Maybe it's not a good idea to try and purge non-governmental organizations like C-Libre and FIAN after all.
It just might get you in trouble.
Today Juan Orlando Hernández met with representatives of several unnamed non-governmental organizations and his Minister of Human Rights, Justice, Government, and Decentralization, Rigoberto Chang Castillo.
Afterward, a communique read by his chief of staff, Reinaldo Sanchez, ordered a review and restructuring of the Unidad de Registro y Seguimiento de Asociaciones Civiles (URSAC), the unit that just a few days ago tried to cancel the registration of 5,429 NGOs claiming deficiencies in their filings.
The goal of the review and restructuring will be to have better control over the NGOs and to modernize the handling of NGO authorizations and the filing of required reports.
The government also walked back the cancellation of those 5429 organizations, ordering a new review of each one's files.
Sanchez noted that the government was aware of the importance of the role played by civil society and the NGOs in strengthening Honduras's democracy and diminishing economic inequality.
Clearly, someone wasn't on the same page...
Oops!
Showing posts with label C-Libre. Show all posts
Showing posts with label C-Libre. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 12, 2014
Sunday, March 9, 2014
NGO Purge
On his way out of the government, Áfrico Madrid, Interior Minister under Porfirio Lobo Sosa, saw the final step in a long-brewing confrontation in which he has been engaged.
That step? abolishing his opponents-- more than 10,000 NGOs.
Friday La Gaceta published a decree revoking the legal status of 5429 NGOs. The Unidad de Registro y Seguimiento de Asociaciones Civiles (URSAC), a part of the Interior Ministry, issued the decree that revokes the permission of these NGOs to operate.
This comes slightly more than a month after Madrid revoked the legal status of another 4800 NGOs in mid January.
Honduras reportedly had about 16,000 NGOs at the start of 2013. So altogether, these two decrees succeeded in abolishing more than half of the NGOs in the country.
That makes it a little harder to figure out who this campaign was really targeting and why.
We would remind readers that back in 2010, the Honduran Congress passed a law to define the characteristics of an evangelical Christian church, declared unconstitutional in 2012, that advanced Madrid's agenda to abolish evangelical churches he felt were "fringe" groups.
According to the decree published this week, the named institutions failed to comply in some way with a previous decree 770-A-2003 regulating NGOs, which gave a 30 day window for every NGO to supply an annual activities report, a financial report, indicate its officers, and so on.
What does the abolishment of these NGOs translate to, in practice?
They can no longer sign contracts or hold bank accounts.
They are ordered to liquidate any property and goods held, and donate the proceeds of that liquidation to a still extant NGO with a similar goal.
All Honduran banks and government agencies were notified of the loss of rights of these 5,429 NGOs. In 30 days, their bank accounts will be frozen by the government, and any remaining assets seized.
This is not just a matter of eliminating a few small and inconsequential groups that were struggling.
Among the NGOs cancelled was the Asociación Comite por Libre Expresión (C-Libre), the most visible group monitoring press freedom in Honduras, composed of of journalists and others.
Hector Longino Becerra, president of the organization, said that the action against C-Libre was part of an attack on organizations that are critical of the government. Becerra said that all of C-Libre's paperwork with URSAC was complete and up to date, and he possessed the receipts to show the filing was done on time.
In the wake of the Friday publication of La Gaceta, Jorge Montes, head of URSAC, claimed Saturday that the NGOs still had 30 days to make things right and avoid cancellation.
That claim is hard to understand since the published law reportedly cancels the legal right to exist of the named NGOs. Montes claims that each NGO's legal representative will be notified in 30 days of the cancellation if, prior to that, their paperwork is not brought up to date.
He emphasized three kinds of reports that need to be filed: a report on activities; a financial report that indicates what money the group holds, where it came from, and where and how it will be spent, and where the NGO's assets are; and an up-to-date list of officers.
The Civil Society Group that advises the government is disturbed by all this and has requested a meeting with Rigoberto Chang Castillo, current Interior Minister, and thus the head of URSAC.
