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Memo to President Obama: READ the Honduran Constitution
By Saulo G. Londono | 07/02/09 | 04:00 PM EDT | 27 Comments
Earlier this week I wrote about the root of the crisis in Honduras. Ever since then I've struggled to watch President Obama make some of the most offensive, ignorant statements I've heard in a long time. As a South American immigrant, I'm furious. Latin America has suffered enough from ill-advised American foreign policy meddling in their internal affairs. Although I'm not really surprised by the politics behind President Obama's statements, I am surprised by the quickness in which he made them and by the conviction behind them. The average viewer would conclude from Obama's tone of certitude that he knows, for a fact, that what happened was illegal and that this "coup" is nothing less than a direct attack on democracy.
The facts are to the contrary, and I would urge President Obama to read, as I have, the Honduran Constitution. I couldn't find a version in English but I did read the whole thing. Here's a list of provisions in the Honduran Constitution (emphasis added) that not only grants the Legislature/Supreme Court/Military the power to do what they did, but actually makes it illegal for them not to act as they have.
Title II, Chapter 3: (citizens)
Article 42: The legal rights of any citizen is lost:
5) If the citizen incites, promotes, or supports the continuance or the re-election of the President of the Republic;
Title II, Chapter 4: (executive power)
Article 238: In order to become the President of the Republic or designated to the Presidency, one must:
3) Be in possesion of a citizen's legal rights;
Article 239: A citizen who has previously held executive power can not be President or designated to the Presidency. Those that break this provision or propose reform of this provision, as well as those that help directly or indirectly, will immediately cease to hold and exercise the power of his/her post, and will be banned from holding any future public office for a period of ten years.
Article 244: If need be, the lawful duty of the President of the Republic, or of its substitute, will be presented to the President of the National Congress if in session, and if not to the President of the Supreme Court.
Article 272: The Armed Force of Honduras is a permanent National Institution, essentially professional, a-political, obedient, and undeliberate. It is constituted to defend the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the Republic, to maintain the peace, public order, protect the Constitution, the principles of free suffrage, and the changeability of the President of the Republic.
Article 278: The orders that tie the powers of the President of the Republic to the Armed Forces, through its Chief, shall be followed and exercised.
Title VII, Chapter 1: (constitutional reform)
Article 373: Constitutional reform can only be declared by the National Congress, in regular sessions, with a 2/3s vote of its members. The decree to be voted on will specify the article or articles to be reformed, and it must be concurred by the subsequent session of Congress by a 2/3s vote before it takes effect.
Article 374: It can not be reformed, under any circumstances, the previous article, this article, the Constitutional articles related to the form of government, the national territory, Presidential term-limits, the prohibition of a President to be re-elected, and the requirements and prohibitions on who can and can not be President.
So there you have it. Not very ambiguous now is it? By using the miltary to unseat Zelaya, and by seating the President of Congress as the next President, the Legislature/Supreme Court/Military acted exactly as their Constitution instructs. I could sort of understand the confusion or the ignorance....if these provisions were somehow hidden in the Honduran Constitution so that only an expert could find it; but by no means do I consider myself a Constitutional expert. I can read Spanish and I can Google "Honduran Constitution". I'm sure Obama's handlers and foreign policy advisors have access to the same information that I do...so whether you agree with him or not, you should know that his outrage is absolutely legitimate. He is not faking it.
In the middle of all this propaganda calling what happened in Honduras, a "coup", let's all take a minute and analyze just exactly what a "coup" means and whether our President should be in the business of telling other democratic countries whether or not they should follow their Constitution.
When foreigners speak of American ignorance, I think this is what they have in mind. Ivy League scholar? *sighs*
userfiles/CONSTITUCIÓN DE LA REPÚBLICA DE HONDURAS(1).doc
TAGS: Honduras, coup, crisis, Zelaya, Obama
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27 Comments | Related Topics »National
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Comments
Awesome Saulo. Taking the side of Castro and Chavez while opposing the will of the Hondouran and Iranian people. What has out boy president gotten us into this time.
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|Thank you Saulo.
I was looking for the Honduran Constitution to see what it said for myself. Of course, I could not find it in english.
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|Contrary to claims that he studied Constitutional law, the number of times he's violated the US Constitution since taking office makes me think otherwise. I doubt he's even read the US Constitution. We can forget about him reading the Honduras Constitution...unless, of course, it starts scrolling across the screen of his teleprompter.
