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Nov 282009

3 reasons not to recognize the Honduran elections

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Honduras will hold a presidential election tomorrow, five months after a coup ejected President Manuel Zelaya and a military-backed interim government took over in Tegucigalpa. Back in September, the Obama administration’s State Department declared that the U.S. government could not recognize the elections’ result under those circumstances.

A presidential election is currently scheduled for November. That election must be undertaken in a free, fair and transparent manner. It must also be free of taint and open to all Hondurans to exercise their democratic franchise. At this moment, we would not be able to support the outcome of the scheduled elections. A positive conclusion of the Arias process would provide a sound basis for legitimate elections to proceed.

Since then, Zelaya sneaked back into the country, an accord to establish a unity government was signed but then ignored, and little else changed. But 3 weeks ago, the Obama administration’s position took an abrupt about-face: the U.S. government now intends to recognize the result of tomorrow’s vote.

Today’s Washington Post editorial page applauds this decision.

Elections have often been used to restore constitutional order in unstable countries; they brought a peaceful end to Augusto Pinochet’s right-wing dictatorship in Chile and to the leftist Sandinista regime in Nicaragua. In the case of Honduras, the election solution is particularly appropriate, since one had been scheduled before Mr. Zelaya was arrested and illegally deported from the country in June.

The temptation to “shake the Etch-a-Sketch” and just start over with post-election Honduras is understandable. But there are very strong reasons why the United States must not rush to confer recognition on the government that emerges from tomorrow’s vote, or to restore full aid and drop sanctions.

1. The people who carried out the June 28 coup will have gotten exactly what they wanted. The message will be that “crime does pay.” This is a terrible message for Latin America – and especially Central America – where democracy is colliding with economies and political systems that have traditionally concentrated wealth and power, including military power, in very few hands. While Manuel Zelaya was hardly a dynamic social movement leader, Honduras’s tiny elite viewed him as a threat and removed him, using the military, through extra-legal means. Elites throughout the region who are unhappy with elected leaders (El Salvador, Guatemala, and Paraguay come to mind, but there are several others) will view the U.S. government recognition of tomorrow’s elections as a capitulation. They will know that if they pull off a coup of their own, the United States’ opposition will be brittle and quickly reversed upon the slightest pretext.

2. The conditions for a fair vote were not in place. Determining the legitimacy of elections requires more than just observing what happens on election day. In the months before the voting, were some parties or candidates unable to assemble, organize and campaign peacefully? Did they have difficulty gaining fair access to the media? Were supporters of some candidates or political tendencies subject to official repression?

Here are links to several eyewitness reports indicating that the answer to these questions is “yes.” Honduras’s 2009 election campaign took place in a climate of fear in which media outlets were shuttered, candidates were put at unfair disadvantages, political activists were intimidated, and examples of military repression were frequent. These reports indicate that the Honduran elections do not meet the standards of Article 3 and 4 of the 2001 OAS Democratic Charter.

3. Recognizing the elections will put the United States at odds with most of the hemisphere. For the reasons above, the list of other countries planning to recognize the Honduran election result is small: it includes Costa Rica, Panama, perhaps Colombia, and few, if any, others. The Organization of American States will not be recognizing the result. If the Obama administration bucks the regional consensus, it will be viewed throughout the hemisphere as a return to the calculating unilateralism that so damaged perceptions of the United States during the Bush administration.

Seven months ago, at the Summit of the Americas in Trinidad and Tobago, President Obama built much goodwill with promises of greater collaboration and consultation, especially with larger states like Brazil and Mexico. That goodwill – already drained by the administration’s handling of its military agreement with Colombia – will all but disappear if the United States goes it alone on Honduras.

Recognizing the Honduran elections is shortsighted and counterproductive – in sum, a terrible idea. But indefinite non-recognition of Honduras is not an attractive option, either. What should the United States do, then? George Vickers of the Open Society Institute lays out some guidelines in a November 25 post to Foreign Policy’s website.

[D]on’t bless these elections and walk away. Instead, Washington should maintain its suspension of government-to-government assistance and not recognize the newly elected regime until there is a full restoration of civil liberties and steps are taken to prosecute human rights abuses. Next, the Obama team should work with the Organization of American States and other democracies — the vast majority of which is reluctant to endorse these elections — to find a way to bring Honduras back into the international community. For starters, if the new government is to recover any semblance of legitimacy, it will need to ensure that adequate conditions exist for a broad and pluralistic debate and dialogue, including with respect to any constitutional issues. Moreover, such a dialogue should be seen as responding to the legitimate rights and concerns of Honduran citizens, rather than being branded as treason, as is customary for the coup government today.

