Amapala, La Alianza, and Nacaome Studied for ZEDE Development

Honduras yesterday completed the announcement that Ebal Diaz started on February 5.  At that time he pre-announced that a ZEDE would be established in Choluteca or Valle. His latest announcement adds some details, but it turns out there is a lot more information that could be shared, and has not been.

On Monday February 10 Diaz, along with Juan Orlando Hernández, annnounced that in cooperation with the Korean International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) they would do a study of where in southern Honduras to establish a ZEDE.  Their announcement said that once an area is selected, the Koreans will develop a master plan for the administration of the ZEDE.  Diaz said:

It's an ambitious project which we start this day with a study and design of the country's first economic zone.

But there's a lot Diaz didn't say that's revealed in a document freely down loadable on the Honduran Ministry of Planning and External Cooperation (SEPLAN) website.  This document, signed by members of the previous administration on August 23, 2012, lays out the project more fully.

Titled in English "The Feasibility Study and Master Plan for the Establishment of a Special Development Region in Honduras", the document is signed by representatives of KOICA, Coalianza, SEPLAN, and the then-Vice President of Honduras, Maria Guillen de Bogran.

This agreement was made before the current ZEDE law was passed (in June 2013) and thus refers to Regiones Especiales de Desarrollo (RED), the predecessor to ZEDES in the model cities legislation that was found unconstitutional.

KOICA agreed to contribute $4 million, and the Honduran government an unspecified amount, in support of the project. The first step called for was a feasibility study of three particular locations in southern Honduras.

The studied locations are Amapala in Choluteca, and La Alianza and Nacaome in Valle.  Amapala is on Tigre Island in the Gulf of Fonseca.  La Alianza is located on the Guascoran river which forms the boundary between El Salvador and Honduras and currently has poor access to transportation.  Nacaome is on the Pan American highway which runs in one direction to El Salvador and in the other direction to Choluteca and on to Nicaragua.

The record of discussions between KOICA and the Honduran government indicates that the feasibility study should take three months from its inception.  The three feasibility studies will be given to the Honduran government, which will then have one month to select one of the three locations to build out.  Then, KOICA will do a more complete feasibility study, a concept design, a master plan for the design and operation of the ZEDE, and an implementation plan, all to be delivered about 19 months after the site is selected, or about halfway through the Hernández administration's term.

While the agreement between KOICA and the Honduran government was signed back in 2012,  apparently Porfirio Lobo Sosa decided to sit on it.  Juan Orlando Hernández, who traveled to Korea to see their economic development zones while head of Congress, and who supports the idea of model cities and economic development zones in Honduras, decided to proceed.

Like the model cities law, the ZEDE law has been contested, and on February 8 the Honduran Supreme Court admitted a challenge to the law.  The challenge alleges that the ZEDE law violates articles 294, 303 y 329 of the Honduran constitution.  These clauses have to do with the ordering of the Honduran territory, the justice system, and the economic development of Honduras.

After admitting the legal challenge, the Constitutional branch of the court passed the case on to the Public Prosecutor, Oscar Chinchilla, for comments.  Chinchilla was previously the lone Supreme Court justice in the Constitutional branch who did not find the model cities law unconstitutional.  Further, he traveled with Hernandez on the trip to visit Korean economic development zones. This suggests it is unlikely he will find anything wrong with the ZEDE law.

In theory, Honduras says it has local buy-in from the mayors of these towns.  But the ZEDE law exempts lands adjacent to the Gulf of Fonseca and on the Caribbean coast from having to hold a referendum for the population to approve being incorporated into a ZEDE.

So it will not surprise us if Amapala ends up being selected for development: the possibilities there include everything from a new port to luxury ocean residential properties, all in an area that has continued to be subject to tension with Honduras' neighbors on the Gulf of Fonseca. All this, and no need to hold a popular referendum if this site is selected.

Questioning the State Department: Human Rights "Progress" in Honduras?

UC Santa Cruz historian Dana Frank, in an editorial in the Los Angeles Times, strongly criticizes the US State Department for its recent affirmation that Honduras is making sufficient progress in correcting human rights abuses to allow disbursal of foreign aid funds sequestered by congressional mandate.


This finding recently received publicity, ironically, because of one small exception: the admission by the State Department that Porfirio Lobo Sosa's hand-picked police chief, Juan Carlos Bonilla Valladares, has a suspect history. As Frank writes:

the State Department did announce that it was withholding all U.S. funds to Juan Carlos (El Tigre) Bonilla, the national chief of police, or anyone under his direct supervision, until an investigation of his alleged death squad activity has concluded.

