Honduras Coup

[Pirika]

http://www.reuters.com/article/newsOne/idUSTRE55R24E20090628

Last Sunday (June 28th) the presidente of Honduras Manuel Zelaya was overthrown by the army. The interim government is now restricting civil rigths (http://www.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUSTRE56100520090702).

This was very similar to the military coups in Latin America in the 60s when all latin countries were controlled by military dictatures until the 80s. Any chance that this will happen again in Honduras?

 

[Nate]

Once again, I find myself in the role of pointing out those pesky annoying thingermajigs...facts.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dy.../07/01/AR2009070103210.html?hpid=opinionsbox1

That is a far better commentary on what has happened than a half-paragraph from reuters. Why? Because it talks about the history behind the "coup" and what actually occured.

Last year, following the script originally laid out by Chávez in Venezuela and adopted by Evo Morales in Bolivia and Rafael Correa in Ecuador, Zelaya announced that he would hold a referendum to set up a constituent assembly that would change the constitution that barred him from reelection. In the next few months, every legal body in Honduras -- the electoral tribunal, the Supreme Court, the attorney general, the human rights ombudsman -- declared the referendum unconstitutional. According to the Honduran constitution (articles 5, 373 and 374), presidential term limits cannot be changed under any circumstance; only Congress can modify the constitution; and political institutions are not subject to referendums. Honduras's Congress, Zelaya's own Liberal Party and a majority of Hondurans (in various polls) expressed their horror at the prospect of having Zelaya perpetuate himself and bring Honduras into the Chávez fold. In defiance of court orders, Zelaya persisted. Surrounded by a friendly mob, he broke into the military installations where the ballots were kept and ordered them distributed. The courts declared that Zelaya had placed himself outside the law, and Congress began an impeachment procedure.

This is the context in which the military, in an ill-advised move that turned a perfectly legal mechanism for stopping Zelaya into a coup, expelled the president. The fact that the constitutional procedure was subsequently followed by having Congress appoint the head of the legislative body, Roberto Micheletti, as interim president, and that the elections scheduled for November have not been canceled, is not enough to dissipate the cloud of illegitimacy that hangs over the new government. This factor has disarmed Zelaya's critics in the international community in the face of a well-coordinated campaign led by Chávez to reinstate him and denounce the coup as an oligarchic assault on democracy.

So was it technically a coup? Yes, because the military acted before the impeachment process was concluded. Zelaya was, however, actively working to subvert the Honduran constitution, had defied the orders of the Honduran supreme court, and had broken into a military installation in order to allow himself the chance to become a permanent leader of Honduras, unburdened by term limits. In response, the Honduran military ousted him (at the directive of the supreme court) and placed the president of congress in his place, in accordance with the Honduran constitution.

So no, that is absolutely nothing like a military dictatorship.

 

[Polis4rule]

A coup, but a Supreme Court and Congress said no to something illegal (according to the constitution) and asked the military to come and remove the president coup. I really don't see why everyone is up and arms over this (though Luduan probably is).

 

[evan]

Everyone is up in arms because it is the military acting like they have the power to control the government. In Latin America that is a very dangerous notion considering their past and history. There is absolutely zero reason for the military to have kidnapped Zelaya and forced him out of the country when the Congress was working to remove him from office. It was dumb of the military and has delegitimised the government of Zelaya's successor Micheletti.

 

[Polis4rule]

Oh sorry, I meant I don't get why the world is up and arms over the fact that the president was removed in the first place. They're ignorant of the fact that he was going to be impeached anyway.

 

[evan]

The world is up in arms because of the way he was removed: military coup. If he were impeached everything would be fine, but when you remove your president from the country by gunpoint while he's in his pajamas then there's an issue.

 

[Nate]

Everyone is up in arms because it is the military acting like they have the power to control the government.

They were directed to remove him by the Honduran Supreme Court. When the Supreme Court has ruled that somebody must be removed from office, that somebody refuses to get out, and that somebody happens to have a whole bunch of heavily armed bodyguards, how exactly would you propose to remove him without the use of force?

I can understand you taking issue with the fact that the Supreme Court ruled that he must be removed immediately instead of ruling to wait for the impeachment process (I would grant that it was a poor decision), but the military was following their legitimately given orders and the rule of Honduran constitutional law. In no way is the military taking things into their own hands, which would be required for "the military [to act] like they have the power to control the government."

edit: after rereading this thread, it seems to me that your points would make a lot more sense if the military had not acted at the behest of the supreme court. Were you not aware that was the case?

 

[evan]

No, I was aware of that. I make no pretense of being a Honduran Constitutional scholar, but I strongly doubt that the Supreme Court is given the authority to order the military to kidnap the president. And if that is the case, well, their consitution is dumb and is just inviting controversy. Maybe they'll fix it in the future.

 

[Caelum]

Well, they "sort of" obeyed the courts order. The court order did give the military the permission to detain Zelaya, but it did not give the military permission to deport him as they did. Even the militaries chief lawyer admits that the manner it was carried out was illegal. Why would they deport him? Possibly to prevent him from challenging the legality of the detainment?

