My strongest rejection to the de-facto government in Honduras
I will here translate the text of a petition a friend is starting, which will be delivered to the Hondurean embassy in Mexico.
In the early hours of Sunday, June 28 2009, the legal Hondurean president Manuel Zelaya was forcibly removed from his position. A coup de etat, perpetrated by the Hondurean army, air force and navy, and with the consent of the Supreme Court. In his place, they imposed Roberto Micheleti, until then the Senate president, a conservative politician (although he is formally part of the Liberal party).
The coup took place because many areas of the government oppose the presidential initiative to start a referendum geared towards starting a Constitutive Congress, among whose ideas were to implement reforms allowing for the immediate presidential reelection for a second term.
Forcibly ousting a democratically elected government is nothing other than anti-democratic. The coup has made the world’s eyes to be set on Honduras, unanimously condemning this incident in a strong and immediate way. The people has been left blind and deaf; the communication media -both traditional and Internet-based- has been blocked. Not only freedom of press and freedom of speech have been blocked. People are crying for the reestablishment of the legally elected government. There is a national strike, the unions have protested massively. This coup has been received by a generalized popular rejection; as the only answer to the protestors, Micheletti has set a curfew, and the army is dissolving the demonstrations with tear gas and long weapons; in some hours we might see them using heavy vehicles against the civilians.
Latin American brothers, we must condemn, if at least symbolically, our rejection to the imposed Honduras government, our rejection to the human rights and individual warranties obstruction.
This humble text was written to collect digital signatures from all those who oppose the violence that this Central American country is suffering. Those that passively just want to express the collective feeling, those that feel a social, civil and human empathy towards what is happening beyond our territorial borders.
Every symbolic act, such as this one, does not weigh much by itself. But by making ourselves present by thousands, through different callings, we can generate enough pressure to incede in those sad actions.
Comments
Cuetzpallin 2009-06-30 09:14:00
Signed
I agree
gwolf 2009-06-30 05:34:20
There are ways…
I agree that if the president follows illegal actions, he must be held accountable. At least in my country, what would happen is that the Congress can take the office from him and hold him to trial - It seems the Congress agrees with what was done (Zelaya has been a very confrontational president, even towards his own party). Ok, so the right path would be to follow the political procedure to judge him.
Now, if instead of a trial he is forcibly put on a plane to a foreign country by soldiers, and soldiers start implementing a repression on communication media and on the population itself… It loses all legitimacy and becomes an illegal coup.
I am hearing the news, interviews with local Hondurean reporters; I am in correspondence with the Hondurean friends I met two weeks ago at ECSL. Even though there is this attempt to mask this as a legal situation, it is very clear that there is repression against all dissenting opinions. The military is telling reporters what to say and what is forbidden, closing stations, cutting electricity and conectivity. That just does not fit in legality.
gwolf 2009-06-30 09:35:39
Thanks!
Incorporating your changes.
in English I think it's "Honduran" rather than "Hondurean"
I have seen both in different sites… Must be something akin to color/colour…?
The other suggestions have been incorporated
Your CAPTCHA system is one of the most painful I've seen. In one case it seemed to be asking me to type a capital Sigma. :-(
Ouch! Sorry for that… In fact, even with the captcha, I am facing a huge amount of spammers ☹ In any case, each time you visit, a different type of captcha will appear, there are several types.
gwolf 2009-06-30 09:37:07
Es dificil confirmar…
En las primeras horas del golpe habían mencionado a un líder opositor (izquierda) asesinado, y luego (afortunadamente) se desmintió, indica que está escondido… Pero sí, es dificil aún saber qué pasa en realidad. Me preocupa, porque tiene ya más de un día que no leo a los amigos que nos estaban informando por correo… Esperemos que se desmientan todas las cosas lamentables… que todavía puedan ser desmentidas :(
gwolf 2009-06-30 10:11:00
Hard to understand problem…
Of course, I won’t claim I completely understand the situation. But if I understand correctly:
- Honduras' constitution includes some locks avoiding some articles to be modified/amended: The leyes pétreas (stone laws). It is stipulated that pretending to change such articles is a crime.
