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Zelaya Girrrl Powerrr!!!
Submitted by guil on Sun, 2009/08/02 - 10:06.
Some NL members did say that Zelaya's political career is over, whether he returns as president, ceremonial ribbon cutter or just citizen. But I'm not so sure it will be the end of the Zelaya dynasty in Honduras. It is interesting to take a closer look at his family.
- First there is his mother Hortensia Esmeralda Rosales Sarmiento. She has been described as his best campaigner. Mel could not have become president without her. His 80-year-old mother is still taking to the streets and offering peaceful resistance to his ousting.
- Then there is his wife Xiomara Castro Sarmiento. She obtained a degree in Accounting and Business Administration. She is politically active in the PLC and made a strong campaign for her husband in 2004 and is now campaigning for his return.
- Zoe, Mel's younger daughter is not politically active. She is married to Juan Carlos Melara Hernandez. They have one daughter Irene, which was seen at he demonstrations. Zoe is pregnant now and will give birth in September.
- Héctor Manuel, married to Marcela Kafati Santos. They have one son called Héctor Manuel. El primogenito de Mel is politically active in the PLC, said to be linked to cocaine trafficking and Mexican druglord Joaquín "El Chapo" Guzmán. He acted as Family spokesman the first days after the coup. The military threatened to arrest him. Not much heard of him since then.
- José Manuel (Melito), age 20 and fan of Barack Obama! Not politically active but has been seen in public at the demonstrations. Likes Fútbol and has an awful lot of pretty girlfriends according to his Facebook profile.
- Then there is La pièce de Résistence: Xiomara Hortenzia (24), nickname "La Pichu". This nickname was given to her by her family when she was still a little girl. I don't know what the real story is about her nickname (sure like to know...), but she really is something. La Pichu already helped her father’s campaign in 2006 by giving talks to the youth. She is directora of Honduras Joven, an organization founded by her father and funded by UN, that is providing volunteer opportunities to Hondurans who are looking to give back to their community, teaches young Hondurans to be business men and women and helping young Honduran musicians. She especially makes the call to the youth of Honduras as 60% of the population is below the age of 30. She is even more present at the demonstrations then her mother. She gave an interview to Telesur and many foreign radio stations and newspapers. She is speeching to crowds like her father. Just watch this girl!
Now why are these Zelaya girrrls so desperate to want Zelaya back in the country? Most of us agree on NL that Mel is not going to be a serious president anymore in Honduras and only just for a couple of months. The PLC doesn't want him anymore either. He just could settle for an early retirement in CR with his family and leave things as they are. So why do his family want him to come back and what is the plan? He recently confessed in an interview with Der Spiegel that there is a BIG plan for social reforms. Der Spiegel 8/1/2009 Zelaya about his U-turn: It was a long process of developing awareness. The neoliberal economic model has failed, and we need social policies for the disadvantaged in our society. That's why I aim for a new model of development, and part of my administration supported me in that endeavor. But the neoliberals simply want to expand their wealth, and they have no interest in the country's development. A few large companies dominate the Honduran economy. This plays into the hands of multinational corporations, which control the market, thereby creating even more poverty. I believe in entrepreneurship and economic liberalism. But things have to become more equitable, which is why we must amend the laws....Zelaya about the November elections: They can take place tomorrow, as far as I'm concerned, but I will not participate. I am working on a BIG plan for social reforms. We are merely changing the strategy, but the struggle continues.
Who is going to deploy this BIG social reform plan? Not Mel, that's for sure! My guess is that his wife, daughter and mother will found a new Liberal Socialist party in Honduras and run for the elections in November as soon as Mel returns as ceremonial ribbon cutter. As I explained elsewhere on NL, there might be a great deal of floating voters that's willing to vote on this new Liberal Socialist party. Mel will retire as a president and will only be giving lectures in all OAS countries. This is not a new scenario. It recently happened in another OAS country north of Honduras. Its president survived an impeachment procedure and his wife almost made it for president. You like the idea ???
Xiomara Castro de Zelaya
Write in candidate
Several prominent people (including a former Supreme Court Judge) and lots of not-so-prominent ones have vowed to serve on her campaign (and, of course, in her cabinet) if she ran or announced a third party write-in ticket come November. The most likely explanation for Mel's referendum was that he could later do as Arias did and one day return to the Presidency after being out, and in between Patricia Rhodes and/or his wife would hold some important role in the office. Their 2 biggest problems are that they cannot likely get elected and they cannot push anything through the current congress - especially not reforms they have still failed to identify.
Please explain
Please explain: "Their 2 biggest problems are that they cannot likely get elected and they cannot push anything through the current congress."
Isn't the congress elected too in November?
Yes, November
Yes, November for them too. The Congress heavily mirrors the two party system - as does much of the population. Honduras used to use an appointment system that was said to slant the Congressional makeup unfairly toward not just the dominant 2 parties, but primarily to the party of the President. This changed maybe 10-15 years ago. But, it didn't bring about the expected change critics pointed to, namely the likely result of a much larger Congressional make-up from those outside the 2 main parties (hardly any measurable change in the last 10 years, really). Alternative parties are just tiny, with a common breakdown for Congress, seats, voting stat, etc., being about 42-48% National, 42-48% Liberal, and whatever is left being split 2, or 3, or even 4 ways. The real problem for those outside the 2-party system is that they have never united and often it seems their divisions amongst themselves are greater than their divisions with the Liberals. Liberals and National agree on some things, the big one being that they do not support Zelaya.
