RNP Budget May Disenfranchise Votes

The Hernandez administration cut the budget of the Registro Nacional de Personas (RNP) which issues official identity cards by $170 million lempiras this year.  As a direct result, up to 1,000,000 Honduran voters, who need the card for the next election, may not be able to vote.

The Executive branch in Honduras proposes a budget, and Congress approves it, making the changes it deems appropriate.  The RNP required, by its estimation, $370 million lempiras (aprox. $17.7 million) to cover its costs this, an election year.  This includes the funding for new identity cards for 1.5 million citizens, including the more than 330,000 teenagers who became eligible to vote this year.  However, it was assigned a budget $200 million lempiras ($9.5 million) by the Executive branch, augmented by $39 million lempiras ($1.9 million) of a budget that Congress allocated for it to dispense with the fees charged for citizens who ask for a new identity card.

That budget only allowed funding for 500,000 new identity cards, of which 330,000 will be new voters.  Yet the demand is for another 1,000,000 identity cards, which the RNP cannot make because it lacks the funds to make them.  In the first 4 months of the year, the RNP made and distributed 700,000 new identity cards.  Since then they've had to stop due to a lack of funding.

Nor have they kept quiet about the problem.  During the budgeting they listed 8 large projects that would make and distribute those identity cards to people without them having to come to a central place to collect them.  The Hernandez government did not request funding for any of them.  Hence the current problem.

So now, either 1,000,000 voters will be disenfranchised in November, or Congress will have to appropriate additional funds to the RNP, which may not have sufficient time to make and distribute that many identity cards.

Honduran Prisoner Leaves Prison; No One Cares

[Updated below] So how does a prisoner with a life sentence housed in a maximum security prison in Honduras suddenly show up on the streets of San Pedro Sula?

In October of 2013, Virgilio Sanchez Montoya, a suspected head of the Barrio 18 gang,  was found guilty of the 2010 massacre at a shoe shop in San Pedro Sula that left 17 people dead.  He was sentenced to over 500 years in prison.  In November of 2016 he was moved from the National Penitentiary in Tamara to the newly constructed "El Pozo" prison in Ilama, Santa Barbara, a maximum security prison where gang members are segregated and kept under harsh conditions.  Yesterday he was arrested walking the streets of San Pedro Sula carrying an AK-47.

Nor is he the first prisoner from El Pozo to mysteriously appear on the streets of San Pedro Sula.  At least 3 others have been re-arrested in San Pedro over the last 9 months, free when they should have been in prison cells.  There's been no explanation, no investigation as to how these admittedly dangerous prisoners are showing up on the streets of San Pedro when they should still be in prison.

Earlier this month 8 prison guards at El Pozo were dismissed for unspecified "security irregularities" but no one noticed any prisoners missing.  One of those dismissed was a guard who made a duplicate key for the prison armory.

The Honduran prisons, which are sieves,  hold almost 19000 prisoners either convicted of a crime, or awaiting trial.  It appears that in these new maximum security prisons, the prisoners are still in control of some aspects of prison life.  That a prisoner with a life sentence can go from a maximum security prison cell to walking the streets of a major city with no one noticing, or caring back at the prison, is disturbing.

[Update] The Insituto Nacional Penetenciario (INP), the people who run the prisons,  put out a story yesterday that this was a case of two people with the same name.  Nothing to see, and anyway, they still have their prisoner.  Except that the photo they released really does look like the same person arrested in San Pedro.

The Public Prosecutor's office confirms that the fingerprints of the person arrested in San Pedro match those of the person who is supposed to be being held in the maximum security prison, El Pozo, in Ilama, Santa Barbara.  The question now is who at the prison pulled off the switch, releasing the gang member and substituting a look alike to occupy the cell?

Innumerecy in the Tribunal Supremo Electoral

The Honduran Tribunal Supremo Electoral announced today that there were 6.2 million registered voters for the presidential elections to be held this November.  The problem is, there can't be.

Depending on who you want to believe, the Honduran population is, this year, 8.2 to 8.8 million individuals.  In Honduras, you must be 18 to vote.  So the question is, what percentage of the Honduran population is under 18?  That number turns out to be 42% of the Honduran population. 

6.2 million registered voters equates to about 72% of the current Honduran population.  So the question is, what percentage of the Honduran population is under 18 and therefore cannot register to vote?  That number is about 42% so Honduran demographics means the TSE election rolls are heavily inflated. 

There are about 14% more registered voters than there should be according to demographics.  That is, if 42% of the Honduran population is under 18 years of age and therefore not eligible to be a registered voter, then at most 58% of the population is eligible to be registered to vote, a total of 5.104 million voters, not the 6.2 million the TSE is claiming.  Thats 1.096 million extra voters enrolled that simply cannot not exist.  Yet they apparently do exist on the voter rolls.

But actually its worse, because the 0.2 percent of the Honduran population that's in prison either convicted of or awaiting a trial, cannot vote.  There are no polling places in prison.  A further 0.14 percent of the Honduran population is in active military service, and also not allowed to vote.  The Honduran military aid the TSE by distributing ballot boxes before the election, and collecting and returning them to the TSE.

This excess of 1.096 million voters has built up over the last several years, and at least in part is because the TSE is notoriously bad at its job of cleaning up the voter roles in between elections.  The dead are seldom removed from the voter rolls, and indeed, in nearly every election since 2005 political parties in Honduras have demonstrated that people known to be dead nonetheless somehow managed to vote in presidential elections of 2009 and 2013, votes certified as fair and transparent by the US State Department.

So it would be good if the TSE learned to count and did a better job of keeping up the voting rolls, because some of us can count, even if the President of the TSE, David Matamoros, can't.

