All posts in category Honduras

Honduras: Is the Coup Finally Over?

By Fulton Armstrong*

Honduran President-elect Xiomara Castro/ hablaguante/ Flickr/ Creative Commons License

Honduran President-elect Xiomara Castro’s actions since her election on November 28 reflect optimism that the country can turn the page on the 12 tumultuous years since the military coup that forced her husband out of the country at gunpoint – and realism about the monumental tasks ahead. The voter turnout (69.28 percent) and her 15-point victory over the incumbent party’s candidate were historic. So was the level of violence – 23 candidates murdered – during the campaign.

A similarly historic basket of problems awaits Xiomara when she’s inaugurated on January 27.

  • Experts say that the government is bankrupt because of corruption, mismanagement, downturns in commodities on which the country has traditionally depended, two major hurricanes last year, and the COVID-19 pandemic. The country’s foreign debt burden is more than $16 billion (nearly 60 percent of GDP), and the economy contracted 9 percent last year. Former Finance Minister Hugo Noé, Xiomara’s senior policy advisor during the campaign, says his team is already dialoguing with the IMF on a new debt deal.
  • U.S. investigations into outgoing President Juan Orlando Hernández (JOH) are reportedly very close to seeking his extradition for trial – which would thrust Xiomara’s young administration into a potentially major political crisis. JOH’s broad network of accomplices are not likely to go quietly either.

Most of the President-elect’s early actions have centered on building an effective transition to what she calls un estado solidario – drawing positive feedback even from potential opponents so far.

  • A transition commission is beginning a national consultation on priorities, especially “the elimination of poverty and hunger” among the 74 percent of Hondurans who are poor and 53 percent extremely poor. Noting that corruption is a major root cause of the country’s economic mess, Xiomara is calling for vigorous anticorruption efforts, including some with UN support, and for repealing the “impunity laws” and “secrecy laws” that have allowed illegal dealing that saps government resources. To address the violence that terrorizes citizens and drives them to migrate, she says she “will fight narco-trafficking head-on.”
  • She has pledged to fight for the protection of women and their rights. Honduras has the highest rate of femicide (4.7 cases per 100,000 women last year, according to CEPAL) and gender violence in the hemisphere – an ugly reality that analysts say is another root cause of migration. She’s advocated an unspecified loosening of restrictions on abortion, which is currently forbidden even in rape cases.
  • Potential opponents have so far gone along. The military high command, whose loyalty JOH worked hard to win, has released a statement committing to working with Xiomara and stating that “she will be the President and commander of the Armed Forces.” JOH allies in the business sector and traditionally conservative media such as the country’s largest newspaper, El Heraldo, have welcomed her.

Rhetoric that the 2009 coup reversed a flourishing democracy is exaggerated – it has always been a flawed democracy and ousted President Mel Zelaya, like his peers, was a flawed leader. But this vote and early reactions indicate broad agreement that the past 12 years have exhausted the country. Xiomara’s Partido Libertad y Refundación (LIBRE) has soundly thumped the country’s two traditional parties, sending both back to re-think their strategies.

  • Governing is likely to be a learning process for Xiomara. Some of her early foreign policy statements – such as repeating her pledge to normalize relations with China (a sovereign decision the United States and most in the hemisphere have taken) and issuing unvarnished praise for Venezuelan Presidents Chávez and Maduro – have drawn unwelcome attention, but she pulled back and quickly put the focus back on her top domestic priorities. She also has to continue finessing coalition politics; her vice president, right-of-center sportscaster Salvador Nasrala, seemed to wander during the campaign but turned out to be a good asset. Her husband, to whom she’s referred as her “best advisor,” still has a reputation that will require some managing.

The U.S. reaction to her government will be crucial. Xiomara’s agenda, with its focus on the “root causes” of the country’s multiple crises, could make her an ideal ally to U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris, who’s worked hard to focus U.S. policy on those drivers. Neither woman can be expected to do magic, but stopping Honduras’s slide, which started under the putschist regime in 2009 and continued under the two National Party presidents who came after, would be a major victory in itself. The surge in Hondurans encountered on the U.S. border – up to about 300,000 in the past 12 months – has grabbed Washington’s attention, but the real test will be whether the Administration and the Honduran government can seriously address the root causes as promised.

December 9, 2021

1 Comment
by clalsstaff on December 9, 2021  •  Permalink
Posted in Honduras
Tagged , ,

Posted by clalsstaff on December 9, 2021

https://aulablog.net/2021/12/09/honduras-is-the-coup-finally-over/

Mexico and Central America: Taking Aim at Corruption in Pharmaceutical Procurement

By Thomas Andrew O’Keefe*

Secretary of Health Headquarters, Mexico City, Mexico / Diego Delso / Wikipedia, Not Modified / Creative Commons License

Under pressure to reduce the cost of medications and medical supplies, the governments of Mexico, Guatemala, and Honduras have resorted to an international facilitator to combat inefficiencies and a lack of transparency in medical procurement while attempting to build their own capacity to manage purchases and reduce related corruption in the future.

