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CENTRAL AMERICA: Shades of Coups Past - And Yet to
Come?
By Raúl
Gutiérrez
SAN SALVADOR (IPS) - If the de facto
government of Roberto Micheletti remains in power in
Honduras, the Central American right may be
encouraged to stage further coups against the
fragile democracies that have emerged in the region
over the last two decades, analysts warn.
The forces of democracy and the international
community must continue to exert pressure to
reestablish the constitutional order and enable
ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya, whose term
ends in January, to return to office, experts from
different countries in the region told IPS.
Ernesto Rivas Gallont, former Salvadoran ambassador
in Washington from 1981 to 1989, says the Honduran
civic-military coup will have profound implications
for several Central American countries if
Micheletti's grip on power is consolidated.
"If those who perpetrated the coup prevail in
Honduras, there is no doubt that it will embolden
the Central American right," the former diplomat
told IPS.
"It's hard to admit, but (Fidel) Castro and (Hugo)
Chávez are right" to fear that if the coup-mongers
consolidate their power, "a series of coups d'état
could be unleashed against governments in the
region," Rivas Gallont wrote in his blog, referring
to statements by the former Cuban president and the
Venezuelan president in early July.
"It is only too obvious that the coup has
exacerbated differences between left and right, and
not just in Honduras," he said.
Zelaya was taken at gunpoint from his house in his
pajamas by about 200 troops in the early hours of
Jun. 28 and put on an air force plane to Costa Rica.
The coup d'état was engineered by the Honduran
military, the leadership of the two traditional
political parties, and big business.
The ousting of the president came after weeks of
political arm-wrestling over the Zelaya
administration's plans to hold a non-binding popular
vote on constitutional reform on that very day. But
analysts say Zelaya was overthrown because of some
of his social policies, and his alignment with more
radical leftwing governments in Latin America.
The "survey," as Zelaya called it, which could not
be legally held because plebiscites and referendums
are banned in an election year, would have asked
people whether they were in favour or against
creating a constituent assembly to amend the
country's constitution. Had the "Yes" vote won,
assembly delegates would have been elected in the
Nov. 29 presidential, parliamentary and local
elections.
Pro-coup sectors say Zelaya wanted constitutional
reform in order to seek reelection, prohibited by
the Honduran constitution, in order to stay in
power. The ousted president says that was never his
intention, nor was it mentioned in the survey
question.
Micheletti, who led the political movement for the
military overthrow of the democratic government as
former president of Congress, says he will not bow
to international pressure. Today he is the interim
president of a government that has not been
recognised by a single country and has been
universally condemned.
The United Nations, the Organisation of American
States (OAS), the European Union, the Central
American Integration System (SICA) and the
Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas (ALBA), among
others, have all condemned the coup in Honduras and
vigorously demanded Zelaya's reinstatement as the
constitutional president.
In contrast, and in spite of these strong
pronouncements, only "the Central American right has
justified the coup, using Chávez as a pretext," IPS
sources said.
For instance, they said, rightwing sectors in El
Salvador have recently been supplanted in government
after decades in power by the formerly-guerrilla
leftwing Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front (FMLN).
"They may be tempted to carry out actions similar to
what happened in Honduras, of the kind that have
marked our history," they warned.
The rightwing Nationalist Republican Alliance
(ARENA) party, which governed El Salvador from 1989
up to June this year, and is now in opposition,
deplored Zelaya's "exile" but did not condemn the
coup.
"It is also true that President Zelaya committed
serious constitutional violations that led other
state bodies" to remove him from office, says a paid
ad by ARENA published in the Salvadoran media in
early July.
The ad also urges Salvadoran President Mauricio
Funes to "refrain" from interfering in the Honduran
crisis, arguing that "it could affect relations
between the two countries."
The Funes administration issued an immediate
condemnation of the coup, and two days later at a
SICA meeting in Managua, El Salvador, Guatemala and
Nicaragua agreed to close their borders with
Honduras for 48 hours Jul. 1-2, as a way of exerting
pressure on the de facto Micheletti government.
SICA is made up of all the Central American
countries: Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador,
Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Panama. The
Dominican Republic is an associate member.
Funes also hosted Presidents Rafael Correa of
Ecuador, Cristina Fernández of Argentina, Fernando
Lugo of Paraguay and Zelaya, as well as U.N. General
Assembly president Miguel d'Escoto and OAS
Secretary-General Miguel Insulza, who waited in San
Salvador in solidarity with Zelaya during his failed
Jul. 4 attempt to return to Honduras.
Some members of the business community, political
leaders and columnists for conservative Salvadoran
media outlets have said Funes should learn from what
has happened in Honduras, and not attempt to
introduce constitutional reforms like Zelaya's.
Salvadoran analyst Leonel Gómez agreed with Rivas
Gallont that events in Honduras could lead to more
coups against democracies in the region.
"The danger here is that it might motivate other
forces to perpetrate other coups d'état like the one
in Honduras," said Gómez, who has participated in
investigations of corruption and the supply of funds
to dictatorships in the region with U.S. Democratic
lawmakers Patrick Leahy and the late Joe Moakley.
The expert said that some Guatemalan military
officers "would be delighted to receive orders to do
the same thing" as their Honduran colleagues.
Centre-left Guatemalan President Álvaro Colom
publicly denied that a military coup was being
plotted in his country, after Chávez warned of the
danger of an overthrow attempt. But Nobel Peace
Prize laureate Rigoberta Menchú said vested economic
interests in Guatemala could be planning to
undermine the rule of law.
Recalling that in the past U.S. governments have
"written dark chapters in the history of Central
America" through their support for military
dictatorships and coups d'état, Gómez urged the
administration of U.S. President Barack Obama to
"act with greater firmness and in accordance with
its principles."
The day after Zelaya was deposed, Obama said "the
coup was not legal" and that Zelaya "remains the
democratically elected president" of Honduras.
With the exception of Costa Rica, the countries of
Central America were governed by military regimes
during most of the 20th century. In most cases these
regimes were imposed by powerful economic interests
in collusion with conservative politicians and with
assistance or direct intervention by the United
States.
In the 1980s and 1990s civil wars broke out between
leftwing guerrillas and the armed forces.
According to historians, Costa Rica escaped the
general trend largely because of the abolition of
the army, announced by then president José Figueres
(1948-1949, 1953-1958, 1970-1974) on Dec. 1, 1948.
The measure came into force in 1949, in spite of an
attempted military coup to prevent it.
Meanwhile in Honduras pro-Zelaya protesters are
blocking highways, the curfew has been reimposed,
and talks in Costa Rica between Micheletti's and
Zelaya's envoys, mediated by Costa Rican President
Oscar Arias, are in a deadlock.
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