Spoiled Ballots Say Something

Honduras has just concluded its national primary elections to choose candidates to compete in the national elections for President, Congress, and Mayorships this coming November. While the official results are not expected before the end of the month, there are some disturbing trends in the voting:  spoiled and blank ballots are becoming much more common.  Spoiled ballots are ones that are defaced by political messages, or vote for more than one candidate for office where only one selection is allowed.  Blank ballots are those that contain no discernible vote.

In the low information, highly politicized elections in Latin America, spoiled ballots and blank ballots mean something.  As Driscoll and Nelson (2014) state:

"Scholars interpret blank and spoiled ballots as resulting from some combination of voter incapacity, where citizens lack the requisite skills or information to cast a valid ballot, and political motivations, when voters deliberately signal their malcontent."

Driscoll and Nelson go on to show that it's less about incapacity in their case study of Bolivian elections, and more about political intentions.  In the Bolivian 2011 election, where 60% of the votes cast were spoiled votes, they conclude that both blank and spoiled ballots are the result of political concern, but that blank ballots were more likely to be from  politically more sophisticated voters.

In Honduras, a quick examination of the Tribunal Supremo Electoral's (TSE) archive of the results of past elections shows that the number of spoiled and blank ballots in general elections oscillates between 4% and 8%.  The rate seems to increase when the candidates are more contentious, as in the election between Zelaya and Lobo Sosa in 2005, and drop when the election is less contentious as in the election between Carlos Reina and Oswaldo Ramos in 1993.

Unfortunately, the TSE archive does not preserve complete data on the primary elections before 2012.  In the  2012 primary, the TSE data show the rate of spoiled and blank votes by political party:

National Party          14.15%
Liberal Party            13.73%
Libre                          5.27%

Yet voter dissatisfaction with Party candidates dropped in the general election of 2013 to 4.88% while overall voter participation rose.

While the full and final results are not yet in, a comparison with this year's reported results to date is nonetheless instructive:

National Party          16.73%
Liberal Party            13.43%
Libre                          6.85%

Honduran press reports indicate a campaign to inflate the number of votes cast in the National Party with at least two videos surfacing showing polling place workers filling out left over ballots and stuffing them into the National Party ballot box.  Twitter was full, after the election, of images of National Party ballots marked with messages against  candidate and current President Juan Orlando Hernandez (here, and here for example). In addition, the TSE has failed to purge voter roles of the deceased, so that even the dead could vote in the primary.

All three parties have strong central administrations that control the degree to which different factions have a say in party positions.  All three parties have had the same faction of the party in control of the central administration since the 2009 coup.

Our interpetation of the data suggests that internal party dissatisfaction with the candidates available is increasing in all three parties, but it's especially notable in the National Party. As Driscoll and Nelson note in their conclusions:

"we show that these votes are intentional demonstrations of citizen dissatisfaction, signaling to elite voters disapproval of the electoral process."

To write these voters off as anomalous is to risk loosing the confidence of the voters that brought them to power. A study of where these spoiled and blank votes come from could be used by a smart political party, as a cue to where it should concentrate its efforts to consolidate Party support.

Los Cachiros testify to bribes paid to Tony Hernandez

Devis Rivera Maradiaga testified in Federal Court in New York today that he met with Antonio "Tony" Hernandez, brother of President Juan Orlando Hernandez, and was promised that he would get government contracts for one of his cartel's companies if he paid Tony Hernandez a bribe.  Today's testimony came during Fabio Lobo's sentencing hearing.

Rivera Maradiaga in the testimony today testified that Tony said he would use the government contracts to help alleviate the debt the administration owned los Cachiros in exchange for a bribe.  Apparently Rivera Maradiaga recorded his conversation with Hernandez, and turned that tape over to the DEA.  He didn't state when the conversation took place.  However, because he recorded it, we know it took place sometime between December, 2013 and 2015 when Rivera Maradiaga was acting as an informant for the DEA.  Rivera Maradiaga said:

"Tony Hernandez was going to help us by paying some money to INRIMAR which the government of Honduras owed."

INRIMAR was the company that los Cachiros formed at the urging of Porfirio Lobo Sosa to receive government money from contracts for construction.  Porfirio Lobo Sosa was president of Honduras until January 27, 2014 when he was succeeded by Juan Orlando Hernandez.

Tony Hernandez has been implicated in numerous previous investigations into the drug trade.  He featured prominently in testimony Ramon Sabillon, a former police commissioner, swore was part of a conversation he had with a member of the Valle Valle cartel.  In that conversation, he was referred to as "The Brother of The Man".  He tied Tony Hernandez to the AA Cartel, run by the Ardon brothers in El Paraiso, Copan, Honduras.  The AA cartel collected money given to the Presidential campaign of Juan Orlando Hernandez from their drug trafficking.

Tony Hernandez personally defended two Colombians caught in a raid at a grow operation in the Department of Lempira.  Somehow the two prosecutor's who investigated the case were re-assigned to another part of the country just before the trial, leaving an unprepared prosecutor to pursue the case.  The judge then gave the Colombian's a preliminary dismissal of the charges and ordered them released from jail.  They then fled the country.  A later investigation of the case showed that a $150,000 bribe had been paid to the judge to release the Colombians.

Tony Hernandez was also linked with the drug trade by Captain Santos Orellana.  At the time Santos Orellana was named as a person of interest by the US Embassy.  He voluntarily came in to talk to the DEA, and later said on Honduran television that they interviewed him about a plot to kill the US Ambassador to Honduras, James Nealon.  They asked him if he could tie Tony Hernandez to the case.  They also questioned him about a helicopter found in Brus Laguna that had been used to transport cocaine.  He reported that he was told it had been used both by the then Defense Minister, Samuel Reyes, and Tony Hernandez.

