Observations on Honduras’ current political situation

To begin, much of what is happening goes back to the 2009 coup and removal of then president Mel Zelaya. Zelaya, who had very, very close ties to Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez and Cuba’s Fidel Castro, attempted in a non-legal fashion to run for president a second time, which was unconstitutional. The country, fearing a dictatorship, organized a coup and removed him from office. Zelaya continues to maintain a strong following, especially in the southern, rural areas of the country and among teachers. Although he is prohibited from running for reelection, he continued and continues to attempt to return to power, first through having his wife run for president and currently, by joining forces with presidential candidate Salvador Nasralla as the face and voice of the new Alianza Party.

Honduras is a country with multiple political parties. (at this time there exist 9 political parties) Because of this, the winning party often does not actually represent the majority of its citizens, because when votes are divided 9 ways, the winning party may only represent 30% or less of the votes. Seeing this weakness, a new party was formed called the Alianza. As it’s name suggest, it is an alliance between the pre-existing Libre party represented by ex-president Zelaya and his wife and the pre-existing PINU party represented by TV host Salvador Nasralla. The Alliance is officially represented by Nasralla.

The elected president replacing Zelaya, was Perfidio Lobo. By most accounts he was not good for Honduras. With close ties to the drug cartels and apparently little interest in governing Honduras, most of the foreign investors, including many of the large textile companies who employed large numbers of Hondurans, left the country in search of countries with more stable governments. The negative effect on Honduras’ economic well-being was devastating.

In November of 2013, Juan Orlando Hernandez of the National Party won election. Looking at world statistics and from the viewpoint of a foreigner living in Honduras, he has been a president whose policies and actions have been good for Honduras. In four years he has reduced the murder rate per capita, has worked to control the massive drug cartel/gang problem, has encouraged foreign investment, has greatly improved the infrastructure of Honduras, has brought Honduras’ public schools to a higher educational level when compared with the rest of the world, and has worked closely with the USA in many areas, including the war on drugs. As a foreigner, I have seen the positive results of his presidency. A much safer country, a growing middle class, a growing economy, a reduction in government and police corruption and a rising interest in Honduras from foreign investors who are beginning to see some signs of a return to stability. However, this is not to say that his administration has not suffered severe issues, such as the theft of millions of lempiras from the country’s already less than adequate social security fund.

As I have spoken with many people about the situation, most agree that Juan Orlando has been a good president. What has fueled the anger we are seeing in this year’s election is that Orlando, through a Supreme Court decision which most of the country felt was done illegally or at best underhandedly, changed the Constitution to allow a president to run for a second and possibly indefinite term. The outcome is the same thing ex-president Zelaya tried to do through brute force and the majority of the population feel that the change made to the Constitution was not done correctly nor reflects the will of the People. Some of what we are seeing now, is a backlash against Orlando because of this.

That brings us to this year’s election. (Fortunately, Honduras did invite observers from the EU and the OAS to come in October to begin observing the electoral process.) On November 26, Hondurans went to the polling booths.   

As the votes came in, the Alianza was initially ahead, then the National party after a technical problem began to marginally pull ahead. By the following day both parties claimed victory. Immediately, the Alianza party accused the National party of voter fraud, meddling in the voting and tabulation process, irregularities and party control of the voting process. That began a lawful 30 day review process of any allegation of fraud brought to the TSE. This is the only reason that no winner was announced immediately.

Without waiting for the TSE under the supervision of EU and OAS observers to review the allegations or to recount the large number of votes that had been challenged, the Alianza supporters took to the streets in protest fueled and encouraged by both Nasralla and Zalaya, who, already having made the decision that they had been cheated, demanded their candidate be made the winner. The National party felt they too had won, and from there everything began to go downhill, naturally.

What began as emotional and heartfelt protest by supporters of the Alianza party, within hours turned to rioting, burning and looting of public and private property, including the closure of public thoroughfares which greatly impacted all of the Honduran people and the economy. The rampant rioting and looting brought a national curfew into effect which helped reduce the violence. Within a few days, the curfew was lifted and there began several days of peace, although fraught with tension.

