generalspeaking

Trouncing Honduras

Honduras is a sovereign nation, among other sovereign nations. It has a constitution and a parliament and it practises its own kind of democratic rule. In its constitution is an inviolable convention that an elected president may only remain in office for one, and one term only, a convention that may not, under its constitution be amended. Honduras is also a poor country, reliant on good relations with its neighbours and on the United States.

Its recently-ousted president had undertaken some financial initiatives better suited to a country that could afford to increase the salaries of public servants, and when President Zelaya insisted on proceeding regardless, the country's budget was set off kilter. The result of which was to make loans from the IMF difficult, and in stepped Hugo Chavez, to finance the country in exchange for an agreement that Honduras become a member of Venezuela's Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas.

When Manuel Zelaya attempted to initiate a change in the country's constitution by invoking the potential for a constituent assembly enabling him to bypass his country's ban on presidential re-election, he further complicated his position. The country's supreme court explicitly banned his initiative, despite which he proceeded with the intention to launch a poll to elicit from Hondurans an opinion whether they would accept a constituent assembly.

Which was ruled illegal by the supreme court, despite which the president proceeded, ordering the army that it must, on his orders, distribute the ballots. When the head of the Honduran military refused to comply, the president fired him. Whereupon the supreme court reinstated General Vasquez, ordering the ballots to be confiscated. Not to be outdone, President Zelaya attempted to recover the ballots in defiance of judicial orders.

Which is when the fed-up and disgusted supreme court issued a warrant for his arrest. Because a new, interim president could only, under the constitution, be named in the absence of the current president, he was spirited away out of the country, into Costa Rica. And it is at that juncture that Roberto Micheletti, the head of congress, next in line of succession and a member of President Zelaya's liberal party, was voted by the legislature to temporarily sit as president.

Until the installation of the new president-elect, already voted into office, ready to take office in January, 2010. Now, the Chavez-led group of Latin American countries seethe with anger that Honduras would unseat one of their own, irrespective of the fact that he acted illegally, and against the country's constitution. The Honduran political establishment; congress, the courts, the military and business community, refuse to return Zelaya to office. His public approval rating had stood, before the crisis at 30%.

Clearly the country had every right to spurn this man's illegal attempts at securing his future as ongoing president of a country that had no wish to accept his will to continue, in defiance of the country's constitution, its supreme court and its congress.

Labels: Political Realities, World News

posted by Pieface @ Tuesday, July 07, 2009