You would think that the fact that the president of Honduras appointed, and continues to support, someone with such a tainted history during a period when in theory the government is committed to clearing up corruption in the police would have raised questions about the Lobo Sosa administration, not just Bonilla. But apparently not: the vast majority of US funding that was subject to withholding has now been approved for release.

Why? Frank, in her final paragraph, reaches the same conclusion as most other observers of the situation; the US administration

is obsessed with an unwinnable, militarized drug war in Latin America, and as result appears to be willing to back almost any government that will allow it to expand its military presence in the region.

Frank cites the almost unbelievable numbers that have been tallied since 2009, when Honduran rule of law was disrupted by a coup, boundaries between military and policing began to be blurred, and the security forces were unleashed by the government to silence dissent:

• 10,000 human rights complaints against security forces
• 23 journalists killed
• multiple reports by international human rights groups about repeated abuses of due process, denial of constitutional rights, and violation of human rights.

Want to read more details? Start with the links provided by the UNHCR. Or those maintained by Reporters Without Borders.

Too internationalist for you? Then visit the website of Freedom House, generally considered a centrist organization. In a report dated July 4, 2012, Freedom House writes that in the past year,

Honduras continued to suffer from human rights violations, impunity, and corruption.

But none of this convinced the State Department to use the leverage provided by Congressional direction to withhold a small percentage of funding--"20% of a portion of U.S. police and military aid", to quote Frank-- to try to move the Honduran government away from its current posture.

What is that posture?

In June, Maria Antonieta Guillen represented the Honduran government in testimony to the UN.  She argued that the government had to walk a "fine line" to "avoid delinquency by minors" while "preserving the integrity of the diverse centers of rehabilitation". Deadly prison fires over the past year have exposed the reality: overcrowding, large numbers detained without charges, and the criminalization of practices of the young. As sociologist Leticia Salomon wrote, these fires are "evidence of the collapse of the system".

Guillen argued that, since human life is the fundamental human right, policing cannot be said to violate human rights, because it is the prevention of violent crime. Whenever accusations of human rights violations are raised, the Honduran government's response is either that the crimes were private (explaining away the systematic and unprecedented increases in crimes against activists and journalists); or that the security forces were acting to combat crime. These justifications betray a fundamental difference in how the Honduran government understands the role of security forces and the status of human rights.

It would be one thing for the State Department to admit that Honduras has not improved its record, and make a case-- however it might want-- that US national security interests outweigh this failure. That at least would not involve giving a blessing to a regime uninterested in improving actual human rights, and incompetent to do so in any event.

What is tragic is that, by certifying progress that no one else sees, the US State Department is lending support to assertions about what is needed for social order in Honduras that are directly at odds with values the US espouses.

Never Mind

Porfirio Lobo Sosa announced Wednesday morning that if Honduras didn't qualify for the Millennium Challenge grants competition this year, next year he would consider withdrawing from the competition for chance at $200 million in program funds and projects.

They told me that I should defer (another year). What's going on? I have been thinking of telling the Vice President (Maria Antonieta Guillen) that she should say that in the following year we will waive it, because they show that they don't behave well, what it is, it isn't fair. When they want to help, they help. There are countries that don't go around with so many things.

He added:

My mother had a saying. She told me: "My son, do good and don't look at anyone else". When you want to help, you help; this gives me, I don't know, I feel at times as if someone said I have money but if you want me to give it to you, do this and that. I'll tell you something: I received this country not at zero, but at minus 10....

Talking about what he felt were too-demanding requirements, he said:

We haven't hidden the weaknesses that we have, all the will, the affection and gratitude, but I feel that it shouldn't have to do with passing an exam. If the brother who is there is not able to investigate, because I recognize, I have the will to clear things up, but not the capacity.

He also criticized the United States for its lack of support for developing the investigative service of the police in Honduras:

I have never hidden my concern with what has happened with the journalists. Never, either, have I hidden that we don't have the ability to investigate... if a country wants to help us and knows that we have a problem with investigations, then what they should do is say "Look sir, I will send you a contingent of 50 investigators to clear up the crimes."

That left the Presidential Minister, Maria Antonieta Guillén to clean up the mess. Late Wednesday she read a statement to the press that said (in full):

The government of the Republic recognizes the good relations with the government and people of the United States and thanks them for the support and resources they've given which support the different program and projects that benefit our people.

