Qué hay detrás del Golpe en Honduras?
Juan Felipe
Submitted by BuzzFlash on Tue, 06/30/2009 - 9:10am.
a.. Guest Contribution
A BUZZFLASH GUEST CONTRIBUTION
by Nikolas Kozloff
Which do you prefer, the official version of U.S. foreign policy in Latin
America or the more hidden story? If you were reading The New York Times,
you probably got the impression that the military coup that just took place
in the small Central American nation of Honduras had everything to do with
President Manuel Zelaya's bid to extend presidential term limits. In a
superficial explanation of events, correspondent Elisabeth Malkin wrote "The
military offered no public explanation for its actions, but the Supreme
Court issued a statement saying that the military had acted to defend the
law" against Zelaya who had spoken out against the constitution.
In Honduras, presidents are limited to a single four-year term but Zelaya
had called for a constitutional referendum which, he hoped, would change the
law so he could stand for re-election. The move, however, inflamed critics
who claimed the President had no right to try to change the law. When the
military refused to help organize the vote, Zelaya fired a top military
commander. Things escalated from there and on Sunday, the military removed
Zelaya from power. Thus goes the official Times version, which gives the
impression that the political conflict in Honduras boils down to a simple
disagreement about the limits of presidential power.
When reading the Times and its coup coverage in Latin America, a healthy
degree of skepticism is in order. Let's not forget the case of the 2002 coup
in Venezuela that briefly removed President Hugo Ch�vez from power. At the
time, the Times shamelessly parroted the official White House version of
events, writing "Venezuelan democracy is no longer threatened by a would-be
dictator...[because] the military intervened and handed power to a respected
business leader [Pedro Carmona, the "dictator for a day"]." A scant two days
later following popular protests, Ch�vez was back in power and the Times was
forced to apologize. "Forcibly unseating a democratically elected leader, no
matter how bad he may be, is never something to cheer," the Times wrote
begrudgingly.
Perhaps not wanting to be caught flat-footed again, the Times proceeded a
bit more cautiously this time round in its coup coverage. In a second
article published today, the paper provides a bit more context to the
Honduran story, remarking that the U.S. has had longstanding military ties
to the Honduran military. The piece however gives the Obama Administration
the benefit of the doubt, repeating a high-up administration's claim that
the White House was not involved in the coup and was genuinely surprised
when the military moved to depose the President.
Perhaps Obama is telling the truth and the U.S. wasn't involved. Or perhaps
not -- Ch�vez has claimed that the hand of U.S. imperialism was at work in
Honduras. I don't endorse either version of events at this point but I do
believe the Times has overlooked vital facts that could shed light on the
recent political turbulence.
In a long piece that I published yesterday about the coup, I went over some
of this important history, pointing out for example that Zelaya was a
withering critic of official U.S. drug policy, opened up diplomatic channels
to the island nation of Cuba, pursued a tight diplomatic alliance with Hugo
Ch�vez of Venezuela and even sent an audacious, strongly worded personal
letter to Obama in December of last year in which the Honduran accused the
U.S. of pursuing interventionist policies in Latin America and needlessly
punishing Cuba through its longstanding economic embargo. Needless to say,
the Times chose to gloss over much of these facts. Moreover the paper of
record has failed to fully examine the role of Roberto Micheletti, Honduras'
new president.
Who is Roberto Micheletti?
A former Congressman, Micheletti is a long time fixture on the domestic
political scene. A member of Zelaya's own Liberal Party, he studied business
administration in the United States and worked as the CEO of Honduras' own
state telecommunications company. Up until two days ago, Micheletti was the
President of Honduras' National Congress. All these details aside, what's
most important to know is that Micheletti has been a long time foe of
Zelaya's diplomatic alliance with leftist Hugo Ch�vez.
At first, it looked like Micheletti would get along fine with Zelaya, a
politician who promoted free trade with the United States. But as the
so-called "Pink Tide" of left regimes came to power in South and Central
America, Zelaya became increasingly more politically independent. What
really set the two on a political collision course was Zelaya's move to
bring Honduras into the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (known by
its Spanish acronym ALBA), an alliance of leftist Latin American and
Caribbean nations headed by Ch�vez. The regional trade group including
Venezuela, Cuba, Nicaragua, Bolivia, and Dominica seeks to counteract
corporately friendly U.S-backed free trade schemes. Since its founding in
2004, ALBA countries have promoted joint factories and banks, an emergency
food fund, and exchanges of cheap Venezuelan oil for food, housing, and
educational investment.
Traditionally, Honduras has been known for its right-wing politics and its
close ties to the U.S. The third poorest country in the hemisphere, Honduras
has long been home to powerful U.S. fruit companies. The military has looked
out for business interests, liquidating any challenge to the social order by
the likes of organized labor for example. Given the pervasive conservatism
of Honduran politics, it's no surprise that when Zelaya moved to cultivate
an alliance with Ch�vez, the maneuver outraged the Honduran business sector
and galvanized the media against the president.
The Ford Imbroglio
It wasn't long before diplomatic relations with the U.S. started to fall to
pieces. In the middle of July 2008, Zelaya went to Managua and met with
Ch�vez to celebrate the 29th anniversary of the fall of Nicaragua's Somoza
dictatorship. Shortly afterwards, Ch�vez confirmed that Honduras would join
in the ALBA scheme. In a sharp retort to the insolent Zelaya, outgoing U.S.