Devis Rivera Maradiaga Testimony part 3

We are reading and summarizing the high points from the nearly 3 hours of testimony that Devis Leonel Rivera Maradiaga gave in the sentencing hearing of Fabio Lobo in Federal Court in New York.  Our source is the trial transcript published by El Heraldo.  This is part 3.

After lunch, Devis Rivera Maradiaga resumed his testimony. talking about how Fabio Lobo had asked him to introduce him to other drug traffickers that he might help out the same way he'd helped los Cachiros.  Devis Rivera introduced him to Carlos Lobo, at Carlos Lobo's house in San Pedro Sula.  Rivera dropped Fabio Lobo off at the meeting, and afterwards heard from Carlos Lobo that he was employing Fabio to help get back some properties of his that had been confiscated, and that Fabio was going to introduce him to Oscar Alvarez's secretary, a lawyer. For these services Carlos Lobo paid Fabio Lobo $100,000.

4. Q. Now, I would like to direct your attention to the fall of
   
5. 2013. Did the defendant help with a cocaine load that arrived
   
6. in the Colon Department around that time?
   
7. A. Yes, sir.
   

In the fall of 2013 Devis Rivera called Fabio Lobo for help with a drug plane carrying 1050 kilograms of cocaine.  When asked why, Devis told the court:

1. A. Because it was a larger shipment. Because I needed his
   
2. protection. I knew that having him with me, everything would
   
3. go well and I felt better supported if I was with the
   
4. president's son.
   

They met in Tocoa, Colon.  Fabio and his security detail arrived in 3 blue Toyota SUVs.  All the SUVs had sirens.  The drug plane landed in Farallones, near Ironia on the land of Ton Montes on a private landing strip owned by Miguel Facussé.  The landing became compromised because the police raided the hacienda where the cocaine was to be stored. A military police officer named Fortin alerted los Cachiros to the police raid and the fact that the plane had left its GPS pinger on and it showed up on radar. A truck with all the cocaine arrived in Tocoa and Devis Rivera went to get Fabio Lobo.  Fabio was being driven by armed military police officers in all three SUVs and they used their sirens to get past a police checkpoint between La Ceiba and San Pedro Sula.

Devis Rivera got money from Digna Valle to pay Fabio Lobo $50,000.  However, Fabio asked for more because General Pacheco needed a cut.  However, Fabio Lobo didn't get any more money.  Devis Rivera testified that he notified Fabio Lobo about 5-8 other drug shipments just in case he needed help with any of them.

6. Q. Did OFAC sanction you and the Cachiros at some point?
   
7. 24  A. Yes, sir.
   

Devis Rivera went to Fabio Lobo with concerns in 2013 about Honduras's plans to enforce the OFAC sanctions.  He met with Fabio Lobo and Oscar Najera in the Hotel Plaza San Martin in Tegucigalpa.  Oscar Najera agreed to talk to Pepe Lobo about the sanctions.  Fabio Lobo agreed to talk with his cousin Palacio Moya who was head of the government department that would confiscate los Cachiros property.  Fabio left for two hours and came back with a list of properties and bank accounts that the Honduran government was going to confiscate.  Devis Rivera paid Fabio Loco between $50,000 and $70,000 for the list, with an understanding that the money would be split between Fabio, Oscar Najera, and Palacio Moya.  Fabio Lobo recommended they destroy all the paperwork they had on the companies that were about to be confiscated, and said that if Devis Rivera wanted to visit the zoo animals while the zoo was being confiscated, that someone named Cesar who worked in the San Pedro Sula office of the OABI would be happy to take him there and get him in.

The Rivera Maradiaga family, with advanced warning, cleared out the computers and paperwork from the assets going to be seized, emptied the bank accounts, and moved vehicles.  After the companies were confiscated, Devis Rivera began to fear for his life, and fear extradition.  In December 2013 he began to record his meetings with Fabio Lobo and became an informant for the DEA.

Devis Rivera Maradiaga Testimony part 2

We are reading and summarizing the high points from the nearly 3 hours of testimony that Devis Leonel Rivera Maradiaga gave in the sentencing hearing of Fabio Lobo in Federal Court in New York.  Our source is the trial transcript published by El Heraldo. This is part 2 of 3.

A few months after the meeting with Pepe Lobo, Devis met with Fabio Lobo in an office in Tegucigalpa.  Fabio gave them a set of contracts to review, and they paid him the bribe due on each one.  Later analysis showed they were contracts that had already been awarded to other companies, who had already carried them out.

Q. Did you have any meetings with the defendant where you discussed drug trafficking explicitly?
A.Yes,sir.

In 2012 Devis met with Fabio Lobo in Catacamas, Olancho.  At the time Fabio told Devis that his father wasn't "helping him out" because los Cachiros were helping Fabio.  By "helping" Devis said he meant participating in drug trafficking.  Fabio told him that the airport in Aguacate, San Esteban could be used as a landing site for drug planes.

Aguacate has a landing strip because it was a CIA base originally, built in the 1980s to assist with the Contra war in Honduras and Nicaragua.  It housed both the CIA and Honduran military torture cells where suspected communists were tortured and murdered.  Five clandestine cemeteries were later discoved at the site.  Between 1988 and 1999 it was reportedly the landing site for numerous drug planes, and the Honduran military stationed there would carefully offload the drugs.

Fabio Lobo told Devis that he would speak with the military base commander about having los Cachiros drug planes land at Aguacate.  However, it turned out that the base commander said it wouldn't work because of the work done there during the Zelaya administration that prepared it to become a public airport with cargo and passenger terminals.