Also, it wasn't just Zelaya that was forcibly removed. Without any court authority the Foreign Minister, several congressman of Zelaya's party (demo unification iirc) have allegedly been detained, other key officials appointed by Zelaya have also been detained on baseless charges of corruption, and arguably most important the parties presidential candidate in the fall (Ham) is in a "secure location" for fear of his life.

I'll obviously admit that Zelaya was corrupt and violated Article 239 of the Honduran constitution and so the military had the right to detain him under order of the supreme court / elected body. However, I think there is more to this given the fact he wasn't detained and allowed to question his detainment - but was exiled; the fact other key officials in his party are being arrested and / or detained; and the fact that the presidential candidate is in hiding in fear of his life. This might have started out as a perfectly legal act, but I have a feeling given the evidence there is a compelling reason to believe that this turned into more of power grab pseudo-coup.

The Honduran government is currently restricting the media there too much for anything to be entirely certain and I think only time will tell based on the installed governments future behavior, how they deal with the future elections, and the slow dissemination of information out of the country due to the restricted media (some AP reporters have even been arrested and information is suppose to only be positive to the new government !!).

edit: PS, it's questionable whether the Congress had any technical grounds to impeach Zelaya the way it is currently framed so it's even more suspicious that this was given out by the courts (though legal-esque as I said above).

edit 2: In short, I think there is a lot more to this than a basic legal exchange of power.

 

[Pirika]

The problem is that now the interim government is taking civil rigths. A referendum to change the constituiton does not justif a coup. This is exactily the same thing that happenend in all latin american countries in the 60s, resulting in military dictatures for almost 30 years.

 

[Deck Knight]

Zelaya had reached the end of his second term and wanted to become a dictator for life like Chavez and Castro, constitutional term limits be damned. Zelaya also sought arms to ensure his continued power and thus the Supreme Court had to oust him through an order to the military. It would not be so legally "messy" if Zelaya hadn't decided he'd be the next tinpot "leader" in the region.

The military in this case was upholding the Honduran constitution, thus doing their job.

Of course, Captain Moron did not do the research. Thus the UN resolution in support of Zelaya, whose reinstatement would inherently lead to an unconstitutional outcome in a few months

 

[Caelum]

Zelaya had reached the end of his second term and wanted to become a dictator for life like Chavez and Castro, constitutional term limits be damned. Zelaya also sought arms to ensure his continued power and thus the Supreme Court had to oust him through an order to the military. It would not be so legally "messy" if Zelaya hadn't decided he'd be the next tinpot "leader" in the region.

The military in this case was upholding the Honduran constitution, thus doing their job.

Of course, Captain Moron did not do the research. Thus the UN resolution in support of Zelaya, whose reinstatement would inherently lead to an unconstitutional outcome in a few months

Your research is actually off, very off. I think Obama's words were too strong for right now given the limited information, but his conclusions aren't "moronic."

First off, this vote was a non-binding consultative poll designed to gauge whether they should even conduct a holding of the constitutional referendum. While his intention may have been to be "ruler for life" this poll would've hardily achieved that for him. The unconstitutionality of it derives from Article 239 which states that

Whoever violates this law or proposes its reform, as well as those that support such violation directly or indirectly, will immediately cease in their functions and will be unable to hold any public office for a period of 10 years.

That's was he was being held against, not that he was seeking to be some tyrannical dictator. Something even more amusing was the poll would be done in November concurrent with the presidential election and so the constitution as-is would be active and he would be unable to run for office again anyway (he'd had to wait till the next term to run again if the referendum did change the constitution), that's an interesting tactic for a dictatorship for life!

Now, let's get to the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court actually doesn't have the authority to impeach a president, only the ability to detain him (and not exile him as the military has, whose chief lawyer admits its illegal); that is the sole realm of the Congress. Furthermore, the Congress of Hondurus was struggling to figure out a clear, legal way to impeach him since it is a matter of debate whether the polling for the purpose of seeking a referendum actually explicitly violates Article 239. The Supreme Court can charge him with a crime and remove him from office (which they claim they did), but INTERPOL is saying they received no international warrant for his arrest so its questionable whether they really did charge him with anything.

It's also been reported that several of the Congressman of Zelaya's party, and key supporters of his, were disallowed from voting on Micheletti's appointment and Zelaya's deposal by military force.. And, as I mentioned above, other key party leaders are and appointees are being detained on baseless corruption charges. Also, the military itself violated the constitution when they exiled Zelaya because he was not allowed to question his "detainment".

Finally, they installed a curfew, shut down pro-Zelaya media, and are arresting reporters. The US embassy has also expressed violations of Human Rights on the part of Micheletti's new government.

No one is saying Zelaya was a great guy and was right for Honduras, but it's pretty obvious there is a lot more to this than meets the eye when you look at it so superficially. The lack of free information coming out of Honduras is even more disturbing. I'll say again, this probably started out legally justified but quickly turned into a power grab that is strikingly similar to a coup.

edit: Also, I have to wonder if this much negative information is getting out about this and the Honduran government is enforcing censorship via intimidation so strongly - what isn't getting out that we should be concerned about?