  • The Mexican government has been trying to obtain lower prices from manufacturers and distributors of patented or single-sourced medications and medical devices since at least 2008, when it created a Coordinating Commission to Negotiate the Prices of Medications and Other Health Inputs. A pooled procurement mechanism overseen by the country’s Social Security Institute (IMSS) was established in 2013 to purchase pharmaceutical products and medical supplies on behalf of various federal and state agencies. When President Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) took office at the end of 2018, he labelled the Coordinating Commission as ineffectual and IMSS’ pooled procurement process as hopelessly corrupt – and terminated both. He consolidated purchasing authority for Mexico’s public health sector in the Secretariat of Finance and Public Credit, which also proved incapable of handling the task. To address widespread shortages throughout the country that were putting lives at risk, the Secretariat was signing contracts at exorbitant prices.
  • Last July, the AMLO administration executed an agreement with the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS), a not-for-profit agency based in Copenhagen better known for implementing humanitarian and development projects. For 2021, the Mexican government is expected to spend some $4 billion to procure medications through UNOPS on behalf of federal entities and 26 of Mexico’s 32 states. UNOPS will reportedly net a 1.25 percent commission for what will be its largest single procurement project to date. In 2022, UNOPS will set up an electronic reverse auction system to conduct the bidding process with international suppliers.

Guatemala and Honduras reached out to UNOPS, with good results, years ago.

  • In 2014, UNOPS began assisting the Honduran Social Security Institute (IHSS) and Ministry of Health to establish a more effective and transparent procurement system for purchasing medications and medical supplies. After a year, UNOPS was able to procure medications at costs at 40 percent or more lower than what had previously been paid. Government funding remains a problem, but allegations of corruption in medical purchases have dropped sharply.
  • Following major corruption scandals at Guatemala’s Social Security Institute (IGSS), the Guatemalan government signed a contract with UNOPS in 2016 that involved both procurement and technical assistance to the IGSS to enhance transparency and strengthen its procurement processes. As a result, the Guatemalan government estimates the IGSS achieved an estimated 57 percent reduction in the prices of procured medicines and a 34 percent savings in surgical medical supplies and cochlear implants. The IGSS claims it was able to utilize these savings to, among other things, build new hospitals and extend health insurance coverage to more Guatemalans.
  • These experiences build on Guatemala and Honduras’ participation since 2010 in a mechanism overseen by the Council of Ministers of Health of Central America and the Dominican Republic (COMISCA) to jointly negotiate the prices of medications and medical devices for subsequent purchase by the public health sector in their countries.

Ensuring efficiency and reducing corruption in medical purchases will ultimately depend on the governments’ ability to reform their own systems, not on developing a permanent dependency on UNOPS or other international entities. UNOPS is scheduled to hand the entire procurement system over to the Mexican government in 2024. The recently created Mexican Institute of Health for Well-Being (NSABI) will initially oversee distribution within Mexico, but the AMLO administration has indicated that this function will eventually be taken over by a more specialized agency that will also have warehousing capabilities (including cold storage facilities).

  • AMLO signed an executive decree at the end of October that recognizes the health safety certificates issued by regulatory authorities in other countries as being equivalent to those issued by the Federal Commission for Protection against Health Risks (COFEPRIS) in Mexico. The decree also simplifies the process for COFEPRIS to issue certifications for the sale and consumption of all imported medications in Mexico. These moves are intended to undermine the ability of unscrupulous pharmaceutical firms to “capture” the regulatory approval process and thereby hinder competition.
  • The positive experiences in Guatemala and Honduras with UNOPS may encourage reformers in other Latin American countries, as just happened in Mexico, to look to the self- financing UN agency for assistance in clamping down on corruption, ensuring better management of the public health care sector, and implementing modern procurement systems to address the longstanding challenge of getting essential medical supplies to citizens who need them. The COVID 19 pandemic has made health a global priority and exposed serious deficiencies that no longer can be ignored. Without robust and equitable public health care systems, there is no sustainable economy.

December 21, 2020

* Thomas Andrew O’Keefe is president of Mercosur Consulting Group, Ltd. and lecturer with the International Relations Program at Stanford University.

Leave a comment
by clalsstaff on December 21, 2020  •  Permalink
Posted in Central America, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico
Tagged

Posted by clalsstaff on December 21, 2020

https://aulablog.net/2020/12/21/mexico-and-central-america-taking-aim-at-corruption-in-pharmaceutical-procurement/

Honduras: A Renewed MACCIH with Teeth?

By Eric L. Olson*

President of Honduras, Juan Orlando Hernandez, January 16,

Juan Orlando Hernández, President of Honduras, January 19, 2016/ Flickr/Creative Commons/ https://www.flickr.com/photos/oasoea/24115247729/in/photostream/

As the January 19 deadline for renewing the Support Mission to Combat Corruption and Impunity in Honduras (MACCIH) approaches, the Honduran government — never enamored of it — has a chance to demonstrate a commitment to root out one of the principal problems that undermine the nation’s democratic institutions and the opportunities citizens yearn for.

  • The Organization of American States has been engaged for months in low-profile discussions with Tegucigalpa on the future of MACCIH, created by an agreement between Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández and OAS Secretary General Luis Almagro on January 19, 2016. Despite concerns that MACCIH lacked the independence and capacity to conduct investigations that its UN-based counterpart in Guatemala (CICIG) once had, it has demonstrated that Honduras can indeed conduct independent, non-partisan investigations into systemic corruption, and begin to prosecute and hold accountable senior officials.