- Zelaya pretended to put a fourth booth in November's polls, so people vote for a president, local authority (i.e. city mayors or governors, I'm not sure), congressman, and whether or not to call for an Constitutive Assembly, to draft a new constitution or to amend the current one
- Many people say that he wanted to amend the current constitution to allow him to be reelected (and that's a stone law). I fail to understand, however, how could that be if it were in the same elections where his successor would be elected.
- The electoral and judicial powers insisted that installing the fourth booth would be against the law
- Zelaya decided to run a non-binding poll to ask the people if they wanted the fourth booth to be installed
- Voting is done with the aid of the military (i.e. distributing voting material, taking care of it after the election). But the Commander of the armed forces disagreed to participate.
- Zelaya changed the army's commander to one more sympathetic to him (which he can do, as he is the Supreme Commander of the army). However, the Congress forced him to put back the previous commander.
- The poll was supposed to be this Sunday. Of course, with him sent out of the country and with the military keeping people "quiet" at home, no polls were conducted.
Anyway… It is not an easy situation. Nevertheless, you will agree, if a president breaks the law, he deserves being judged according to the laws, not just thrown out by the military.
John Hughes 2009-06-30 08:07:00
English corrections
Firstly, in English I think it’s “Honduran” rather than “Hondurean”.
In the early hours of Sunday, June 28 2009, the legal Hondurean president Manuel Zelaya was forcibly taken off his position.
“removed from” would be better than “taken off”.
Forcibly ousting a democratically elected government is anything but anti-democratic.
A double negative - “anything but” “anti” implies a positive in English, so this sentence seems to say “Forcibly ousting a democratically elected government is democratic.”
Maybe something like “is nothing other than anti-democratic”.
There is a national strike, the unions have protested massively. This strike has been received by a generalized popular rejection
By the second “strike” above I assume you’re refering to the “coup d’etat”, rather than the “national strike” in the first sentence.
Your CAPTCHA system is one of the most painful I’ve seen. In one case it seemed to be asking me to type a capital Sigma. :-(
John 2009-06-30 07:03:00
Neither party is right in this issue
I have problems supporting either side of the issue here. On one hand, Congress and the military ousting a sitting president and appointing their own with no election is clearly wrong.
On the other hand, the courts had told Zelaya that it was unconstitutional for him to hold a public referendum in order to increase the term limits. The constitution is clear, the president gets one term, that’s it. There is an amendment system in place to modify that clause, and that’s the way it should be done.
Trying to force an unconstitutional public referendum just makes it a populist circus.
Both parties are in the wrong.
Philipp Kern 2009-06-30 00:49:00
Not that I would know much
Not that I would know much about this, but the petition says: “The coup took place because many areas of the government oppose the presidential initiative to start a referendum geared towards starting a Constitutive Congress, among whose ideas were to implement reforms allowing for the immediate presidential reelection for a second term.”.
Now I read on another (German) blog that the referendum was rejected by the Supreme court, but the executive chose to act against the judicatory ruling. Don’t they have to live with the consequences? Normally even a democratic government shouldn’t be allowed to ignore the law…
reg 2009-06-30 11:26:32
desde argentina…
aqui tuvimos una reforma importante de la costitucion, que involucraba una releleccion entre otros temas. de todas formas, las modificaciones las disponian las congresales del congreso constituyente y se sometian a la aprobacion del congreso. creo que una forma de superar el personalismo en eso es… que no se aplique la reeleccion al actual gobernante, y que rija a partir de la siguiente periodo. hay formas democraticas de cambiar las cosas. y si un presidenteactua por fuera de la ley, debe someterse a juicio politico, y subir su vice, y llamar a elecciones o algo asi. pero invocar a las fuerzas armadas, dejar a cargo a alguien que andie eligio, silenciar los medios de comunicacion y establecer toque de queda, con la segura supresion de las garantias constitucionales… no es la forma, seguro que no.
toxickore 2009-06-30 06:00:00
Por desgracia ya se dieron
Por desgracia ya se dieron las primeras muertes y desapariciones. Guerra sucia contra civiles por parte del ejército :S