They stated:
Their point: the Honduran government isn't doing that when 62% of the country's legally established NGOs are disestablished by the government.
We couldn't agree more.
That step? abolishing his opponents-- more than 10,000 NGOs.
Friday La Gaceta published a decree revoking the legal status of 5429 NGOs. The Unidad de Registro y Seguimiento de Asociaciones Civiles (URSAC), a part of the Interior Ministry, issued the decree that revokes the permission of these NGOs to operate.
This comes slightly more than a month after Madrid revoked the legal status of another 4800 NGOs in mid January.
Honduras reportedly had about 16,000 NGOs at the start of 2013. So altogether, these two decrees succeeded in abolishing more than half of the NGOs in the country.
That makes it a little harder to figure out who this campaign was really targeting and why.
We would remind readers that back in 2010, the Honduran Congress passed a law to define the characteristics of an evangelical Christian church, declared unconstitutional in 2012, that advanced Madrid's agenda to abolish evangelical churches he felt were "fringe" groups.
According to the decree published this week, the named institutions failed to comply in some way with a previous decree 770-A-2003 regulating NGOs, which gave a 30 day window for every NGO to supply an annual activities report, a financial report, indicate its officers, and so on.
What does the abolishment of these NGOs translate to, in practice?
They can no longer sign contracts or hold bank accounts.
They are ordered to liquidate any property and goods held, and donate the proceeds of that liquidation to a still extant NGO with a similar goal.
All Honduran banks and government agencies were notified of the loss of rights of these 5,429 NGOs. In 30 days, their bank accounts will be frozen by the government, and any remaining assets seized.
This is not just a matter of eliminating a few small and inconsequential groups that were struggling.
Among the NGOs cancelled was the Asociación Comite por Libre Expresión (C-Libre), the most visible group monitoring press freedom in Honduras, composed of of journalists and others.
Hector Longino Becerra, president of the organization, said that the action against C-Libre was part of an attack on organizations that are critical of the government. Becerra said that all of C-Libre's paperwork with URSAC was complete and up to date, and he possessed the receipts to show the filing was done on time.
In the wake of the Friday publication of La Gaceta, Jorge Montes, head of URSAC, claimed Saturday that the NGOs still had 30 days to make things right and avoid cancellation.
That claim is hard to understand since the published law reportedly cancels the legal right to exist of the named NGOs. Montes claims that each NGO's legal representative will be notified in 30 days of the cancellation if, prior to that, their paperwork is not brought up to date.
He emphasized three kinds of reports that need to be filed: a report on activities; a financial report that indicates what money the group holds, where it came from, and where and how it will be spent, and where the NGO's assets are; and an up-to-date list of officers.
The Civil Society Group that advises the government is disturbed by all this and has requested a meeting with Rigoberto Chang Castillo, current Interior Minister, and thus the head of URSAC.
They stated:
It is the responsibility of the state to create an enabling environment for the functioning of civil society organizations and to keep watch over the unfettered right to free association.
Their point: the Honduran government isn't doing that when 62% of the country's legally established NGOs are disestablished by the government.
We couldn't agree more.
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
Honduran Government vs. Freedom of the Press
Porfirio Lobo Sosa neither understands, nor likes, freedom of the press. He laments the fact that the Honduran press can print things that he thinks are not true, and threatens publishers for not supporting government policies.
Stories demonstrating this are not uncommon. On February 8, La Prensa published an account, headlined "President Lobo returns to threatening the media of communication", quoting Lobo Sosa complaining that newspapers shouldn't display images of violence because they affect young people:
Back in December, Lobo Sosa personalized his attack, decrying the publisher of two Honduran daily newspapers, La Prensa and El Heraldo, Jorge Canahuati, for allegedly opposing his police purification campaign, because they covered the rejection of the law by justices of the Supreme Court (later removed in a legally dubious way by Congress).