Working with its partner in the Public Ministry, a special anti-corruption prosecutor’s unit (UFECIC), MACCIH has had a key role in 13 major cases involving 124 individuals, including 80 government officials and 44 private citizens. Several cases involve networks of corruption in the Honduran legislature as well as the former first lady (now sentenced to 58 years in prison), and graft and corruption in the country’s public health system (IHSS). The official evaluation of MACCIH’s first four years by the Mesa de Evaluación, a process established by agreement between the Honduran government and OAS, has recommended full renewal.

The brave work of the UFECIC prosecutors, who formalize the investigations that MACCIH first develops, has been crucial. MACCIH screens and recommends the prosecutors and investigators that make up UFECIC, but its mission is to support, not conduct, prosecutions. This distance is intended to strengthen capacity within Honduras’s justice system.

  • Honduran civil society, previously skeptical that MACCIH would work, is now largely on board. The Coalition for the Renewal of MACCIH has issued statements calling for the mandate to be extended — proclaiming ¡Renovación Ya! — as have the National Anti-Corruption Council, the Association for a More Just Society, the Catholic Bishops Conference and its Evangelical counterpart, and others. Even members of the business community, long leery of anti-corruption initiatives, support renewal.
  • At least rhetorically, the United States supports MACCIH renewal. Acting Assistant Secretary of State Michael Kozak and other State Department officials have endorsed it, and Democrats in the U.S. Congress have been strong advocates. Washington’s implicit approval of the Guatemalan government’s dismantling of CICIG, however, remains a concern for MACCIH supporters.

President Hernández’s foot-dragging on renewal has fueled worries. Renewal could be done simply with an exchange of letters in which the government signals its desire to renew the mandate as is; unless the agreement is to be amended, no congressional action or further steps are needed. The delay has given rise to fears that the government is seeking to limit the length of the new mandate (from the current four years to two or even one). There is further concern that the government, with pressure from Congress, seeks to limit the MACCIH mission to citizen oversight functions, prevention efforts, and technical training. These are all important elements of the mission, but the heart and soul of the MACCIH’s success has been its support for the UFECIC and its investigations. To undermine or limit investigations would likely lead to the demise of UFECIC and render the MACCIH toothless.

Renewal of MACCIH — with the investigative elements of its mandate intact — gives President Hernández, who labors under a cloud of allegations about involvement in narcotics trafficking and other illicit practices, an opportunity to demonstrate his commitment to fighting corruption, strengthening the rule of law, and building judicial and democratic institutions. If the mandate is changed, not simply renewed, it will have to be approved again by the Honduran Congress, where odds are long. The Congress has already recommended MACCIH not be renewed and, as the official Mesa de Evaluación documented, it has already attempted to reverse anti-corruption legislation, such as by lowering penalties for misuse of government funds.

  • Hernández has the clout to direct his supporters in Congress, many of whom fear MACCIH’s investigations into their activities, to abandon their obstructionist tactics, while reaching out to opposition legislators who support MACCIH. Alternatively, he could ignore Congress altogether and simply reach an executive agreement with the OAS, something that would carry less legal weight but may preserve MACCIH’s essential elements.
  • The President’s inaction hurts MACCIH and broader anti-corruption efforts as well as Honduras. Failure to push renewal — with teeth — will not only damage his reputation and further erode his legitimacy in the eyes of Hondurans and the international community; it will send a message of hopelessness and despair to Hondurans seeking to build a better future for their country.

January 13, 2020

* Eric L. Olson is Director of Policy, Seattle International Foundation, and a global fellow at the Wilson Center in Washington, DC.

 

1 Comment
by clalsstaff on January 13, 2020  •  Permalink
Posted in Honduras
Tagged ,

Posted by clalsstaff on January 13, 2020

https://aulablog.net/2020/01/13/honduras-a-renewed-maccih-with-teeth/

Honduras: Facing the Budget Challenges?

By ICEFI and CLALS*

Honduran Lempiras

Honduran Lempiras/ Alex Steffler/ Flickr/ Creative Commons

Honduras’ proposed budget for 2020 reduces support to the country’s most needy – while protecting the military and security agencies – and, particularly if the debate on priorities is not made more inclusive, risks exacerbating already high political tensions and chronic economic mismanagement. On the revenue side, the draft budget shows a drop in tax revenues from 18 percent of GDP in 2019 to 16.5 percent – which, ICEFI has found, is not justified by technical analysis of the circumstances. Government spending – excluding payment on the national debt but including transfers to funds and trusts – equaled 19.7 percent of GDP, compared to 21.5 percent in 2019. (ICEFI estimates that the average government spending in Central America in 2019 will be 18.5 percent.) This drop will affect most public entities, particularly in social spending.

  • Education faces deep cuts. The budget of the Secretariat of Education, for example, will drop from 4.85 percent of GDP in 2019 to 4.49 in 2020. Transfers to public universities are slated to be reduced 23.1 percent from 2019 levels, and scholarships are also on the chopping block – cut 27.5 percent for national and 37.5 percent for international scholarships.
  • Health spending in Honduras – the country with the highest poverty rates in Central America – will decline from 2.39 percent to 2.37 percent at a time that inflation is more than 4 percent. The budget for Infrastructure and Public Services will be hit hardest – cut from 0.82 percent of GDP to 0.40 percent. Capital expenditures or investment will decline 33.5 percent year on year, including 38.5 percent from machinery and equipment and 34.6 percent for construction.
  • One of the only government sectors seeing increases is in the military and security, according to ICEFI. The 2020 budget proposes a 39.6 percent increase from 2019 on military and security equipment.