Ambassador to Honduras Charles Ford said that a large portion of remittances
sent by U.S.-based Hondurans back to their home country were the product of
illicit drug trafficking. Ford added that he frequently felt intimidated
during his three-year stint serving in Honduras.
Incensed, Zelaya charged that the U.S. was the "chief cause" of drug
smuggling in Latin America and the Caribbean. Ford was being "belligerent,"
Zelaya affirmed, simply because Honduras had pursued diplomatic relations
with Caracas, Havana, and Managua. Just because Honduras received U.S. aid,
Zelaya said, did not mean that his country was a "vassal" of its northern
benefactor. Moving on from his feudal rhetoric, Zelaya accused the U.S. of
promoting coup d'etats, invasions, and uprisings across Central America. He
added that Ford had suggested that Honduras provide political asylum for the
anti-Castro terrorist Luis Posasa Carriles, an offer that Zelaya flatly
rejected.
Defending his new found friend Ch�vez against the Honduran right, Zelaya
said he shared the Venezuelan's antipathy towards superpowers that sought to
impose their will on other countries "like when Ambassador Charles Ford
asked me through the State Department to give a visa to Luis Posada
Carriles." The Honduran Foreign Minister said that his country had sent a
formal letter of protest to the U.S. government, adding that Ford's remarks
were unacceptable.
Needless to say, it wasn't long before Micheletti joined others in
criticizing Zelaya's moves to join ALBA. The President of the Honduran
Congress also called on Zelaya to show more respect towards Ambassador Ford.
"I believe we have the obligation to be close with the country to our north
because he is our friend and will continue to be so," Micheletti said. The
politician also sought to delay Zelaya's moves to have Honduras join
Ch�vez's Petrocaribe program that would provide Venezuelan oil to the
Central American nation at subsidized prices, and he also vowed to hold up
passage of ALBA in Congress. ALBA, Micheletti declared, would not pass
Congress and would wind up as a "dead letter."
The ALBA Debate
Facing political opposition, Zelaya indignantly declared that he did not
legally need to consult Congress to pass the ALBA accord with Ch�vez. That
in turn set up a confrontation with Congress and one legislator even
remarked that he was thinking about introducing a motion that would declare
Zelaya a usurper and mentally unfit to serve as president. By this point,
the Honduran private sector was going into hysterics with one powerful
association charging that ALBA would constitute "a political and military
alliance which would ideologically conspire against free trade, the exercise
of individual liberty and societal free choice."
Insinuating himself further into contentious local politics, Ch�vez went to
Tegucigalpa where he spoke before a crowd of 50,000 unionists, women's
groups, farmers, and indigenous peoples. Venezuela, Ch�vez said, would
guarantee cheap oil to Honduras for "at least 100 years." Infuriating the
local elite, Ch�vez declared that Hondurans who opposed ALBA were
"sellouts." Hardly content to stop there, Ch�vez lambasted the Honduran
press, which he labeled pitiyanquis (little Yanqui imitators) and "abject
hand-lickers of the Yanquis." The outburst led Micheletti and members of
Congress to denounce Ch�vez for being "disrespectful" and "vulgar."
With Honduran society becoming increasingly polarized over Ch�vez and ALBA,
Zelaya moved to mollify his political enemy in Congress. In October, the
President of Congress agreed to sign the ALBA agreement and in exchange,
Zelaya offered his political support to Micheletti who was intent on running
for president in 2009. In exchange for joining ALBA, Venezuela offered to
buy Honduran bonds worth $100 million with proceeds spent on housing for the
poor. Ch�vez also offered a $30 million credit line for farming, 100
tractors, and 4 million low-energy light bulbs. Cuba would send technicians
to help install them, in addition to more doctors and literacy teachers.
Relations continued to deteriorate with the U.S. and in December 2008,
Zelaya sent a strongly worded letter to Obama criticizing the conduct of
U.S. ambassadors, amongst other issues [see my last article for a fuller
discussion of the note].
Micheletti's Towering Ambition
Ultimately Micheletti came up short in his bid to get his party's
nomination, losing out to ex-Vice President Elvin Ernesto Santos. When
Zelaya declared his intention to proceed with the constitutional referendum
that would allow him to stand for re-election, Santos opposed the move as
illegal. Micheletti however won out in the ensuing power struggle: following
Sunday's coup d'etat, Congress declared the veteran politician Honduras'
next President.
In a press conference after being sworn in, Micheletti said that if Zelaya
"returns without the support of [the Venezuelan president] Mr. Hugo Ch�vez,
then we will receive him warmly." Asked whether Honduras would continue to
participate in ALBA, Micheletti remarked, "I believe that first we are going
to revise what ALBA has produced for Hondurans."
As a political figure, Micheletti is very reminiscent of another coup
plotter, Pedro Carmona. In April 2002, this politically well connected
businessman briefly became Venezuela's "dictator for a day." With the
support of Washington and The New York Times, Carmona held on until Ch�vez
was reinstated with the help of the military and angry protesters in the
streets of Caracas. Could history be repeating itself now in Central
America? Today, The New York Times presents Washington's point of view
concerning events on the ground in Honduras without delving too deeply into
the political context or Micheletti's possible motivations.
A BUZZFLASH GUEST CONTRIBUTION
Nikolas Kozloff is the author of Hugo Ch�vez: Oil, Politics and the
Challenge to the U.S. (Palgrave, 2006) and Revolution! South America and the
Rise of the New Left (Palgrave, 2008). Check out his Web site at
http://senorchichero.blogspot.com.