On June 28, the President of Honduras, Manuel Zelaya, was seized by that country’s military on the orders of the Honduran Congress. Upon being escorted out of the country, he was replaced by the head of the Congress, Roberto Micheletti, who was named interim president until the scheduled election in November.
Zelaya’s removal from office was prompted by his pushing of a referendum which would’ve allowed him to serve a second term in office, something not allowed under Honduras’s constitution. Supporters of the coup argue they were only siding with the rule of law. But the international community, including the Organization of American States (OAS) and the Obama administration, have sided with Zelaya, ordering that he be restored to power.
Who’s right?
Roger Noriega, a former assistant secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs during the George W. Bush administration, argues that the Honduran government acted correctly in removing Zelaya, a “capricious blowhard” whose friends include Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez and Cuba’s Raul Castro.
Zelaya’s self-serving lawlessness was ignored completely by OAS leadership and, as far as one can tell, by every government in the region that now dares to pass judgment on Honduras’ constitutional order. The feckless regional diplomats who have failed to confront undemocratic caudillos in Venezuela, Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua and Honduras are complicit in their abuses. Today, they have neither the credibility nor moral authority to pass judgment on those desperate patriots who act to defend their freedom, in Honduras or anywhere else.
Noriega’s position shouldn’t come as a surprise. He is an ardent supporter of free market oil and energy investments in Latin America by American companies, a vision of a U.S.-backed “corporatocracy” that reads straight out of Confessions of an Economic Hit Man. Such a vision requires fairly weak but stable Central and South American governments who are friendly to the United States, exactly the opposite of those led by Chavez and Castro. By backing Zelaya’s attempt at extending his power beyond constitutional limits, U.S. corporate interests in Honduras could be greatly damaged.
Corporate interests aside, however, the reality is that the Honduran Congress and military acted within constitutional guidelines by removing Zelaya, an act also backed by that nation’s Supreme Court. Therefore, the call to return Zelaya to power makes absolutely no sense.
Imagine if this had happened in the United States. Imagine if George W. Bush had tried to push through a referendum that would’ve allowed him to serve unlimited presidential terms, something disallowed by the 22nd Amendment. Had he then been impeached and ultimately removed from office, would the international community still expect him to be returned to the Oval Office until his term expired? Of course not! So why is it demanding that of Zelaya?
President Obama called the removal of Zelaya a step backward from the “enormous progress of the last 20 years in establishing democratic traditions in Latin America.” Yet it was actually the democratically-elected Congress that was following the constitution, not Zelaya. If Obama really believed in upholding Latin America’s “democratic traditions”, then he would be siding with the Honduran Congress, not with the likes of Hugo Chavez.
As the Wall Street Journal points out, supporting Zelaya is “one more act of appeasement toward an ambitious and increasingly dangerous dictator.” At some point, that appeasement must end. It may be too late for Venezuela and Cuba, but it’s not too late for Honduras.
Update:
This editorial explains that while removing Zelaya wasn’t the government’s only choice, it was by far the best one:
The Honduran institutions had only three options. The first was do nothing and let things follow their course leading to an irreversible situation of an established regime administered in perpetuity by Chavez and Zelaya. The second was to try to get rid of the president for willingly, which would have allowed sufficient time Zelaya to request support for the Venezuelan military, making Honduras the scene of a bloody war. They opted for the third option, an unexpected and bloodless military coup to prevent Zelaya to consummate his plans to remain in power.
At least you can write about both sides. That seldom happens in the media of any kind. I think the Obama Admin needs to RESTATE their policy AND the news outlets OUTSIDE of FOX NEWS needs to spend more time on this subject. They are only discussing one side of this. You would think they would bring in one of their special reporters who knows something about everything.
But to NO AVAIL. They report it and don’t discuss.
Jeff, thanks for the comment.
Although I didn’t mention it in the blog post, the primary reason I’m personally interested in this issue is because our church does a lot of mission work in Honduras. So I’m speaking more from the view of the people in that country. But regardless, it is a much more important issue than the media seems to think it is. It seems like all they want to talk about is Michael Jackson. Pretty frustrating.
But yes, I do disagree with Obama’s stand on Honduras. I wish that the U.S. and the international community would defend the Honduran government, which was acting well within its constitutional guidelines. Instead, no one is willing to stand up to Hugo Chavez and his cronies (or to Iran or North Korea for that matter). I think that’s a big mistake.
Hi, I’m Honduran and just read your post. Thank you for pointing out many of the issues that are not being discussed by the international institutes and community.
I think that this sunday, the world got a taste of Zelaya’s “self-serving lawlessness” as he ignored the warnings and suggestions made at the OAS meeting to not return too Honduras so quickly as it would agitate the people.
We Hondurans are glad that the window for dialogue has been openned, and hope everything ends well and that Mr. Chavez stays in Venezuela because in Honduras HE is NOT WELCOME.