Both EU and OAS issued statements saying that although there were “irregularities” found in the voting process, no fraud was actually found. The EU’s statement was much more accepting of the election results, but encouraged reform, while the OAS, although apparently unable to actually find fraudulent behavior, went so far as to reject the election outcome based on the irregularities and recommended a new election be held. This did not happen and probably won’t for a variety of reasons, not least being that the constitution of Honduras, as I understand it, does not allow for a run-off election.

After almost 3 weeks, the TSE officially declared Juan Orlando the winner. This immediately restarted the protest and outrage, except this time even more violently. For four days the rioting, burning and looting went almost completely unchecked, especially in San Pedro Sula. The US Embassy issued a “hold in place, hunker down” statement to all US citizens living in Honduras. Finally, the Honduran military and National Police force were brought in to restore law and order. Of course, and unfortunately, there were clashes between protesters and law enforcement personnel resulting in death and injuries on both sides.

On Friday the 22 of December, the US Embassy issued a statement recognizing Orlando as president while at the same time, encouraging the country to refrain from further violence, to engage in a robust debate on electoral reforms and for both parties to work together to restore unity to the country. Following this statement, Nasralla conceded defeat, withdrew from his party, although publicly stating that he "believed the USA had sided with Orlando because he is more closely aligned with them". He then recanted his withdrawel and as of this date claims that he will hold his own presidential inauguration in San Pedro Sula the same day as President Orlando has his inauguration in Tegucigalpa. It will be interesting to see if he actually does this as the legal or illegal ramifications of this would be profound. (Following the US’s recognition of Orlando, most of the other world leaders have followed suit.)

It is difficult to say what the final response of Nasralla and Zelaya will be. In my opinion, they have only two realistic options to choose from. (a) To continue to incite civil disobedience and unrest, possibly leading to civil war, or (b) to concede defeat gracefully and to look towards a new opportunity in 4 years. Next week should be very interesting.

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The following opinions are mine. 

I do NOT claim to be unbiased or neutral in my opinions of what has taken place. As a foreigner I am unable to vote. However, as a foreign investor, I certainly have a vested interest in the outcome.  

Let me begin by saying that, although my world view falls solidly on the conservative, capitalistic side of the fence, I am not an Orlando supporter as such. I do support the conservative direction in which he has steered the country economically and applaud the advances he has made in reducing crime and murder rates in the past 4 years. Nasralla may have made a decent president, but his political leanings and choice of political partner makes me very wary of him, and here I am speaking from the perspective of a foreign investor and property owner.

I will however, comment on what I have observed this past month.

First and foremost, I am absolutely for freedom of speech and expression. I have observed many peaceful protest here in Honduras and the police have always helped the protesters by directing traffic and giving them space to protest freely. I have never, myself, seen any oppression of free speech. However, when the recent protest turned to raw greed, vandalism, looting, rioting and destruction, not only did I lose my respect for the civil rights “process”, but also for the opposition leaders who openly encouraged and incited their supporters to continue the violence and rampaging. In contrast, the National party and it’s supporters were quiet, orderly and non-confrontational.

In my opinion, in a democracy, which Honduras is, civil rights do not extend to harming other’s bodies, or to infringe on their right to engage in commerce, or the destruction of property, public or private. It is true that protest often become violent as passions are high, and it’s a recognized and documented fact that when this happens, it almost always leads to looting.  Although some see violence as the only way for poor people to be heard, I encourage these people to read history, where peaceful protest by poor and oppressed people, has changed the course of nations.

In my opinion it was wrong to begin rioting before the electoral review process had been completed, or to begin at all for that matter. There is nothing romantic about violence and bloodshed. There is nothing beautiful in the death of a young person who probably doesn’t even know what he or she is actually fighting for. More often than not, that death is for nothing more than a politician’s desire to be in power. and not really for the perceived cause.

Division and strife is the number one weapon being used at this time. It’s evident in the streets, but it is also evident in conversations, in families, in local churches and even to some degree among the foreign community here. Everyone has an opinion including myself, and of course that opinion is the just one, the correct one. In the end, the vote was a mere 1.5% difference. It’s George Bush and Al Gore all over again except thankfully they don’t have hanging chads here. Half the population feels cheated while the other half feels they got what they voted for.