On another occassion Fabio took Devis to a clandestine airstrip somewhere between Catacamas and the Patuca river.  They went by helicopter, along with a half brother (unnamed) of Fabio's to measure the landing strip and see if it was appropriate for their use in the drug trade.  However, when Devis showed the strip to a Venezuelan pilot working for him, the pilot said it was not usable because it was in a valley between two tall mountains and he'd be afraid of hitting them on landing or takeoff.

1. Q. Now I would like to direct your attention to 2012. Did the
   
2. Cachiros control a landing strip in the Cortes Department?
   
3. A. Yes, sir.
   
4. Q. Did the defendant ever help you with a cocaine shipment
   that came to that landing strip?
5. A.Yes,sir.
   

Devis Rivera testified that Fabio helped them in 2012 with a 400 kilogram shipment of cocaine that arrived by air from Apure, Venezuela to the landing strip in Cortes.  Devis Rivera called Fabio to come to San Pedro Sula and bring his security because they were going to transport some cocaine.  When Fabio got to San Pedro, he was directed to go stay at the Playa hotel in Puerto Cortes, where Devis Rivera picked him up and took him to his beach house in Chachaguala, on the Caribbean coast of Honduras.  Fabio told Devis Rivera he had spoken with the San Pedro Sula Police commander who had volunteered to kill any police operations along the highway where the drugs had to be transported.  Devis and Fabio drove to Choloma to meet a truck with the offloaded cocaine from the plane and then escorted the truck to La Entrada, Copan, making $800,000 - $1 million profit.  Fabio received an AR-15, an armored SUV, and $20,000 - $30,000 dollars as his pay for that day.  Devis Rivera also paid the same amount to Ramon Matta, the son, as payment for fitting out the SUV.

Ramon Matta is the son of Ramon Matta, a drug dealer kidnapped by the DEA from Honduras, convicted of drug running in a US Fedral Court, and now in a Federal Prison.  Matta was kidnapped by the DEA because at the time there was no extradition between Honduras and the US.  Ramon Matta, the son, took over his father's property, which includes an hacienda with an airstrip in Olancho.

Devis Rivera Maradiaga Testimony part 1

Now that El Heraldo has published a transcript of Devis Leonel Rivera Maradiaga's testimony at the sentencing trial for Fabio Lobo in New York, we are getting more information about the Lobo family involvement, and that of the current Security Minister, Julian Pacheco Tinoco.  As the testimony is long and detailed we'll break our summary of it into several posts.  This is post 1 of 3.

2. Q. Generally, how did you and the Cachiros obtain assistance
   
3. from Honduran politicians?
   
4. A. By paying them.
   

Devis Rivera Maradiaga told the court that he was involved in the drug trade from 2003 to 2013, and that los Cachiros was headed by his brother, Javier, and himself.  They started out as Transportation cartel, moving small quantities of drugs in cars.  They received the drugs both via coastal boats and via airplanes.  In the period 2009 - 2013 they moved more than 20 tons of cocaine from Olancho to Copan, where they gave it to the Valle Valle cartel.  They relied on Honduran law enforcement for protection and for paid assassinations.  They relied on the Honduran military for information about police operations, radar clearance, and for security.

Devis Rivera Maradiaga is from Tocoa, Colon.  He states he was aided by a Congress person, Oscar Najera, and Juan Gomez, Adam Funes (Mayor of Tocoa) , and Hidence Oqueli.

1. Q. Are you familiar with a man named Porfirio Lobo Sosa, who uses the nickname Pepe?
2. A. Yes.

1. Q. Did you and the Cachiros receive assistance from Pepe Lobo
   
2. and the defendant during that time frame?
   A. Yes.
   
3. 
   
4. Q. What did you do to get that assistance?
5. A. We paid them.
6. Q. More than once?
7. A. Yes.

Devis Rivera told the court that he met with Pepe Lobo, an ex-President of Honduras, for the first time when Pepe Lobo was running for President in 2009. At that time his brother Javier paid Lobo Sosa $250,000 - $300,000 as a bribe.  The money came from Javier's drug operation.  Devis was not present when the money was paid, and only knows about it.  Javier told him the first bribe was sent to Lobo Sosa using Javier's father, Isidro Rivera,  Lobo Sosa's brother, Moncho Lobo, and Juan Gomez.

An additional bribe was paid to Lobo Sosa in 2009.  Javier asked Devis to go to Tegucigalpa and join him and Juan Gomez in a hotel room.  Juan Gomez was advising Javier and Devis what to say to Pepe Lobo about what they wanted from him.  They then left the hotel, near Congress, and traveled to Lobo Sosa's house, El Chimbo,  in Tegucigalpa,   Javier asked Lobo Sosa about the first bribe, and Lobo Sosa thanked him for their support.  Javier asked for help with Oscar Alvarez, who in 2009 was investigating los Cachiros.  Javier also asked for protection for the organization, and protection from extradition to the United States.  They also talked about the shell companies Lobo Sosa suggested they set up to receive government contracts as a way of paying them back for the first bribe.  At the end of the meeting Juan Gomez handed Lobo Sosa a stack of 500 lempira bills about 10-12 inches tall, telling Lobo Sosa it was from all of them.  When they returned to their hotel, they received delivery of a suitcase with $200,000 - $250,000 in cash in it.  The money was, Devis understood, from another drug trafficker who lent Javier the money.  Javier gave the suitcase to Juan Gomez, who in turn, gave it to Lobo Sosa's security detail.

Finally they got down to Fabio Lobo's involvement.  Jorge Lobo, Fabio's cousin, introduced them to Fabio.  Jorge told him that Fabio was looking for people to award government contracts to since his dad had just won the election.