At first glance, the budget would appear to produce a surplus in 2020 of about 0.4 percent of GDP, which is double that ICEFI estimates for 2019. But factoring in the transfer of resources to the funds and trusts – a more reliable way of tracking fiscal behavior – the deficit will actually be 1.5 percent of GDP. That’s lower than ICEFI’s estimate of the deficit this year (1.9 percent), but it is achieved at the expense of the wellbeing of a majority of the Honduran population.

If approved and implemented as proposed, the budget will set back several strategic goals that the Honduran government itself has set. The budget confirms the government’s desire to reduce the public deficit principally through cuts to social spending and some capital expenditures – even though the approach contravenes commitments made under the UN Convention of the Rights of the Child and General Comment No. 19 (2016) on public budgeting for the promotion of children’s rights, which establishes that states should not deliberately adopt regressive measures that undermine child’s rights.

  • Although some provisions of the budget in principle could expand production of goods and services, they do not clearly point to either social inclusion, especially in terms of gender, age, and ethnicity. Budget allocations dedicated to attention to women are very low, equaling barely 0.19 percent of all spending. Neither does the budget focus on achieving any particular Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The transparency and inclusiveness of the budget debate in the Honduran Congress will be crucial to determining the longer-term impact of this budget on human rights and the provision of public goods and services to the most vulnerable Hondurans, including children, adolescents, and women. Executive and Congressional decisions on the budget will shift the country’s path toward prosperity and governance – or continue down a path of instability and tension. More breaks for those capable of paying taxes, while cutting essential services to those who cannot, will be a step in the wrong direction. At a minimum, Honduran leaders should demonstrate the benefits of such moves will outweigh the costs. The legitimacy and effectiveness of the Honduran budget will depend on a broad, inclusive, and honest debate.

November 26, 2019

* The Instituto Centroamericano de Estudios Fiscales conducts in-depth research and analysis on the region’s economies. This is the second in a series of summaries of its analyses on Central American countries.

Leave a comment
by clalsstaff on November 26, 2019  •  Permalink
Posted in Honduras
Tagged , , , , ,

Posted by clalsstaff on November 26, 2019

https://aulablog.net/2019/11/26/honduras-facing-the-budget-challenges/

The OAS and the Crises in Bolivia and Chile: Power Politics and Inconsistencies

By Stefano Palestini Céspedes*

Protests in Chile, October 2019

Protests in Chile, October 2019/ Carlos Figueroa/ Wikimedia Commons/ https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archivo:Protestas_en_Chile_20191022_07.jpg

As political crises emerge one after the other in Latin America, the Organization of American States (OAS) is showing inconsistent behavior based on ideological rifts and power politics. This inconsistency – evidenced by the OAS’s role in the ongoing crises in Bolivia and Chile – undermines its mandate to protect human rights and democracy throughout the hemisphere.

In Bolivia, violence spread in the streets of various states after the opposition accused incumbent President Morales of manipulating the results of the October 20 elections. The OAS Electoral Mission reported possible irregularities, and both the Permanent Council and the Secretary General pressed the government to authorize an audit of the electoral procedures and a vote recount. Morales consented to both requests.

  • The same accusations of electoral irregularities were made two years ago in the Honduran presidential election, but a coalition of states headed by the United States swiftly recognized President Hernández – delegitimizing the OAS electoral mission and the Secretary General’s call for new elections. Those same countries have now pressed Morales, first for a recount of votes and later for new elections. When the OAS Electoral Mission confirmed the existence of electoral irregularities on November 10, the Bolivian military withdrew support for the government, prompting Morales’s resignation – an outcome radically different from that in Honduras.
  • Despite political violence and recurrent accusations by Morales of unconstitutional alterations to the constitutional order voiced by the Bolivian foreign minister at the OAS headquarters, neither the Secretary General nor OAS member states invoked the Inter-American Democratic Charter. President Morales did not explicitly invoke the Charter, thinking that the crisis would follow the same course as in Honduras, or that the military remained supportive. Either way, he was wrong.

In Chile, in contrast, the police have engaged in systematic violations of human rights since an unprecedented social uprising that started on October 18. Twenty-three people have been killed, 1,950 have been injured, and 180 have suffered eye injuries from rubber bullets fired upon protesters by police – many losing their sight. The Inter- American Commission on Human Rights issued a declaration regarding the violations of human rights during the State of Emergency imposed by President Sebastián Piñera in the aftermath of the uprising. But the OAS political bodies have remained silent.

  • Neither Secretary General Almagro nor the Permanent Council have issued a single declaration of concern or condemnation regarding the situation in Chile. Almagro has refrained from convening the Permanent Council or the General Assembly, but he has loudly claimed the existence of destabilization attempts organized by Cuba and Venezuela (which he called “Bolivarian breezes”). To be sure, issuing such a statement without providing evidence or convening the political bodies of the organization jeopardizes the credibility of the OAS and breeds conspiracy theories. In a recent interview, President Piñera also subscribed to the thesis of foreign intervention in Chile’s protests without providing any evidence. The Chilean Attorney General confirmed that the government has not provided any information about the action of foreign groups.