At the same time, we would like to emphasize the positive impact that the first Millennium Challenge grant compact left for our compatriots.

The government of Honduras is making a great effort to reach the agreed levels in security, human rights, and the struggle against corruption.

It is in the permanent interest of the people and government of Honduras to agree to new or existing programs that will contribute to the well being of the Honduran people.

She went on to say:

"There's no contradiction between what I said, and what he (Lobo Sosa) said. They have helped us a lot."

Honduras's previous evaluation, in 2010, disqualified it in part based on measures of corruption, freedom of information, and economic activity.

On Thursday, it was confirmed that they would not be included in the current Millennium Challenge Corporation funding either.

Bernard Martinez, 2 Others At Culture Suspended

Maria Antonieta Guillén announced today that Minister of Culture Bernard Martinez and his two Vice Ministers, Godfredo Fajardo and Tony Sierra have been ordered to absent themselves from the premises of the Secretaria de Cultura, Arte, y Deportes (SCAD) for the next two weeks.

They are to be absent while a verification commission is appointed and investigates the accusations brought by employees of SCAD as part of a human rights investigation of their management. When that investigation has been completed, Porfirio Lobo Sosa will make a decision as to their fate. The SCAD employee union took over the facilities last week and has asked that Martinez and Fajardo be fired.

Lobo Sosa has made it clear that if Martinez is fired, he will be replaced by another PINU party member, not a National Party member as Ricardo Alvarez has demanded.

Airport Misinformation

La Tribuna reported this morning that the Lobo Sosa government promises to build two airports in the Department of Copan, one at Rio Amarillo and one at La Concepción. Really? Is that even financial feasible? Who will fund it? We have our doubts about this story.

Tiempo, on the other hand, reported yesterday that the government will call a representative assembly of the municipalities of the Departments of Copan, Lempira, Ocotepeque, and Intibuca to decide where to build the airport. La Tribuna published an article yesterday that agreed in detail with what the Tiempo article reported.

Confused? Either La Tribuna is, or we are.

The story yesterday was prompted by a meeting between two of the presidential designates, Maria Antonieta Guillén and Victor Hugo Barníca, the Minister of Tourism, Nelly Jerez, and the Secretary of Public Works, Transport, and Housing, Miguel Pastor, and a delegation from Santa Rosa de Copan and La Concepción headed by Monseignor Luis Alfonso Santos, the Bishop of Santa Rosa de Copan. The Alcalde of La Concepción, José Tulio Sánchez told reporters that the land owners there were willing to donate 40 manzanas of land for the airport, saving the government about $5 million, the asking price for the land in Rio Amarillo, if it chooses to build the airport at La Concepción.

Yesterday Guillén was quoted as saying

"There are two options, one alternative is Rio Amarillo and the other is La Concepción; the smart decision of the President is not to exclude one or the other but to consider both possibilities in terms of analyzing the convenience of building either airport."

Yesterday the story was that the central government would not make the decision, the communities would make it.

Today the message La Tribuna reports is that Guillén told them that the government would build both airports to avoid a confrontation between the municipalities of the region. Except that it's not at all clear she said exactly that, since the rest of the article is full of phrases about weighing the benefits of each, and that those benefits would be discussed in a regional assembly by the 25 of March.

Guillén is cited as the source of another dubious piece of information in the La Tribuna article. She is reported to have stated it would cost over 400 million lempiras to construct the road from La Concepcion to Santa Rita to connect that airport with Copan Ruinas. Yet a year ago, an article from Hondudiario reposted in an Internet forum cited the cost of 24 kilometers of road as 116 million lempiras. Where did this inflated estimate of 400 million come from? Proceso Digital has an answer: they attribute that bit of information to Miguel Pastor and SOPTRAVI. Using the cost to produce a lane mile of roadway in individual states in the US, this estimate is roughly the same as it would be to construct a similar length road in Louisiana, using US prevailing wages and material prices. For Honduras it seems rather high.

We think today's La Tribuna article is wrong; its simply internally inconsistent and we think Miguel Pastor would do well to question that 400-500 million lempira estimate for the cost of constructing the road in light of the previous estimates around 25 percent of that cost.

A (Millennium) Challenge for Honduras

The Washington Post today published an English-language version of press reporting from Honduras following the decision by the Millennium Challenge Corporation to postpone a decision on whether or not to include Honduras in the next phase of the program.