In February Lobo Sosa again singled out the same two papers, this time for criticizing his lack of progress against the level of fatal violence in the country:
We make no claim that the Honduran press is exceptionally reliable, or lacking in bias. But Lobo Sosa wants to stop the press from doing anything that makes his government uncomfortable, even though part of the role of a free press is just that: making the powerful uncomfortable.
Lobo Sosa's government has now developed a proposal for a new Ley Marco de Telecomunicaciones (Telecommunications Law). As La Prensa reports, the proposed law would allow the government to close media outlets, and would introduce an unprecedented censorship body.
The target is broadcast media, radio and television, whose ownership overlaps with the print media against whom Lobo Sosa has railed, but which are more easily subject to government control because they are dependent on licensing of the broadcast spectrum.
At the end of last week, press reports on proposed reforms presented to Lobo Sosa by CONATEL (Comisión Nacional de Telecomunicaciones) said the new law would
C-Libre is a consortium formed in June 2001, with a stated mission to promote freedom of expression and freedom of the press in Honduras. It had previously made its proposed telecommunications law revisions available on its website. While much of their proposal has to do with ensuring access to broadcast spectrum by different sectors of society (including a proposal to limit ownership of broadcast media to one channel per family), it also included a passage that seems intended to respond to Lobo Sosa's critiques of the media: a call for a national council for the regulation of ethics in communications.
The new body they proposed would oversee programming to assure that it conforms to morals, to avoid what C-Libre called the loss of national moral values and identity. It would have oversight to determine if programming was appropriate for a Honduran audience. It would be able to make lists of the kind of programming considered damaging to the Honduran population.
While in theory it could not restrict the rights of the media with respect to guarantees of freedom of religion, ideas, or politics, this provision in C-Libre's proposal was denounced by a representative of the Sociedad Interamericana de Prensa (SIP) in Honduras, Rodolfo Dumas:
On Monday, La Prensa published an analysis comparing the law actually proposed by the Lobo Sosa government to the existing legal code. They found an inserted passage in the first article giving the government the right to regulate the content transmitted for the "protection of the ethical principles and cultural values of society".
What the government can demand is framed entirely in vague and lofty-sounding language, that nonetheless falls into the debatable terrain Dumas noted in the C-Libre model law:
In other words: the government can say that you shouldn't broadcast stories about any topic it thinks would be against "social interests".
And if a broadcaster does violate this clause, the new law is ready, having established a new basis for formal sanctions if media "promote lack of respect either for the reputation of someone, or weakening of national security, public order, public health or the fundamental rights and liberties of infancy, childhood, and adolescence.” The fines approved would rise from a maximum of 500,000 lempiras in the present law (about $25,000), to 3% to 5% of the gross income of the enterprise.
Added to the call for a Regulatory Commission on Programming, the new language would put the government in a position to impose its perspective on what programming would be in keeping with government policies and views on ethics and values.
Whatever else that might be, it is not a free press.
But then: Porfirio Lobo Sosa doesn't like a free press.
Stories demonstrating this are not uncommon. On February 8, La Prensa published an account, headlined "President Lobo returns to threatening the media of communication", quoting Lobo Sosa complaining that newspapers shouldn't display images of violence because they affect young people:
"I don't know how Ana Pineda has not entered a complaint with the UN or before whoever it should be, you know the damage that the media of communication does to children, some of them in their front page display the violence".
Back in December, Lobo Sosa personalized his attack, decrying the publisher of two Honduran daily newspapers, La Prensa and El Heraldo, Jorge Canahuati, for allegedly opposing his police purification campaign, because they covered the rejection of the law by justices of the Supreme Court (later removed in a legally dubious way by Congress).
In February Lobo Sosa again singled out the same two papers, this time for criticizing his lack of progress against the level of fatal violence in the country:
Here we have two newspapers that greet me every day, what they forget is that although the days are passing by rapidly, they will never make me bend, I am going to impose order in Honduras, you can be sure.
We make no claim that the Honduran press is exceptionally reliable, or lacking in bias. But Lobo Sosa wants to stop the press from doing anything that makes his government uncomfortable, even though part of the role of a free press is just that: making the powerful uncomfortable.