When discussing the election, I have often expressed the importance that in a business sense, (and probably in a political sense too) it is never wise to bite the hand that feeds you. (The Alianza has already expressed a much lesser willingness to work with the USA than the National party has shown, including the promise to remove our army base near Comayagua.) Not only is the USA Honduras' number one trade partner, but there are an estimated 250,000 legal and 450,000 illegal Hondurans living and working within the USA who each year send millions and millions of US dollars back to Honduras to support their families, which also hugely benefits Honduras’ economy. This does not take into account the millions of dollars the USA gives to Honduras each year to fight the war against drugs and for social programs. Nor the thousands of teams that arrive here each year bringing medical brigades and other types of donations from clothes to support for children's homes. Should these enormous flows of funds and services be restricted or eliminated completely, it would deal a nearly crushing blow to Honduras' already fragile economy.  Considering this, it seems to me that it would be wise to work with, rather than against your best customer. (There does seem to exist here a real lack of understanding of the economic impact the election may have on the country's economy. As a matter of fact, the inability to understand and analyze world history and current global events seems to play heavily into the population's failure to view this election in the economic light it I feel it deserves.)

Speaking of education, in my conversations with many people here, it seems that most do not actually realize that Venezuela's economy has been bankrupted at the hands of it's own government (Venezuela is a big supporter of the Alianza)  nor that around the world the majority of socialist countries are struggling under the weight of inadequately funded social programs even as aggregate taxes and unemployment soar. Here, the average working class Honduran currently pays little to no personal income or property tax. The government's main source of revenue are corporate taxes, income tax on the wealthy and a national sales tax on the purchase of goods and services. Taking all this into consideration, it seems unrealistic to expect that a third world country such as Honduras, could actually create enough wealth to pay for all the services expected of socialism, without a solid economic base which can only be provided through strong international trade and foreign investment, which depends on a stable government that sees the value in creating and maintaining these relationships long-term.

So can anything good come from this? Absolutely.

It’s obvious that the people of Honduras want a change from the status quo of politics. The same wave of change that carried Trump into office is what brought Honduras to this point. They want a government that is less corrupt, that cares about Honduras as a country first and foremost.  People want change and the current administration would be wise to hear them.

I have been saying for several years that, as Americans we have a crystal ball with which to gaze into Honduras' future. That crystal ball is the United States of America. Although the gap is closing rapidly due to technology, in general Honduras is 30 - 40 years behind the US in standard of living, infrastructure development and use of technology and information. Most streets are unpaved, water and sewer treatment plants are almost non-existent. Eighties music is still popular here. Conservative churches are still struggling to deal with issues the American church dealt with long ago, etc. However, I believe that all of this set to change, and rapidly. I also believe that the youth are on the brink of a cultural revolution, just like we experienced in the sixties.  No, I don’t think Honduras will have a “hippie” generation, but the youth here are tired of seeing no opportunities unless you are born rich or can get to the US. There is a growing middle class here that are being educated. (Ah, here we come back to education as bringing enlightenment) These are bright kids, graduating as engineers, technicians, nurses, and lawyers….with nowhere to practice. How frustrating that must be for them. So look out Honduras. I only hope that a sufficiently honorable cause will be presented to these young people. One that will catch their attention and light the fire of passion, and not some cause that ultimately they will be disillusioned by when all they fought and died for doesn’t bring the change they so ardently hoped for.

I hope that this election will cause the current government to realize that it is in their best interest to bring the change the people want. I hope that they will recognize the urgency to rid the country of the gangs that control much of the larger cities. I hope they will bring economic reform through an anti-corruption agenda so that foreign investors will feel safe in bringing much needed jobs to Honduras. I hope the US sees the importance of helping the strategic ally we have in Honduras by encouraging and rewarding foreign investment through tax incentives and other methods. 

Honduras needs jobs. 

I believe with all my heart that jobs solve most of society’s problems, at least those that are not spiritually or emotionally rooted. When people are working, providing for their families with their own hands and seeing the rewards of hard work demonstrated through better living standards, people are more content and less likely to cause trouble or turn to crime. Honduras has an incredible workforce, just waiting for opportunity. My constant refrain to people who want to help Honduras is this. “Please stop bringing free things which only reduces a society to a dependent welfare state void of honor and self-respect, and instead bring jobs which allows the person to purchase for themselves the things they need, while at the same time benefiting the overall economy of the country”. This is what Honduras wants.

This is a great country and one I have grown to love. I pray that this nation will honorably face the future united, and that the world will see all that Honduras really has to offer.