The story, by AP reporter Freddy Cuevas in Tegucigalpa, repeats claims made by the Lobo Sosa government attributing the MCC's decision to corruption that took place under the Zelaya administration:

"We lament this decision because it was based on an evaluation of the perception of corruption levels in the country. And it affects the people the most," said Maria Guillen, Lobo's chief Cabinet minister.

Guillen told reporters that the decision was "due to corruption detected in 2007, 2008 and 2009," though she did not elaborate.

Foreign Minister Mario Canahuati blamed "the previous government" and said "now Lobo has to taken on this burden (even though) he acted transparently."

Poor Lobo Sosa; an innocent victim of a retrospective economic coup by Manuel Zelaya.

Except that this storyline, so pleasing to the Honduran right wing, is not supported by anything said by the US Embassy or the Millennium Challenge Corporation. In fact, the MCC press release said that

“MCC recognizes the positive steps taken by the Government of Honduras, as well as its strong commitment to reform and reconciliation. We look forward to continued engagement with the Government of Honduras and future consideration of the country for a second compact.”

So what actually made Honduras unattractive to the MCC right now-- as opposed to in some mythical future when reconciliation (that word, again) is complete and reform (what reform?) has taken place?

Participating countries are evaluated every year by the MCC, which issues "scorecards" showing how they performed. The scorecards are issued for each fiscal year-- so a scorecard for FY (Fiscal Year) 2011 summarizes a year that began in calendar year 2010.

As we previously discussed, "control of corruption" was one of the few indicators where Honduras failed to meet the standard required in the "scorecard" released by the MCC in October of 2009 (covering 2008-2009), scoring in the 44th percentile among its peer group of countries. (A reorganization of the MCC website broke the original links to this document; all the cumulative scorecards can be found here.) But even so, Honduras actually met its goals in this category in 2009. That's why "control of corruption" was green on the lovely color graphic MCC uses to summarize performance.

(In contrast, the two areas where Honduras failed to meet the criteria in FY 2009 stood out on the scorecard in bright and alarming red: "rule of law" and "fiscal policy".)

In the absence of any clear statement from MCC about where Honduras might have gone wrong-- other than that little coup thing and continuing violations of human rights, of course-- it is useful to simply glance over the scorecards from FY 2005 to FY 2011, covering data from 2004 to now.

"Fiscal policy" was already a major problem in the scorecard for FY 2005, when Honduras scored in the 47th percentile. Fiscal policy remained a problem consistently over the entire history of Honduras' participation in the MCC Compact from 2005 to now. Honduras score dropped to the 30th percentile for FY 2007, rose to the 37th percentile in FY 2008, to the 43rd percentile in FY 2009, and to the 44th percentile in FY 2010. The most recent scorecard (for FY 2011) shows a major erosion, back to the 40th percentile.

Fiscal policy is the only category in which Honduras consistently missed the MCC's targets. It seems much likelier that the decision of the MCC was based on this consistent inability to meet the expectations of the Corporation. But two other indicators shifted back and forth between acceptable and unacceptable: "rule of law" and "control of corruption".

"Rule of law" was marginal-- in the red in FY 2005, back into the green in 2006 where it stayed until FY 2008 (2007-2008, the year that political conflict that ultimately led to the coup began to be really visible). In the 2010 scorecard covering 2009-2010, 'rule of law' was again scored as a failure, which makes sense considering this covered the period of the coup d'etat and de facto regime.

"Control of corruption", the measure that the Lobo Sosa government wants to blame for the failure of MCC to renew Honduras, was an issue in FY 2008, improved in FY 2009 sufficiently to be scored in the green, and then in FY 2010 and FY 2011 reached its lowest point, well within the red (falling to the 44th and 45th percentile). But these results cover the period from 2009-2011: that is, a period when the Lobo Sosa government and its predecessor, the de facto regime of Roberto Micheletti, were in control for the majority of the time.

It is not surprising that the Honduran government would like to blame a scapegoat for this decision. It is unfortunate for them that the data available don't support their claim, and suggest a far simpler explanation: Honduras just didn't meet the economic expectations of what is, after all, a neoliberal economic institution.

But it would be great if the Washington Post could manage to pretend to do some actual reporting rather than simply giving print space to unexamined claims like those made by the Honduran cabinet ministers quoted in the article they chose to print.