2. Q. Were you interested in government contracts at that point?
   
3. A. Yes.
   
4. Q. Why?
   
5. A. For money laundering.
   

About a week after the conversation with Jorge Lobo, Devis and Javier met with Jorge and Fabio Lobo in Trujillo. Fabio explained that he was going to get government contracts awarded to them for a bribe of about 10-20% of each contracts value, which would be paid, in part, to the various heads of the government agencies that awarded those contracts.

Devis then talks about a third meeting with Pepe Lobo in Tegucigalpa.  Juan Gomez arranged the meeting.  Devis met Juan Gomez at the Plaza San Martin hotel, and found that Oscar Najera, a Congress person from Colon was there.  In the ensuing conversation, Devis said he was made to understand that Najera was there to join them in their meeting with Pepe Lobo because Najera wanted a government job in the new administration.

The same day they went to Pepe Lobo's Tegucigalpa house and met with him.  Fabio Lobo was there as well.  They talked of government contracts and how Pepe would not extradite anyone during his term as President.  Devis said that Lobo Sosa told them not to worry about protection, that if they needed anything to talk to Juan Gomez, who would in turn notify Fabio Lobo, who would then talk to then General Julian Pacheco Tinoco who was head of the military intelligence unit.  During the meeting Fabio called General Pacheco to tell him to expect a visit from him later in the day.  The meeting closed with a discussion of the company Devis and Javier would set up to get government contracts:  INRIMAR.

Los Cachiros name Honduran Ex-President as Protector

One of the leaders of Honduras's Cachiros drug cartel testifying at the trial of Fabio Lobo told a Federal judge yesterday that he paid enormous bribes for protection to both Porfirio Lobo Sosa, ex-President of Honduras, and to his son, Fabio.

Devis Leonel Rivera Maradiaga, one of two brothers identified by the US Treasury as the leaders of the Los Cachiros drug cartel in Honduras spent over 3 hours on the stand in the trial of Fabio Lobo for drug trafficking in the US.  Los Cachiros operated as a cartel in Honduras from 2008 to 2013.

During his testimony, Rivera Maradiaga was asked if he had received assistance from Porfirio Lobo Sosa, to which he replied "Yes" indicating that the first time was in 2009 when Lobo Sosa was still a Presidential candidate for the National Party.  Rivera Maradiaga testified that he paid Lobo Sosa $250,000 - $300,000 for that initial protection as a campaign contribution.  Rivera Maradiaga also mentioned a second meeting with Lobo Sosa where he gave him a packet of 500 lempira bills "eight or twelve inches high".  Rivera Maradiaga also testified that he was present at a third meeting, post election, with Lobo Sosa in which Lobo Sosa promised not to extradite him to the United States and said he would give them government contracts to pay back the bribe they gave him during the campaign.  It was at this third meeting that Lobo Sosa designated his son, Fabio Lobo, as his intermediary for Los Cachiros and made him their contract for security.

Rivera Maradiaga testified that Fabio Lobo helped him with security arrangements on two occasions.  In 2012 Fabio helped Los Cachiros with a 400 kilogram shipment of cocaine that arrived by plane.  The second time, in 2013, it was a ton of cocaine.  Fabio Lobo received a payment of $30,000 for the first shipment, along with several vehicles and an AR-15.  Rivera Maradiaga says Fabio Lobo "asked for a bit more for the second shipment because he had to pay the Chief, that is General Tinoco."

Police Corruption Abounds in Honduras

A criminal gang of Police in Honduras have continued to serve since 2003 when they're names became known in an investigation about a group running guns to the FARC in Colombia.  Several are now or have been high ranking Police executives.

On July 6, 2003, then Congress person Armando Avila Panchamé was arrested while fleeing the crash of a drug trafficking airplane in Olancho.  The plane had landed on the ranch of Ramon Matta, son of the Honduran drug lord with the same name who was arrested and extradited illegally to the US in 1998.  Panchamé was arrested along with 10 others.  The vehicle he was driving had attracted police interest because it had been seen a few months earlier near Arenal, Yoro, at the scene of another drug plane crash.  After his arrest, Panchamé waived his immunity, and was tried and convicted and sentenced to 20 years in prison.  He was shot to death by another prisoner in prison less than a year later.

Panchamé was the second National Party Congressperson in a month to be arrested for drug trafficking that year.

Also in 2003, Police officer Exequial Antonio Estrada Izaguirre sent a report to the head of the Police Investigative unit, Coralia Rivera de Coca, detailing the misbehavior of a number of his fellow officers in Monjaras, Choluteca.  It seems Inspector Leonel Enrique Matute Chavez was stopped along the road there and his vehicle was found to contain more than a hundred weapons of various calibers to be sent to Rodrigo José Londono, in Colombia, to pass into the control of the FARC.  The arms were being sent by Panchamé to a drug plane that was to land in Choluteca to exchange them for money.

This report listed their high level contacts in the police used by Panchamé:  Ramirez del Cid, Napoleon Nazar, somebody Sauceda, somebody Sabillon, all of whom were present when the drug plane landed in Choluteca, so that nothing would go wrong if the Honduran police or DEA found out. These names should be familiar to you from previous posts about police involved in crime organizations.  All of them have multiple accusations of criminal involvement in known cases in Honduras, yet all of them have continued to rise in the Police ranks.

A confidential US State Department memo at the time concludes that Avila Panchamé was "offered up" as a sacrificial lamb "in an effort to demonstrate to the US the GOH's commitment to combating drug trafficking and corruption at the highest levels" much as the Valle Valle and Rivera Maradiaga were for the current government.

The police investigation has remained open and there are entries in the file through 2016, but it remained buried in police files until this year, along with evidence that someone tried to have the files expunged during the last few years.  Three of them became the Police Commissioners before retiring. Ten have been either removed through the Police cleanup process or suspended.  Two more were caught in criminal situations and removed.  But 15 of them remain active in the police.