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|Seeing as you read the entire Honduran constitution, I'm surprised you didn't include Article 4 in your post (although, seeing as it states that the President is not subordinate to Congress or the Supreme Court, which would make any law passed by Congress to prevent the President from availing himself of artice 5 of the Honduran Civil Participation Act unconstitutional and therefor null and void, perhaps that is not so surprising), or Article 2, which specifically calls the usurping of power (which would obviously include staging a coup) an act of treason.
And holding a referendum to see if people would be in favour of seeing the constitution amended does not qualify as an attempt to actually change the constitution.
Also note the the opinion of the Supreme Court (which the International Comission of Jurists terms highly politicised) on the constitutionality of an action is meaningless as the Congress removed that power from them, unless you take the postion that, as stated in the constitution, it is not subordinate to Congress either, in which case the members of Congress who passed that law would also have been in violation of the Constitution, and therefor should have been removed from office and prevented from running again.
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|*read comment below*
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|1. Article 374 of the Constitution says that the Constitution cannot be amended ever to alter the ban on term limits.
Query whether or not any ban on amending a Constitution, anybody's Constitution is not inimical to the notion of free people freely governing themselves.
2. Article 239 makes it illegal for any government official to advocate the elimination of term limits.
Query whether asking for a plebiscite constitutes advocating the elimination of term limits. I think not. All Zelaya was doing was to ask for a plebiscite to take the pulse of the electorate on the subject of term limits.
3. Article 42 causes any citizen who advocates the elimination of term limits to lose their citizenship.
Query whether voting in favor of amending the Constitution to eliminate term limits should result in the loss of citizenship.
Query further how you are going to prove who voted for the elimination of term limits if the election is truly done by way of secret ballot.
I think that the Right Wing Nut Jobs who want to restore Honduras to a oligarchical cleptocracy don't have all of their ducks quite lined up.
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|I think you have put your finger on it.
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|Query: is Peter saying the Honduran Constitution does not say what it plainly says? (which would be consistent with an American liberal apporach to the U.S. Constitution).
Query: is Peter presenting his opinion as conclusive fact, unsupported by fact or evidence?
Query: does Peter know how to spell the big words with which he is trying to impress us? It's kleptocracy, not "cleptocracy."
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|hi,
i have been following this with interest. it seems zelaya conceived of an end run around the constitution by having the wording of the referendum not speak of amending the constitution but of having a national assembly for REWRITING the constitution. i cant find an english version of the constitution to determine the legality of this. it seems he may have not violated the constitution in this respect. if so, what part?
also, it has been claimed that he did not set up the referendum legally and that this was the reason for the supreme court to order his removal. if this is the case, can you post the law he violated in english?
thanks so much. this has been a great educational experience.
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|Connie,
Article 239 of the Honduran Constitution states that anyone who directly or INDIRECTLY advocates the change of the term limit of the president shall immediately cease to have any authority to function as a public servant and is banned from office for 10 years. Since Mel was openly running for another term, this was a violation of article 239,
The Supreme Court ruled that the referendum was illegal and therefore the military, which is constitutionally obligated to oversee elections/referendums, could not legally hold the referendum.
Mel fired the military chief of staff. The Supreme Court ruled that the firing was illegal and ordered the military chief reinstated. Mel refused.
The constitution states that a the president must submit a budget to the legislature by Sept. 15, 2008, but Mel refused to submit one.
There is a plethora of reasons obligating the military remove him. Also, since 2003 there has been no constitutional method of removing a president, such as impeachment and conviction in this country.
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|Article 239 of the Honduran Constitution states that anyone who directly orINDIRECTLY advocates the change of the term limit of the president shall immediately cease to have any authority to function as a public servant and is banned from office for 10 years. Since Mel was openly running for another term, this was a violation of article 23.
i understand that. however that does not preclude for the RE-WRITING of the constitution through a national assembly which the wording of the referendum clearly demonstrates. i am aware, through my research on the subject that the honduran has legally been re-written 15 times since 1825. so my question, again, does not pertain to article 239 which clearly does not apply in this case, but rather is there any specific prohibition against re-writing the constitution again?
here is the wording of the referendum as translated....