The inconsistency displayed by the OAS in the handling of the political crises in the region suggests that the OAS applies different standards to similar situations. In fact, the organization is split into two coalitions: a larger and stronger one composed of right-wing governments that embrace or accept the foreign policy of U.S. President Donald Trump based on a revival of the Monroe Doctrine; and a smaller, weaker one composed of states with leftist and centrist governments with an anti-imperialist or a non-interventionist rhetoric.

  • Breaches of democracy and human rights violations exist on both sides of the rift, but the OAS political bodies seem to focus only on the side that happens to be weaker. This is bad news for those that would like to see in the OAS an honest broker and mediator in political crises, no matter the ideological color or the power of the concerned state. If this trend continues, it is also bad news for the protection of human rights and democracy and for multilateralism in the region.

November 11, 2019

* Stefano Palestini Céspedes is an assistant professor at the Institute of Political Science, Catholic University of Chile.

Leave a comment
by clalsstaff on November 12, 2019  •  Permalink
Posted in Bolivia, Chile, Honduras
Tagged , ,

Posted by clalsstaff on November 12, 2019

https://aulablog.net/2019/11/12/the-oas-and-the-crises-in-bolivia-and-chile-power-politics-and-inconsistencies/

Honduras: MACCIH Still Trying

By Aída Romero Jiménez

MACCIH Feb.22.2019

Luiz Antonio Marrey, Special Representative of the Secretary General, Spokesperson of the MACCIH / Flickr / Creative Commons

MACCIH, the OAS-sponsored mission to support the fight against corruption and impunity in Honduras, continues to investigate cases but with a lower profile than one year ago– and under growing political pressure.

  • Without MACCIH, most observers believe, cases like La Caja Chica de la Dama – for which ex‑First Lady Lobo is awaiting trial in prison – would not have developed. MACCIH is also credited with shutting down the Red de Diputados, a network of Congressmen accused of misappropriating government funds; the Pacto de Impunidad o Fe de Erratas, legislation that effectively shielded Congressmen involved in the Red; the Pandora case, which accused 38 lawmakers of stealing funds from the Ministry of Agriculture; and serious charges against former President Lobo’s brother.
  • Although MACCIH provides important leads and analytical capacity to UFECIC, the special prosecutor unit created to investigate corruption cases, its most valuable support comes from the political cover it provides as an internationally sponsored entity. It is often the public face of anti-corruption efforts in the country, even though Luiz Antônio Guimarães Marrey, the spokesman since last June, and his deputy have significantly scaled back their use of social media since the previous spokesman, Juan Jiménez Mayor, irritated the government with his public profile.

MACCIH’s successes have provoked resistance and, at times, a strong backlash from powerful sectors that feel threatened by its work, not unlike what has occurred with the International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG).  When Guatemalan President Jimmy Morales banned the head of CICIG, Iván Velásquez, from returning to the country, several Honduran Congressmen were quick to state that the MACCIH mandate similarly had to be revised, and that its involvement in investigations had to be reigned in to ensure it was not overstepping its limits.  Echoing CICIG’s critics in Guatemala, they also alleged that MACCIH was violating the country’s sovereignty.

  • The Honduran Constitutional Court was already gunning for MACCIH when it ruled in May that UFECIC was unconstitutional. (UFECIC has continued its investigations without further interference, but local observers believe this could change at any moment.)  Congress has also redoubled efforts to reform Article 115 of the General Law of Public Administration to effectively shield itself from Public Ministry investigations into their handling of public funds.  Legislators want to transfer authority for such inquiries solely to the Supreme Auditing Tribunal, which civil society actors claim is sympathetic to the Congressional leadership.
  • The lack of judicial independence has remained a serious obstacle. In a high percentage of cases that go to trial, the charges have been reversed or downgraded, signaling just how fragile and corrupt the Honduran justice system is.

MACCIH’s progress in fulfilling its mission makes it vulnerable to attack and, possibly, non-renewal when its mandate expires in January 2020.  MACCIH spokesman Guimarães Marrey said in December that 11 new cases will soon be announced.  Many Hondurans hope that President Juan Orlando Hernández will be among the targets, on the assumption that he was aware of or involved in drug trafficking operations for which his brother, Tony, is under arrest in the United States.  Whether that happens or not, pressure on MACCIH is unlikely to abate.  Guimarães Marrey earlier this month re-released a draft “Effective Collaboration Law” – MACCIH’s main legislative priority – allowing plea-bargaining in return for accurate information leading to prosecutions.  Legislative opposition to the proposed legislation is strong, and its prospects – like MACCIH’s – remain uncertain.

February 22, 2019

*Aída Romero Jiménez is a team member of the CLALS project Monitoring MACCIH and Anti-Impunity Efforts in Honduras.

3 Comments
by clalsstaff on February 22, 2019  •  Permalink
Posted in Honduras
Tagged ,

Posted by clalsstaff on February 22, 2019

https://aulablog.net/2019/02/22/honduras-maccih-still-trying/

Honduras: Will Political Reforms Go Anywhere?

Honduras Highway Sign

Honduras by Nick Youngson CC BY-SA 3.0 Alpha Stock Images / Picserver.org / Creative Commons

By Eugenio Sosa*

Honduras’s long-running political crisis and the realignment of its political parties have given rise to broad discussion of political and electoral reforms, but resistance from the political parties – including the relatively new Libertad y Refundación (LIBRE) Party – appears likely to stymie significant change.  Honduran civil society groups increasingly believe that only through political and electoral reforms will the country move toward democracy.  Holding elections is an important starting point, reform advocates say, but deepening democracy requires reducing the monopoly of the political parties.  The configuration of the parties has changed significantly since the coup d’état in June 2009; the century-old “bipartisanship” of the National and Liberal Parties has been shaken up and become more volatile.  LIBRE has moved to the front line, and smaller players, like the Partido Anticorrupción (PAC), have faded.  Reformers argue that this realignment affords the country an opportunity to undertake reforms that cut across the country’s institutions and processes.