UN Concerned New Criminal Code Violates Human Rights

President Juan Hernandez is urging the Honduran Congress to pass his package of reforms to the penal code, saying that opposition to them is just politics.  Among those are changes to the law so that the Police and Military have immunity from being prosecuted for the use of force, and another change that criminalizes protests as terrorism.  Needless to say the UN Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights (OHCHR)  has grave concerns about three of the changes.

First the OHCHR is concerned about changes to the definition of terrorism in Article 335 of the Codigo Penal.  The changes adds to the paragraph on terrorism:

"Apply the penalties from the preceding article to those who as individuals or as part of a criminal organization of any type, that seeks to assume the powers that belong to the State such as taking territorial control, the monopoly on the legitimate exercise of the use of force by the different institutions of criminal justice, causing fear, putting in grave risk, or systematically and indiscriminately affecting the fundamental rights of the population, or any part of it, the internal security of the State or the economic stability of the country."

For those who haven't been paying attention, every Honduran government since the coup has asserted that protests such as the Torchlight Marches were violating the fundamental rights of the population because protesters blocked the streets.  The change in the law criminalizes as terrorism protests against the government.  The OHCHR agrees, and suggests that the law make a more narrow definition of terrorism:

"The UN has shown over and over the necessity for the States to limit the application of anti-terrorism measures to the field of acts of authentic terrorism, as specified in the Doctrine, comparing practices in laws, and the Special Relator of the UN for the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental liberties in the struggle against terrorism in 2010."

The OHCHR also has concerns about the changes to Article 222 of the Penal Code referring to extortion.  They point out the new law, as written, strengthens the penalty to 20 years to life in prison.  This ignores the Honduran Supreme Court guidance that calls for a penalty that is proportional to the harm caused called for in their review of the proposed law.  The Honduran Supreme Court also indicated in their review of this proposed change that it felt that increasing the penalty would not significantly serve as a deterrent to lower the incidence of extortion.  Furthermore, the law defines extortion as terrorism, which for the OHCHR is just wrong.  Extortion is never, per se, automatically an act of terrorism.  Such an equation breaks the spirit and international norms in the struggle against terrorism. It significantly restricts the processual and penal guarantees violating the principles of necessity and proportionality through the way it restricts the rights of the accused and prisoners, the OHCHR concluded.

Finally the OHCHR suggests that changing the law to create impunity for law enforcement officials who use use their weapon in the line of duty need to be reconciled with a respect for human rights.  As article 25 is modified to read, law enforcement officials would have immunity from prosecution any time they fired their weapon in the line of duty.  The OHCHR points out that this creates a situation of impunity for officials who resort to the arbitrary excessive use of force, perform extrajudicial killings, torture, forced disappearance, and so on.  The OHCHR goes on to point out that if they approve this reform, they will be in violation of international treaties and norms to which the government of Honduras is signatory.

So naturally, the National Party is all for said reforms.  PAC, PINU and Libre have come out opposing the reforms, and elements of the Liberal Party are split on supporting the package of reforms, with a final vote set for Tuesday.

Indigenous Leader Murdered

An Indigenous leader and pre-school teacher of the Tolupan in Honduras was murdered yesterday by five unnamed attackers in his home in the Montaña de la Flor community of La Ceiba.  José de los Santos Sevilla was a son of recently deceased leader Tomas Sevilla.

Sevilla was active in the community in bringing electricity and a hospital to Orica, and in maintaining the Tolupan beliefs.  The Mayor of Orica, Rosy Alexander Rodgrigues, said that the La Ceiba band was the most advanced [modernized] of the Tolupan bands of the Montaña de la Flor.

Jose de los Santos Sevilla is the first Tolupan leader from Montaña de la Flor to be murdered according Rodriguez.

The Public Prosecutor's office dispatched a team to investigate the murder.

Drug Runners Vouch for the Corrupt in Honduras

Its a case of those linked to the drug trade vouching for those linked to corruption.  Today Security Minister Julian Pacheco Tinoco said that he would keep Police Commander Felix Villanueva in his post as head of the Honduran civilian police force.

Pacheco Tinoco has been linked by a DEA informant's testimony in a trial of Colombian drug runners to the drug trade.  The informant identified Pacheco Tinoco as the person he talked to to assure the safe transhipment of a cargo of narcotics ultimately headed to the United States.  Speaking about keeping Villanueva in his post as Police Commissioner, Pacheco Tinoco said:

"This was never in doubt.  He's always been at 100 percent.  We have 100 percent confidence in him; we believe in him."

This is not completely a surprise however.  When Villanueva presented his personnel file for review, he used three lawyers who advise the Minister of Security as his personal references.

Felix Villanueva, on the other hand, based on an investigation by the Direccion de Investigación y Evaluación de la Carrera Policial (DIECP), has an amassed wealth that he cannot explain.  They accuse him of illegal enrichment in a report.  In fact, they accuse 29 police officers of having amassed wealth they cannot account for.  Three of the high level officials alone, including Villanueva, amassed 27.7 million lempiras ( about $1.35 million ) that they cannot account for.  The report, DECC-EP-92-2012, states that Villanueva alone has 2.3 million lempiras ( about $115,000 ) that he cannot account for.  That report dates from 2012, five years ago. This report was submitted to the Tribunal Superior de Cuentas, which has never acted on it.

Several of the officers identified as having amassed wealth they could not account for have been fired from the Police, but not Villanueva, who was allowed to continue as Police Commissioner even after it was revealed that Villanueva himself ordered that police personnel files be cleansed of all accusations of abuse or corruption, including his own personnel file.  This came to light because though he filed paperwork stating he had no complaints, the Public Minister's Investigation Police force (DPI in Spanish) still had records of such complaints and produced them.  This is another case that languishes in the Public Prosecutor's office.  It has not been investigated.  Villanueva has not been asked to make a statement.