""Do you agree that in the general election of November, 2009, a fourth ballot box be installed, in order to decide upon the convocation of a National Constitutional Assembly to approve a new political Constitution?"
no mention of amending. no mention of term limits.
logic would dictate that if the congress or the court could have proved that zelaya had violated article 239 they would have ousted him in march when he first proposed the ballot initiative. it also would seem quite illogical for a politician to blatantly risk ouster by violating his own constitution.
no, what we have here was a shrewd political move that was airtight yet would not have benefited him for at least 4 years on the assumption that a) the constitution could be re-written b) language could have been adopted to increase presidential terms c) that he could have been re-elected at all with his present 30% approval rating.
jump forward.....the courts had realized that he had, indeed, out maneuvered the constitution and came up with an equally airtight yet completely dishonerable way to stop him(disahonerable by most standards of democratic thought in a republic)
the congress was forced to pass a law banning polls or plebicites 180 days before a national election. they did this 5 days before the poll and less than the same 180 period thereby retroactively making zelaya either an immediate criminal or at the least, a criminal if he went ahead with the poll.
so, yes he broke the law when he went ahead with the poll.
this was a political game of chess which he lost. unfortunately, the people lost by having their voice heard and the present government has tarnished themselves in the arena of world opinion.
the us media has not told this story the way it has taken place. because of this i suspect that our present administration had a hand in this despite their obvious lukewarm gestures of indignation proffered.
i am not concerned with the liberal or conservative aspect of this story. just a truthful representation of what happened by an increasingly corporate/liberal/controlled press.
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|Connie, please refert to Article 373:
Article 373: Constitutional reform can only be declared by the National Congress, in regular sessions, with a 2/3s vote of its members. The decree to be voted on will specify the article or articles to be reformed, and it must be concurred by the subsequent session of Congress by a 2/3s vote before it takes effect.
It clearly states that any "reform" of the constitution, whether through amendments or through a re-writing of the document, can only be declared by the National Congress. Zelaya did not go through Congress, in fact he worked around Congress to try and put that illegal referendum on the ballot. As far as your point as to why Congress and the Court didn't hold him in contempt back in March, they couldn't; because Zelaya never made the decree public. Do just a little more research and you'll find that the Courts went after Zelaya the same day as he finally made the decree public. One can't legally question a decree that has not been made public.
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|luis,
finding anything remotely accurate in the english language press is difficult. i appreciate your explanation. could you provide some links to the court proceeding you are speaking about concerning the decree.
until i see othertwise, i'm afraid it still does not appear any different than the situation i stated above.
i see no wording in article 373 that either precludes any public official from taking a poll or referendum to find out if the public would support a national constitutional assembly. it is eqally ambiguous as to whether constitutional reform(re article 373) implies a national assembly or amending the present constitution(as we know, amending in some cases is unconstitutional). big difference.
It clearly states that any "reform" of the constitution, whether through amendments or through a re-writing of the document, can only be declared by the National Congress
untrue. n there is no mention of re-writing the constitution. only the term reform. technically reforming is taking something and making it take a new form whereas a re-writing could be interpreted as a whole new creature. i can only guess what has been lost in translation.
s far as your point as to why Congress and the Court didn't hold him in contempt back in March, they couldn't; because Zelaya never made the decree public. Do just a little more research and you'll find that the Courts went after Zelaya the same day as he finally made the decree public.
if the court had been successful in its attempts to go after him for the public decree, then,logically, there would have been no need to pass the law that finally made his actions illegal(possibly retroactively).
going back, it seems by the wording that he found a back door around both the constitution and the congress. they found a back door to stop him. what is incorrect about that statement?
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|"going back, it seems by the wording that he found a back door around both the constitution and the congress. they found a back door to stop him. what is incorrect about that statement?"
I think that's an incorrect statement because they didn't have to find a "back door" around to stop him. they knew that what he was doing was wrong, they knew that if they used the military to stop him, public opinion would be against them, so they did what they needed to do to make it look more legitimate. no one else i've spoken to about this incident even knows anything about the honduran constitution...
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|luis, there is a difference between intent and being able to prove intent.
if they knew what he was up to but could not prove it, then they were at a crossroad.
in the end, he defied a public law, so the present congress won. but before the passage of that law, they could only scold him for subverting THE SPIRIT OF THE LAW and not the law itself.
still, my main beef is that the press is not telling the whole story.
and....i think the cia is yet again involved.
is it better to turn your country into a totalitarian right wing police state to save it from becoming a totalitarian left wing police state? i think the jury is still out on that one.
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|"is it better to turn your country into a totalitarian right wing police state to save it from becoming a totalitarian left wing police state? i think the jury is still out on that one."
I think that's a false dichotomy. If you think that the military/congress/supreme court acted as a "totalitarian" authority by following their constitution, then fine, that's your view, but that's hardly the case.
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|"Seeing as you read the entire Honduran constitution, I'm surprised you didn't include Article 4 in your post (although, seeing as it states that the President is not subordinate to Congress or the Supreme Court, which would make any law passed by Congress to prevent the President from availing himself of artice 5 of the Honduran Civil Participation Act unconstitutional and therefor null and void, perhaps that is not so surprising), or Article 2, which specifically calls the usurping of power (which would obviously include staging a coup) an act of treason."