Zelaya's confession
Zelaya had, under Chavez funding, a weekly newspaper, monthly magazine, official and unofficial websites, and a radio program - not to mention legally required television coverage in the country. Had he really wanted to change a country or build support for change, surely these information avenues must have crossed his mind - and he had near-complete control of all these things and never touched on a what changes he was talking about or what he was going to do, specifically. Never. The outgoing President's "big plan" (if it exists in any coherent form) resurfaces here in an interview with Der Speigel. Since he is so vague the interview is rather pointless. Yet another journalist who cannot muster a single good question when sitting at the table with a deposed President. But, even if Zelaya wasn't so cryptic, are we to assume he is about to release his plan for the country and he is using that ever-popular C.A. source, the German weekly Der Spiegel, to build a "buzz" in San Pedro or Tegucigalpa? Per the new Honduras and the Honduran elite, Zelaya hasn't named a name, presented a fact, displayed any evidence, nor proposed, well, a real proposal at anytime in the last 4 years. To quote my Honduran taxi driver (who voted for Zelaya): "I expect more facts from the guy who puts the used tires on my car. Zelaya is pathetic in an occupation where you just always have to assume patheticness anyway". Zelaya's criticism is some vague, anti-neo-liberal something, and that is about all you can say about it. When asked about it, he had only answers more vague than those seen via Goodman's interview, just as when asked what rights the elite would lose under his alleged proposed Constitutional reforms following the referendum, he always refused to answer. And, when given the opportunity by international reporters who previously couldn't care less what he thought, to say anything he wanted to say, and go to any length imaginable in doing so, he apparently hasn't anything specific to say at all. After 4 years in office he is just now working on "big plans" - and even now they are either too good or too secret to actually be revealed.
Plan beyond
I think we all agree that Zelaya is often telling vague stories in a clever way. He is smart enough though to make the OAS, UN, Europe and about every foreign journalist make believe his stories. You got to give him that!
The deploying of many strange and illegal actions during his presidential term didn't make much sense either. We agree on that too.
If he is working on a big social reform plan, he could only be working on it for less then two years and not four as you are saying. He made his socialist U-turn less then 2 years ago. He brought in ALBA only 1 year ago and it did cross my mind that the raise of the minimum wages he introduced might have backfired, because the oligarchy and the PLC were sabotaging it. Other socialist plans might have been sabotaged too and maybe that is why he introduced the cellular phone tapping and his propaganda press.
What I am saying is that the guy is a bit nuts, but it seems he thinks he has a socialist mission for Honduras. And so is his family. It might be his own idea or Chavez', but if he wouldn't thought he was on a mission, he wouldn't make all those efforts right now to reenter the country for four months of ceremonial ribbon cutting. There must be a plan for beyond that period.
Years
But Zelaya's problems with most Honduran leaders, including his countless problems with his own Liberal party, stem from his earliest days of the Presidency (Day 2, many maintain), and were not born with the more obvious ALBA / minimum wage battles (his successes can be measures at 2 years, not his failures). It is one thing to wonder whether or not a 50+ year old well-off President had a political revelation per the poor (of course it is possible), but quite another when that man saw firsthand what Honduras had to offer the poor per post-Hurricane-Mitch (he handled massive monies and onsite work in response to that disaster) - less international aid, and countless other matters. It isn't clear what happened in 2007 that might have topped that. There is no known event tied to his transformation, not that there necessarily needs to be though. But, it is not just Mel who had some quasi-religious awakening, but virtually every single one of his relatives, too. Is it believable that so many people, simultaneously, all do a political 180 (technically, perhaps more like a 110 or something but you get the idea)? Might not be the first time in C.A. history it happened, but think of what must be assumed for someone to believe that Mel and company basically just woke up one day about 2 years ago, and all were disgusted by what they knew and saw, and decided to proceed as they did, as the new Socialists of Honduras - all without an announced plan. It is a pretty big assumption. It might be easier to swallow if Mel were extremely intelligent, charismatic, a great orator, full of ideas, etc. - but he isn't. It is hard to take most all of the Zelaya family seriously, at face value.
Bingo!
I believe this is the answer to the question I was asking in my blog post. As much as everyone seems to want to blame this on Chávez, the U.S. action/non-action, ... this really does seem like a good internal reason.
The good news is that it will give the "anti-Chávez crowd" an ongoing way to blame everything on Chávez anyway as "helping people" is clearly all the fault of Chávez.
Threat
But, if Zelaya in fact had no intention of extending his Presidency (as he claims), and he cannot get anything passed the current Congress and hence cannot change Constitutional matters (a given right now), and he hasn't a Mel-friendly candidate in the upcoming election (a fact), how would this vague "big plan" concept explain why it wasn't in everyone's interest to sit back, do nothing, and wait him out? Even if the big plan were widely known, sweeping, and someone picked up the tab for it, it still doesn't explain who would ever implement it, given the pre-coup or post-coup political makeup of the country. It could be argued that per the short-term future of Honduras Zelaya is a bigger threat post-coup (attention, platform, sympathy, maybe even funding) than he ever was pre-coup.
helping people??
Like Nicaragua where must of the aid from venezuela is going to danielistas pockets ???
I now you enjoy when listen good news, that are like music for your ears, but for a lot of nicaraguans 62% only is a noise compass. And for "anti-Chávez crowd" i think we must extend it to a bigger list, like Chavez...he hate a lot of people , and love a fews like iranians, cubans, russians , chinese and i don't forget all the leftist network.