So the drug runners are now vouching for the corrupt in the Honduran government of Juan Orlando Hernandez.

Seventh Arrest in Murder of Bertha Cáceres

Honduran Police from the Agencia Técnica de Investigación Criminal (ATIC) announced that they have arrested a seventh person in connection with the murder of environmentalist Bertha Cáceres in Honduras last March.  Henry Javier Hernandez Rodriguez, a former member of the Honduran military, was traced to Reynosa, Tamaulipas, Mexico, where he was working in a barber shop.  We first learned his name last May, when the Public Prosecutor met with representatives of the Consejo Cívico de Organizacion Populares e Indígenas de Honduras (COPINH).  At that time he was identified as having participated in the murder of Cáceres, but had not yet been located.  Hernandez Rodgriguez is currently being held by Mexican police, but is expected to be sent back to Honduras as early as tomorrow.

Honduran Security Minister implicated in US Drug Trafficking Trial

Honduran Security Minister, retired General Julian Pacheco Tinoco, was implicated as being part of a Honduran government drug trafficking ring by a DEA informant according to testimony provided by US Federal Prosecutors at the trial of Efrain Campo Flores and Franqui Francisco Flores de Freitas.

Efrain Campo Flores and Franqui Francisco Flores de Freitas are the nephews of Venezuela's first lady, Cilia Flores.  They have been charged in federal court with conspiring (i) "to import five or more kilograms of cocaine into the United States from a foreign country", and (ii) "to manufacture or distribute five or more kilograms of cocaine knowing and intending that it would be imported into the United States."

The two defendants who were arrested in Haiti had sought to suppress some of their post arrest statements to the DEA and prosecutors.  Some of that evidence was about an October, 2015 meeting between a DEA informant, now deceased, identified as CW-1, and one of the nephews to discuss bringing planes with drugs into Honduras from Venezuela.  A DEA Special Agent, Sandalio Gonzalez, testified that CW-1 was unable to record the meeting, but provided photos showing the two Venezuelan nephews meeting with CW-1 and others.  Agent Gonzalez gave recording devices to two more DEA informants in Honduras, identified as CS-1 and CS-2 and urged them to travel to Venezuela to talk with the nephews and "to record all conversations, negotiations, and discussions of drug trafficking or money laundering".  CS-1 and CS-2 met with the nephews in Caracas, Venezuela, 4 times during October 2015.  A 3rd informant, CS-3 met with them in Honduras in November 2015 to discuss flight logistics and recorded that meeting.

Informant CW-1, known as "El Sentado" because he was confined to a wheel chair, was killed in Honduras in December 2015, shortly after the nephews were arrested.   Informant CS-1, José Santos Peña,  is known as "The Mexican" because he was posing as a representative of the Sinaloa Cartel.  Their co-defendant, Roberto Jesus Soto Garcia, a Honduran, was recorded negotiating the logistics of handling plane loads of cocaine in Honduras. 

Informant CS-1 is José Santos Peña, a Mexican drug trafficker who used to work for the Sinaloa cartel.  Informant CS-2 is his son.  In 2000 Santos Peña was arrested by Mexican authorities and turned over to the DEA, where he turned informant and was working from 2003 to 2016 for the DEA.  During the trial of Campo Flores and Flores de Freitas, Santos Peña testified that he had received around $750,000 from the DEA, and a further $300,000 from other agencies.  At one point, Informant CS-1 was asked during the trial about Julian Pacheco Tinoco:

Prosecutor:  In your work as a DEA informant did you meet with with someone called Julian Pacheco Tinoco?
CS-1:  Yes sir
Prosecutor: In what country did you know Mr. Pacheco Tinoco?
CS-1: In Honduras.
Prosecutor:  Do you know if he has a position in the Honduran Government?
CS-1: Yes sir
Prosecutor: What is that position?
CS-1:  Minister of Defense of Honduras
Prosecutor:  How did you know him?
[At this point the defense lawyer Randal Jackson objected, but the judge denied the objection]
Prosecutor:  How did you know him?
CS-1:  I knew him through the son of the ex president of Honduras, Fabio Lobo.
Prosecutor:  Were you meeting with Mr. Lobo as part of your work as a DEA informant?
CS-1:  Yes sir.
Prosecutor:  What was your meeting with Mr. Pacheco about?
CS-1: It was so that he could give me help to receive shipments from Colombia to Honduras.  He was in charge of a part of the security in Honduras.
Prosecutor:  What type of shipments?
CS-1:  Cocaine.

The Prosecution presented evidence that Campo Flores had deleted a chat session and contact information on his Samsung phone with Pacheco Tinoco. Informant CS-1 also admitted on the stand to lying to the DEA, not telling them about visits to prostitutes and continuing to traffic in cocaine for himself, for which he and his son were sentenced to life imprisonment.

On November 21, 2016, the two nephews were found guilty.

Incompetent Design, Failed Implementation

Another multi-million dollar project funded by international agencies has failed in Honduras, the Trans-450 high speed bus service for Tegucigalpa.  This project, funded by Interamerican Development Bank (BID in Spanish) and the Central American Bank of Economic Integraion (BCIE in Spanish) was supposed to create high speed buses along major avenues in Tegucigalpa.  Originally it was to be completed and in service by 2015.  Today the promise is maybe 2018, if the major obstacles can be overcome.  In reality the multi-million dollar project is all but abandoned.