  • Depoliticizing the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) and making it a truly independent and autonomous body to supervise elections. The current TSE has fallen far short of its legal requirements to ensure, without prejudice, to enfranchise all citizens. 
  • Professionalizing and depoliticizing the National Registry of Persons – removing the partisan activists who dominate it today and directing it to issue identification cards without political influence. Observers agree that 30 percent of voters on the current lists have deceased or left the country.  Other citizens’ names have been mysteriously dropped from voter rolls or been lost while changing domicile.  Similarly, the country needs a complete, honest census.
  • Allowing regular citizens to staff election tables in polling places. They should be chosen based on clear criteria, such as their contributions to society.  In 2013 and 2017, credentials were being bought and sold with party funds, totally undermining observers’ credibility.
  • Establishing second round balloting when no candidate wins an absolute majority. The country’s shift away from a two-party system has significantly increased the chance that a president would be elected with a percentage of votes below the abstention rate.  A runoff between the top two candidates will give the victor greater legitimacy.

Other important reforms are receiving less attention.  Laws on transparency and accountability in campaign finances, such as the Law on Clean Politics implemented in 2017, have not had significant results so far, but discussion of ways to give them teeth has been limited.  Neither is there much talk about how the incumbent candidate benefits from access to public resources, including access to the national networks, or about the biases of privately owned media, which slant coverage and charge different rates for advertising depending on their preferences.  Guarantees of political participation by sectors traditionally excluded from representation and government, such as women, the indigenous, and youth, are also largely off the table.

The urgency for reform, obvious since the coup in June 2009, has surged since the contested elections in November 2017, during which the Constitutional Court decided in favor of the reelection of President Juan Orlando Hernández in the face of evidence of electoral fraud.  Honduras is now living the paradox of a President serving a second term that is still prohibited by the Constitution.  Some issues, such as re-election, demand serious national debate and may have to be resolved by plebiscite or through a National Constituent Assembly.

  • Despite the broad base of the organizations proposing reforms, the success of any initiatives will depend on the views, limitations, and vetoes imposed by the three main parties. Even LIBRE, the newcomer that previously challenged the status quo, sometimes appears to be buying into existing systems and could go soft on reform.  As a result, one possible outcome could be that certain reforms are implemented in form – such as modernization of the National Registry of Persons – but the parties retain their influence over the office’s magistrates and personnel.  In addition, neither of the three main political forces appears interested in allowing authentic citizen control over voting tables on election day. 
  • While the need for reform is arguably deeper than at any time since the current Constitution was approved in 1982, and while the proposals for moving forward are constructive and mature, the prospects for change appear limited. The configuration of the country’s political parties has changed, but their priorities and behavior have not. 

January 22, 2019

*Eugenio Sosa is a sociologist and senior analyst at the Centro de Estudio para la Democracia (CESPAD), in Tegucigalpa.  This article is adapted from his essay on the CESPAD website.

Leave a comment
by clalsstaff on January 22, 2019  •  Permalink
Posted in Honduras
Tagged

Posted by clalsstaff on January 22, 2019

https://aulablog.net/2019/01/22/honduras-will-political-reforms-go-anywhere/

Honduras: Would a Constituent Assembly Help?

By Hugo Noé Pino*

Several people raise their hands in the Honduran National Congress

A recent session in Honduras’ National Congress. / Congreso Nacional de Honduras / Creative Commons

The need for Honduras to convene a National Constituent Assembly appears increasingly compelling even though the country’s political elites continue to oppose one.  Proponents of an “ANC” argue that it would not only help the country overcome the fraud perpetrated in last November’s elections; it would give oxygen to the country’s failing democracy.  They note that the current constitution, promulgated in 1982, has been violated and modified so many times – such as when President Juan Orlando Hernández was allowed to run for reelection – that the document’s original meaning has been obscured if not lost.  ANC proponents cite other facts pointing to the need for an assembly:

  • The constitution calls for a “planned economic policy,” in which the state and law “shall regulate the system and process of planning with the participation of the Powers of State, and political, economic and social organizations shall be duly represented.” But that planning model, which has never been implemented in Honduras, has been overtaken by the neoliberal model, based on market freedoms, adopted in the 1990s.  Amendments passed in 2012 were intended to create special employment and development zones, but not a single one has emerged.
  • Since the 2009 coup, Honduran society has been polarized by violations of the law, the concentration of power, abuses, corruption, and other problems – all aggravated by the widely contested election of last November. Business, workers, farmers, trade unions, academia, non-governmental organizations, and other sectors have been unable to find agreement on how to deal with the nation’s pressing problems.  ANC supporters say that true national reconciliation is going to require a new social pact that a new constitution can create.
  • Backers also argue that the ANC would breathe new life into the political parties – deeply discredited by the corruption and chaos engulfing them – and allow them to become a mechanism for intermediation between society and the state. An assembly, they say, would bring political leaders and the people together in pursuit of better alternatives to the current system.  A system of checks and balances, including a new judicial system, would help guarantee the separation of powers and enhance citizen participation in public policy.