Richard, Article 4, which you're quoting, also says this: "La alternabilidad en el ejercicio de la Presidencia de la República es obligatoria. La infracción de esta norma constituye delito de traición a la Patria."
That means that the changeability of the Presidency is obligatory, and that the infraction of this law is an act of treason. You speak of the bodies of government in Honduras as being independent and unsubordinate to the others, which is true, but it wasn't Congress or the Military who wrote the Honduran Constitution. As I have presented, it is clear that the framers of the Constitution wanted to make sure to anyone who read it, that what they call the "changeability of the Presidency" (the prohibition on re-election) is one of the main tenets of the document. The Constitution was adopted in 1982, after decades of Latin America being run by military dictatorships that disguised their authoritative rule by calling their military chief, the "President of the Republic". It is obvious that the framers of the Constitution added this "changeability of the Presidency" to the document to prevent similar things from happening in the future (that's why they can't name the Chief of the Military to the Presidency, only the President of the Congress or the Presidency of the Supreme Court).
As far as your comment about Article 2, I consider it null and void because I don't consider what happened a "coup". I agree that Article 2 describes a "coup" as an act of treason, but what happened last week was not a "coup" by any stretch of the imagination.
"Also note the the opinion of the Supreme Court (which the International Comission of Jurists terms highly politicised) on the constitutionality of an action is meaningless as the Congress removed that power from them, unless you take the postion that, as stated in the constitution, it is not subordinate to Congress either, in which case the members of Congress who passed that law would also have been in violation of the Constitution, and therefor should have been removed from office and prevented from running again."
The International Comission of Jurists? What?! So you're saying the opinion of a Supreme Court is meaningless because of one provision in the Constitution which states that the government bodies are unsubordinate to each other? First, I think you misunderstand the meaning of the word "subordinate". Second, as I stated previously, all bodies of government are bound by the Constitution and the document clearly states that what Zelaya tried to do was an act of treason. The steps that Congress and the Supreme Court took were completely justified.
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|You guys have to understand that the Honduran constitution is a living breathing document that can mean whatever you want it to. Just like the U.S. Constitution. You guys act like words have meanings or something.
Seriously though, great article Saulo. Keep up the good work.
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|"Query whether or not any ban on amending a Constitution, anybody's Constitution is not inimical to the notion of free people freely governing themselves."
Answer: No, and to clarify, they don't have a ban on amending their constitution; they just have a different process for doing so (Article 373).
"Query whether asking for a plebiscite constitutes advocating the elimination of term limits. I think not. All Zelaya was doing was to ask for a plebiscite to take the pulse of the electorate on the subject of term limits."
Answer: Well if you're asking for a plebiscite on the elimination of term limits, then yes, it clearly constitutes as advocating for it. It doesn't matter whether he's "taking the pulse" or not. It's illegal and an act of treason. Period.
"Query whether voting in favor of amending the Constitution to eliminate term limits should result in the loss of citizenship."
Answer: It's up for interpretation whether or not someone voting for the elimination of term limits constitutes as "supporting" or "advocating" it. What is not up for interpretation, though, is that what Zelaya was trying to do clearly constitutes as such.
"Query further how you are going to prove who voted for the elimination of term limits if the election is truly done by way of secret ballot."
Answer: That's an impossible task, hence the decision by the bodies of government to go after the illegal process itself, instead of giving the citizens of Honduras an opportunity to *possibly* commit an act of treason.
"I think that the Right Wing Nut Jobs who want to restore Honduras to a oligarchical cleptocracy don't have all of their ducks quite lined up."
Your comment could have done without this last idiotic statement.
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|thank you Saulo. As a Honduran I appreciate your words, if the international community lent more than just lip service to the word democracy and justice, the world woul be a much better place.
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|I'm about as liberal as they come and after reading the Honduran constitution it's pretty clear this whole thing is legal. The international community needs to wake up to this one.
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|Hence the reason I wrote this post. Thanks for reading, pass it along, and tell your friends that they should know better :)
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|This is not rocket science.
Zelaya wanted to be president for life as his ally Chavez has seemed to position himself to be.
Zelaya was trying to circumvent the Honduran constitution by asking for a popular vote to re-write the constitution.
Ortega will be positioning himself for president for life next.
In a democracy, one doesn't change the constitution for self gain or for the furtherance of one political dogma. Chavez, Zelaya, Ortega, or any other president of a free democratic country should allow the voice of the people, through their constitutions and votes, determine the political dogma the country will follow. If a particular political dogma is accepted by the people it will not stop because of a new president.