Lobo Sosa's government has now developed a proposal for a new Ley Marco de Telecomunicaciones (Telecommunications Law). As La Prensa reports, the proposed law would allow the government to close media outlets, and would introduce an unprecedented censorship body.
The target is broadcast media, radio and television, whose ownership overlaps with the print media against whom Lobo Sosa has railed, but which are more easily subject to government control because they are dependent on licensing of the broadcast spectrum.
At the end of last week, press reports on proposed reforms presented to Lobo Sosa by CONATEL (Comisión Nacional de Telecomunicaciones) said the new law would
seek to regulate the granting of radio and television frequencies and to create mechanisms to censor radio, television, and print media. The proposal has been based on a proposal presented by the non-governmental organization Comité por la Libre Expresión (C-Libre), whose content turned out to be more injurious than the Government's proposal for the regulation of media, since it even spoke of Committees of Censorship for radio and television news programs...
C-Libre is a consortium formed in June 2001, with a stated mission to promote freedom of expression and freedom of the press in Honduras. It had previously made its proposed telecommunications law revisions available on its website. While much of their proposal has to do with ensuring access to broadcast spectrum by different sectors of society (including a proposal to limit ownership of broadcast media to one channel per family), it also included a passage that seems intended to respond to Lobo Sosa's critiques of the media: a call for a national council for the regulation of ethics in communications.
The new body they proposed would oversee programming to assure that it conforms to morals, to avoid what C-Libre called the loss of national moral values and identity. It would have oversight to determine if programming was appropriate for a Honduran audience. It would be able to make lists of the kind of programming considered damaging to the Honduran population.
While in theory it could not restrict the rights of the media with respect to guarantees of freedom of religion, ideas, or politics, this provision in C-Libre's proposal was denounced by a representative of the Sociedad Interamericana de Prensa (SIP) in Honduras, Rodolfo Dumas:
“It disturbs us very much when the proposal of C-Libre speaks of a national council of regulation of ethics in communication, that is worrying because we already known that both the Convención Americana [de Derechos Humanos], la Declaración Universal [de Derechos Humanos] and our internal law prohibits advance censorship, and it is an absolute prohibition, This type of article has to be approached with great caution."
He also noted that there even is a section of the proposal that speaks of the need for truth. It demands that the news should be true, which is a term that today many politicians like to use when they refer to these issues, he added, He noted that "there is already a declaration of principles issued by all those related in regard to liberty of expression in which the demands of truthfulness, expedience, and impartiality are incompatible with liberty of expression and liberty of the press, because the concept of truth is ethereal, it is subjective, so to demand the truth, whose truth will it be? The official truth? Your truth or mine?"
On Monday, La Prensa published an analysis comparing the law actually proposed by the Lobo Sosa government to the existing legal code. They found an inserted passage in the first article giving the government the right to regulate the content transmitted for the "protection of the ethical principles and cultural values of society".
What the government can demand is framed entirely in vague and lofty-sounding language, that nonetheless falls into the debatable terrain Dumas noted in the C-Libre model law:
“In regard to the content of transmissions... these should be subjected to the regulations, parameters, policies, dispositions and administrative rulings that for reasons of social interests shall be established in conformity with the law".
In other words: the government can say that you shouldn't broadcast stories about any topic it thinks would be against "social interests".
And if a broadcaster does violate this clause, the new law is ready, having established a new basis for formal sanctions if media "promote lack of respect either for the reputation of someone, or weakening of national security, public order, public health or the fundamental rights and liberties of infancy, childhood, and adolescence.” The fines approved would rise from a maximum of 500,000 lempiras in the present law (about $25,000), to 3% to 5% of the gross income of the enterprise.
Added to the call for a Regulatory Commission on Programming, the new language would put the government in a position to impose its perspective on what programming would be in keeping with government policies and views on ethics and values.
Whatever else that might be, it is not a free press.
But then: Porfirio Lobo Sosa doesn't like a free press.
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