from another valid election. If those opposing Zelaya are the majority as they claim to be, then Why no wait for the elections and take this man out of power?
I was waiting for the comments from the Zelaya'supporters but I remembered that those probably don't have internet access and not to mention they should barely speak Spanish due to the "democratic educational system" that the coup supporters have stablished in the poor Honduras.It is a country with the 70 % of the population living in poverty. Thist is the real "shame on you".

Good luck

Well i respect your opinion but i desagree from your article about honduras. I believe that unfortunately Mel has made a terrible mistake by hearing HUGO CHAVES'advices....too bad really. Besides MEL just did not respect the constitution he swear to respect when he was elected by hondurean people. He make his ideas above the laws of the country and that is a bad example for the 70%poor people from there. How should they respect the constitution if even MEL - THE PRESIDENTE did not RESPECT? Well the hondurean constituition did not have an impeachment artigo...that was not a problem cause there is a SUPREME COURT AND THE LEGISLATIVE in the country and the ARMY to execute the orders. You did mention in your article about the money CHAVES gave to MEL about 163 million dollars, the farm equipments and the lights for all honduras. Where are all the money, please? FINALLY I WOULD ADVICE ALL THE SOCIALISTS AND COMUNISTS' FANS THAT IF THEY JUST LOVE IT MOVE THEMSELVES TO VENEZUELA, CUBA, BOLIVIA, BRAZIL AND NICARAGUA IT IS JUST SIMPLE AS THIS!! NO NEED TO BE STRESSED AND VIOLENT!!! THANKS A LOT

In the first place if you want to make a comment it is way out of the line to attack the author ,It seems like you, the actual Honduras de Facto goverment(same ones since the coup) are the ones working hard online trying to impeach.suppress and attack democracy ,I have read many times the same comments; it is wrong and shameful, in fact you people sound and act like those in Israhell who in the same line have an internet army trying to suppress the reality or try to justify their actions.No matter what you do or say always will be somebody to tell the truth.IT is not about Chavez or Fidel Or socialism or communist; It is what apparently is going on in Honduras since the coup..contaminated by repression, violence, and fear.The World already know about all those killings execution style ,the kidnnappings,the constant abuse,etc. against those who dont agree with de facto goverment. I tell you this ...here in the US we are in a fight against those who want to put in a garbage can our constitution,many people ,not dozens or thousands but millions lost their live for what we are today, so be aware. Those who really know the trully meaning of democracy will defend it and always will be around .

The other day i start this blog ,check it out ...http://hondurasarmy.blogspot.com/

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