Whether through a rewrite of their constitution or some other process, Hondurans – of all political stripes – need to work this out, with help from the international community. If the people running Honduras instead decide to crack down further and exclude other voices, the United States cannot reward them with recognition and aid.

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3 Responses to “3 reasons not to recognize the Honduran elections”

  1. Aaron Ortiz Says:
    November 29th, 2009 at 3:23 am

    I want to congratulate you for your site, even if I do not agree with your stance on the Honduran election. I’d like to respond to your reasons for rejecting it.

    1. The people who carried out the June 28 coup will have gotten exactly what they wanted.

    But is wanting elections a bad thing? Does this imply that Zelaya did not want elections before he was removed?

    Your article says “Honduras’s tiny elite viewed him as a threat and removed him, using the military, through extra-legal means”. But the Catholic Church, the Commisioner for Human Rights, the Congress, The Supreme Court all agreed that he should be removed.

    But even if they didn’t, Zelaya did break article 239 of the Constitution, making his removal legal. Of course the military also broke the Constitution by exiling him.

    2. The conditions for a fair vote were not in place

    Your article says “In the months before the voting, were some parties or candidates unable to assemble, organize and campaign peacefully? Did they have difficulty gaining fair access to the media? Were supporters of some candidates or political tendencies subject to official repression?”

    The interesting thing about this is that the candidates were an integral part of the San Jose and the Guaymuras Accords, and were invited to Costa Rica for the talks.

    The people who were arrested were not supporters of a presidential candidate. They were supporters of the Constitutional Assembly, and the boycott of the election.

    Even so, Cesar Ham is on the ballot tomorrow, and he is proposing the Constitutional Assembly with no opposition. Only those supporting the boycott are being “harassed”. But promoting a boycott of elections is ilegal, according to article 42 of our constitution.

    3. Recognizing the elections will put the United States at odds with most of the hemisphere

    Much of the hemisphere has undergone the “pink tide” of which Obama is a part. Yes, relations will strain a bit, especially with ALBA nations. Obama and Clinton have managed to disappoint both sides, left and right, and have taken a very centrist approach. I admire them for that unpopular stance. I think it is the correct one, neither right nor left.

  2. Tambopaxi Says:
    November 30th, 2009 at 9:13 pm

    I agree with Aaron Ortiz, point by point, albeit for slightly different reasons; this is not to say that his questions and points are not valid, though, for they are.

    1. Zelaya own actions were his undoing; if he hadn’t violated the Constitution in his afan for power, he wouldn’t have been hustled out of the country on civilian orders – contrary to conventional wisdom, this was not, repeat, not, a military coup. The interim government’s actions were not those of a tiny elite, they were the actions of the rest of a democratic government acting to save it from the actions of one, rogue guy, and they were supported by hundreds of thousands of Hondurans who demonstrated their peaceful support for Zelaya’s departure in the streets.

    2. I just found your posting today, otherwise I would have responded to your second point in the future subjunctive. As it is, the Honduran people have already refuted this point. The elections went off quietly and effectively. I’m sure that Zelaya’s backers would have liked to do something spectacular and violent, but they didn’t. The fall back position on this for people who can’t abide what’s happened in Honduras (including yourself, Adam) is that the turn out may (you hope) not be as high as those of prior years. Perhaps, perhaps not, it’s not clear at the moment. What is clear is that Honduras and Hondurans don’t care one whit what outsiders think.

    On the fear, violence, repression thing (I qualify it as such because it’s become a cw mantra as well): If in fact, there is substances to the allegations you cite, then, as Valenzuela’s pointed out, it will be the role of the Verification Commission to confirm those allegations and take appropriate action.

    3. The U.S. at odds with the rest of the hemisphere… Umm.. It’s not, and as time goes by, most of the countries in the region will recognize the new government, with the exception of the ALBA countries, which means most countries will be in line with the U.S. Oh, and btw, eventually, U.S. aid flows will resume as well, is my guess…

    Vickers’ article is another simplistic attempt to portray Honduras as being in the thrall a small, elite oligarchy that treats anyone who disagrees with them as a traitor. That’s not true. Contrary to how some people would like to paint the country, there are lots of Hondurans who are quite aware of the country’s flaws, and they’d like to do something about. They just don’t think that you have to violate the Constitution to do something about it, as Zelaya tried to do and failed.

  3. ¿Por qué se deben reconocer las elecciones en Honduras? | Alejandro Tarre Says:
    December 4th, 2009 at 12:47 am

    [...] 3 reasons not to recognize the Honduran elections, Adam Isacson. [...]

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