Prospects for an ANC do not look good at this moment despite important endorsements, such as that of the Honduran Catholic Bishops Conference in a public letter last December.  Most of the political elite, responsible for setting the country on its destructive course, stridently oppose the idea, but proponents feel the elites will eventually have to accept one.  The “national dialogue” launched after the November elections has made no progress or, worse, has aggravated tensions.  The black cloud over those elections and the surge in corruption cases under investigation – an important achievement of the Misión de Apoyo contra la Corrupción y la Impunidad en Honduras (MACCIH) and its partners working under the Attorney General – have driven politicians to dig in their heels.  Their efforts to hold onto power, prevent transparency, and block accountability puts them directly against the sort of reforms an ANC would represent. 

  • Even when the political class eventually allows the ANC proposal to take off, many obstacles lay ahead. One of the first – and extremely difficult – steps would be selection of a truly independent Supreme Electoral Tribunal to oversee a referendum on the ANC and the election of assembly delegates.  The questions on the ballot would be simple, focused on support for the ANC and support for presidential reelection, but the task of making Honduras an inclusive society, with transparency, accountability, and respect for the rule of law would take the sort of vision and discipline that only a new constitution would provide.  While critics claim an ANC would be playing with fire, it’s certainly better than the current situation in which we are all threatened with being burned.

August 14, 2018

* Hugo Noé Pino is currently a professor and coordinator of a Ph.D. program at the Universidad Tecnológica Centroamericana (Unitec) in Tegucigalpa, Honduras.

Leave a comment
by clalsstaff on August 14, 2018  •  Permalink
Posted in Honduras
Tagged ,

Posted by clalsstaff on August 14, 2018

https://aulablog.net/2018/08/14/honduras-would-a-constituent-assembly-help/

Honduras: Narcotics Trade Accelerating Deforestation

By Luis Noé-Bustamente*

Río Plátano Biosphere Reserve (Honduras)

Río Plátano Biosphere Reserve in Honduras. / UNESCO / Wikimedia / Creative Commons

The rapid increase in deforestation in Honduras is being driven to a significant degree by the narcotics trade’s use of logging, land purchases, and cattle operations to launder drug profits.  Honduras has lost approximately 30 percent of its total forest cover since 2000, according to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.  Research indicates that the burgeoning drug trade connects businesses involved in illegal logging, timber sales, and the use of the cleared land for cattle ranching as a mechanism to launder drug trafficking money.  Criminal organizations insert illegal timber into the existing legal supply-chain, hiding illicit profits within legal revenue streams.

  • Drug traffickers’ access to capital gives them immense social, economic, and political influence in remote areas. Research published in the journal Environmental Research Letters shows that they are able to conduct unusually large, remote, and fast forest-clearing in areas where they also collaborate with illegal loggers to grab land, enabling them to later merge both activities through cattle ranching operations.  Last year, a spatio-temporal study led by Dr. Steven Sesnie, an ecologist at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, estimated that as much as 25 percent of the annual forest loss in Honduras during the past decade can be linked to the drug trade.

Even though these emerging regional bosses are growing in influence and audacity, the Honduran government does not acknowledge the scope of their illicit activities – even in the Rio Plátano Biosphere Reserve (RPBR), the country’s largest natural forest reserve (approximately 800,000 hectares).  In 1997, the Honduran Congress designated three different zones in the RPBR to provide some long-term protection of its sparsely inhabited core zone and to promote sustainable development in its more populated buffer and cultural zones.  Available information indicates, however, that enforcement has been very spotty, with only very rare action against only low-level violators.

  • Parts of the RPBR have experienced what forestry experts call alarming levels of cleared forest patches – even in areas with limited or no road access, where only illicit traders go. The RPBR’s secluded “cultural zone” is experiencing forest clearing at an estimated rate of more than 100 hectares per year (50 times more than in 2005).  Sensie’s report directly correlates this with increased drug trafficking throughout the country.  Indeed, there is a positive and substantial correlation between the country’s recorded percentage of GDP from drug trafficking (based on the same study) and the amount of irregular forest loss.

Under current conditions, Honduras has limited ability to address the institutional, socioeconomic, and criminal factors that exacerbate deforestation.  Unemployment, corruption, weak law enforcement, and violence create an environment that facilitates the illegal triad attacking Honduran forests – the narcotics trade, illegal logging, and land grabs.  The country has shown little political will to use what few legal tools it has to keep illegal groups from bribing and, failing to buy them, intimidating the law enforcement and government officials who give them harvesting or transport permits.  High unemployment and poverty in rural Honduras also create a strong incentive for local residents to cooperate with criminal organizations to obtain income and protection for their families – and severely dissuading them from with what few investigations might be undertaken in their areas.

  •  The increasingly obvious link with the narcotics trade, however, offers a way to squeeze illicit logging and livestock operations. Earlier this year, two months after U.S. prosecutors indicted Honduran Congressman Fredy Najera Montoya for conspiring to import cocaine into the United States, Honduran courts finally – after years of allegations against Najera for “operational irregularities” – accused him of environmental crimes related to his illegal use of wood products and forging official documents.  Such actions, as well as a recent agreement to work with USAID to better enforce environmental laws, are good signs, but meaningful progress addressing deforestation must take into account the underlying causes: the country’s weak rule of law, lack of economic opportunity for most of its population, and the near-total lack of institutional presence in much of rural Honduras.