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|Mark my words: Obama will try a similar trick. Not only does he want to be Pres. of the U.S. forever, he wants to be president of the Western Hemisphere Socialist Dictators Club. Sung to the tune of Mickey Mouse: B-A-R ( are you waking up, America?) A-C-K ( kiss you rights goodbye!) O-B-A-M-A (One Big Ass Mistake, America!) Stop the madness!
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|Saulo,
I'm afraid you're infected with the right-wing illness, which is basically one of selective ignorance.
Clearly, the Honduran constitution says (1) the president cannot hold more than one term, (2) only the congress can amend the constitution -- an obvious abuse of individual rights -- and (3) introducing laws to change (1) or (2) is illegal.
What it does NOT say is that a plebicite to obtain the public's opinion on whether the constitution should be thrown out and re-written is illegal.
It seems clear that the Honduran congress and court were so opposed to hearing the people's opinion on this issue that they were willing to undertake a coup by exceeding their own authorities to oust the legally-elected president.
Consider that international jurists -- who, I suggest, know constitutional principles far better than you -- question the legitimacy of the honduran court's conduct.
One must ask why the congress and court would be so frightened of the people's opinion on this issue. The journalism -- and the honduran nationals whom I know -- say the congress and court are dominated by the wealthy land owners. Every time the common Honduran citizen exercises the right to vote, it's a threat to this upper class's control. That, after all, is what they have against Zelaya: his power rests with the poor majority.
I would suspect, young man, that you came to the US from a rather comfortable upper-class life in South America. Your biases, then, would fit nicely with the USA right wing.
Clearly, the Honduran constitution does not say it is illegal to seek a plebicite which does not directly change the constitution. That's all the president did.
The fact that you don't like Zelaya's populism does not give your support of the Honduran coup traction. Misapplying the law is dangerous. Trying to claim the Honduran constitution says what you think it should say is an equally irresponsible position.
Typical wingnut: long on emotion and accusations, short on facts.
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|Too ashamed of your viewpoint so you had to go by Anonymou this time? You seem to be copping an attitude/getting nasty there, typical of leftwing losers with no real argument. Your next post you're just going to call Saulo a racist, aren't you? Honduran Supreme Court is free to interpet their constitution any way they see fit. They are a soveriegn nation. You libs don't seem to have a problem with that when it comes to the courts giving you what you want.
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|Saulo for your coverage of this. I have spoken with several people from Honduras, a couple of them now living in the US and several who live in Honduras. They asked that I help them pass along their thoughts and requests to bloggers in the US who have taken an interest in the situation in Honduras.
So, here goes... All have said that the situation is far more dire there than most here in the US realize. And they have said that the ousting of Zelaya was entirely warranted, and exactly as you describe, is actually required by their Constitution. Some of these are travellers who have retired there. Others are lifelong residents and workers there. So they represent a variety of different segments. Several are union workers who have actually been against the land redistribution and general strike policies of the more prominent traditional leftist unions. They instead want to move toward modernization and creation of new types of jobs from the private sector, rather than demanding the government keep the outdated industrial and service jobs that have long since been replaced by automation and technology. Working citizens in Honduras fear for their own safety against other union workers with differing opinions, many of whom are being accused of "sympathizing with the capitalists". Now, I am not necessarily offering this as my own opinion as I do not live in Honduras myself; I am merely passing on statements and views from residents of Honduras about the development into the current situtation there. Further, they have been asking that people in the US please try to help them get their full stories out to the media. They say that the US and others have only been presenting one side of the story and are misrepresenting much of what's reported (again, their words, not mine). Some of them also say that so called progressive American labor unions are interfering with the liberty of the citizens of Honduras and are contributing to the positioning of their country for a complete fall to Socialism. They are pleading for the support of average Americans who hold dear to them liberty and democracy, and asking us to urge our government leaders to travel directly to Honduras to view and assess the situation on the ground before continuing to back Zelaya and before heeding any further calls for action from US labor unions (and I will tell you that they very specifically denounce SEIU). All they ask is that Americans please take it upon ourselves to get some of their own views of the story (from Hondurans), other than just relying upon the mainstream media's portrayal of this as a defiant coup. All who corresponded with me have said that this was not a coup and that it is the right thing to allow their interim President to continue with the plan for a democratic election in November. A few have read your post, Saulo, and agree with your assessment of the actions that were taken and are grateful for such coverage. I am sure there will be others from Honduras with a differing view. I'm simply passing along the view of about 10 or so citizens, all unrelated to one another, who each corresponded with essentially a consensus on the same view as one another. As a Libertarian myself, I will admit that I can easily draw the same opinion as theirs when I read their stories and study some of the history of such conflicts in their country.
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