July 17, 2018

* Luis Noé-Bustamente is a CLALS research assistant.  He is on a team dedicated to a new two-year project by CLALS and InSight Crime investigating the clandestine wildlife trafficking and logging industries throughout the region.

Leave a comment
by clalsstaff on July 17, 2018  •  Permalink
Posted in Honduras
Tagged , ,

Posted by clalsstaff on July 17, 2018

https://aulablog.net/2018/07/17/honduras-narcotics-trade-accelerating-deforestation/

Honduras: MACCIH at Two Years

By Charles T. Call*

Photo of MACCIH and OAS representatives holding a banner with OAS logo

MACCIH and OAS representatives /Flickr / Creative Commons

Halfway through its four-year mandate, the Mission in Support of the Fight against Corruption and Impunity in Honduras (MACCIH) has scored some important successes but confronts growing sabotage from segments of Honduras’s political elite determined to undermine the Mission’s work.

  • After months of negotiation, President Juan Orlando Hernández – under intense political pressure because of his campaign’s role in a scandal involving $330 million stolen from the country’s Institute of Social Security – and OAS Secretary General Luis Almagro agreed to form MACCIH, and the Honduran Congress approved it in April 2016. The broad purpose was “to pursue a comprehensive approach to fighting corruption and impunity in Honduras by strengthening the institutional system and increasing civil society participation.”
  • Although inspired by the UN-backed International Commission against Impunity in Guatemala (CICIG), MACCIH was not given the same power as CICIG to “co-prosecute” cases with the Attorney General’s office. In the name of strengthening national institutions, only Honduran prosecutors could indict and prosecute cases.  The OAS’s weakness (compared to the UN) and the configuration of MACCIH – with four in-country coordinators operating under confusing allegiances and with smaller staffs and budgets than CICIG – were also problems.  The organization’s dispersed mandates also detracted from the central outcome desired by the population – corrupt top officials in jail.

Nevertheless, MACCIH got off to a strong, if slow, start.  Just six months after its launching, it contributed to a new “Clean Politics Law” that increased transparency of election financing and created a unit within the Supreme Electoral Tribunal to monitor and report on infractions.  MACCIH also worked with the Inspector General to discontinue the practice of “conciliation” in corruption cases, whereby charges could be reduced or dropped if officials returned the stolen goods.

  • The Mission also made headway on high-profile cases that it selected, including the convictions of two ex-Vice Ministers, a Judicial Council magistrate, and nine others. It gained indictments in its two highest-profile cases – against five congressional deputies and against former First Lady Rosa Elena de Lobo.  These cases, and this month’s “Pandora” case implicating several current former legislators and officials, sent a message that top elected officials were not immune from prosecution.  The government’s new Special Prosecutorial Unit against Impunity for Corruption (UFECIC), reporting directly to Attorney-General Óscar Chinchilla, proved an effective partner.

Especially since elections last November – whose process and outcome were widely questioned – the government and political elites have redoubled efforts to clip MACCIH’s wings in multiple underhanded ways.  The Congress has failed to act on important laws and, more blatantly, passed what was dubbed the “Impunity Pact,” which effectively blocked MACCIH’s jurisdiction over congressional misdeeds and postponed any prosecutorial action for misuse of funds until the High Court of Auditors finishes an investigation likely to take three years.

  • President Hernández is part of the whole-of-government campaign to undermine MACCIH. For three months, he sat on the nomination of Brazilian former prosecutor Luis Antonio Marrey Guimarães, nominated by the OAS to head MACCIH after Special Representative Jiménez Mayor resigned in February, before approving it this week.  The future of MACCIH was further clouded by a ruling in May by the Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court, on a case brought by members of Congress, finding that a 2017 agreement creating UFECIC was unconstitutional.

Given the judicial, legislative, and executive assaults on its powers, MACCIH confronts serious challenges as it commences its third year of operations. Special Representative and Spokesperson, OAS Secretary General Almagro appears reluctant to permit an autonomous head of mission.  Despite declarations of support, the United States and other funders are showing skepticism over MACCIH’s viability, complicating efforts to move forward and recruit for many key positions.

Most importantly, even if MACCIH survives legal challenges and its powers to investigate congressional corruption are reinstated, its success depends crucially on the Attorney-General selected to succeed Chinchilla, whose five-year term expires in September. Now that the governing party has flexed its muscles in the courts and Congress, the Public Ministry remains one of the very few potential checks on executive power – and central to the success of MACCIH and other anti-corruption efforts.  If the United States and other donors continue to believe that Honduras needs to reduce corruption and give democratic rule a fighting chance, they need to step up their diplomatic support for an independent Attorney-General and functional MACCIH.

 June 21, 2018

* Chuck Call teaches International Peace and Conflict Resolution at American University, where he directs a Center for Latin American & Latino Studies project analyzing MACCIH and anti-corruption efforts in Honduras. A report from that project, launched at a public event in Tegucigalpa on June 21, is available HERE.

Leave a comment
by clalsstaff on June 21, 2018  •  Permalink
Posted in Honduras
Tagged , ,

Posted by clalsstaff on June 21, 2018

https://aulablog.net/2018/06/21/honduras-maccih-at-two-years/

« Older Posts