In 2011 the Honduran Congress passed Decreto 77-2011, a bill that said it would make Tegucigalpa a city with a world-class high speed bus system. At the time only 33  world cities had such a high speed bus service.  The project was to be financed by a BID loan approved in December 2010.  This loan only financed the first of the 3 phase development/deployment plan.  The project oversight committee, established in the enabling legislation was supposed to seek other outside funds to supplement the BID money to finish the project.

The Trans-450 was a high-speed bus project similar to the high speed buses in Mexico City.  These long, articulated buses would run in lanes only they could use along major avenues in the city, and would reportedly remove hundreds of buses from regular traffic.  The project was expected to server 117,000 riders daily.  Ricardo Alverez (National Party) was its chief proponent.

 In early April 2014 Tegucigalpa Mayor Ricardo Alvarez inaugurated the first phase of the project promising residents that by June of that year they would be able to ride the first articulated bus in Honduras.  He said that about half of the money available through BID had been spent on the project so far.  (Inversiones Multiples de Transporte (INVERMUT), the newly formed company created to operate the system, to whom the Honduran Congress granted an 18 year exclusive contract, said that the 21 buses needed to operate the system would arrive in mid April of that same year.
All of that was a lie.  Nothing happened for the next year and a half.  Why?  Supposedly they lacked the funding to continue, which in itself is weird because in 2013 the BCIE had granted a $10 million loan to the government of Honduras for phase 3 of the project.  Alvarez had noted at the inauguration of Phase 1 that only half the BID funding had been spent to date.  BCIE also mentions in their English language page on the funding that the project was also partially funded by the OPEC Fund for International Development, never mentioned in the Honduran press coverage.

Despite the failure of the buses to materialize, or service to begin on the phase 1 part of the project  inaugurated in April, 2014, the City council of Tegucigalpa none-the-less signed an 18 year exclusive concession with INVERMUT that October that among other things, guaranteed INVERMUT a certain level of income, to be made up with Public funds if the ridership was below a certain level..

The buses never started running on Phase 1 of the project because the finalization of that part of the project, the building of access bridges to the stations, the purchase of the buses, etc. couldn't be done until other technical problems were solved.

Phase 3 construction started in 2015, when phase 2 construction was also underway, but phase 1 was never actually finished, or put into service as intended.  Technical issues prevented the construction of a bus parking area, or central terminal.  No bridges had been installed for pedestrians to get to the bus stops located in the center of busy avenues.  No plan had been done for handicapped access, and hence no ramps or elevators had been contemplated.  No one had planned to plant new trees for those that were being removed in the Trans 450 right of way.  The list goes on.

Its the end of 2016, well past the promise date for the extended end of construction.  BID says all their money has been spent.  Yet the system is not yet finished.  Major parts of the technical plan remain, such as a central bus terminal, and bus parking area.  INVERMUT sstill doesn't have the buses.  In late November, 2016, the Mayor of Tegucigalpa said it would be 2018 before the project was open to the public.  The municipal committee given oversight of the project voted 6 to 5 to keep the project going.  The city of Tegucigalpa itself has put a further $3 million into the project.

BID interim representative Rafael Mayen told the Honduran press that:

"In the bank its making us sad and it hasn't pleased us, that which is happening with the Trans 450"

Mayen also took the opportunity to reject any attempt to change the project to a monorail since the space was not designed for a monorail.  He noted the buses are built at the factory, but cannot be brought to Honduras because there's literally nowhere to park them.  The project never imagined or built a parking lot for the buses for when they're not in service!

Meanwhile, Honduras will be paying interest on those $33 million the BID invested in this project beginning in 2018. 

Honduras Structurally Incapable of Fighting Corruption, Impunity!

On Wednesday the Misión de Apoyo Contra la Corrupción y la Impunidad en Honduras (MACCIH) provided their 38 page report on their first six months of operation in Honduras to the OAS.  They did so in a public hearing where representatives of the funding countries like Canada and the US participated, along with a representative of Honduras.  During the opening statements, the Honduran representative, Arturo Corrales,  tried to establish for the record, that :

"Honduras has a clear, holistic perspective [on impunity], the institutionality of civil society and its intermediate bodies and the support of MACCIH, this is the mssion, the project is a complete system...It is worth noting this distinction because this project existed before MACCIH arrived and I assure you it will continue after MACCIH terminates its functions."

While technically correct, on paper it looks like Honduras was doing things to clean up corruption, in practice, this was a smokescreen for more of the same.  In the months prior to the formation and installation of MACCIH in Honduras, the Honduran government, guided by Corrales, Juan Orlando Hernandez, and Ebal Diaz formed the Sistema Integral Control la Impunidad (SICI) as a palliative to quiet the weekly marches of the indignados.  This was a largely hollow proposal that in effect consisted of the Executive branch of the Honduran government holding "hearings" with civil society groups that by and large already supported the existing government.  In the weeks leading up to that announcement, Ebal Diaz, a government advisor spokesperson, made public statements that were counter factual, to the effect that "corruption was already contained" (it wasn't) and deliberately manufacturing false numbers to argue that the Comisión Internacional Contra la Impunidad en Guatemala (CICIG), which is what the indignados wanted for Honduras, was ineffective (it has, to date, been quite effective in identifying and prosecuting corruption and impunity).

The other smokescreen they erected was to allege that corruption during the Zelaya administration was more important, and the Public Prosecutor's office pursued this rather than the mess the National Party governments of the last two administrations created. With the help of the DEA, they proceeded to dismantle the drug cartels in Honduras that had supported the Liberal Party in the 2013 elections. 
 This is institutionality that Corrales was proudly referring to, palliatives and smokescreens that accomplished next to nothing.

Even today there is no institutionality against corruption and impunity in Honduras, or MACCIH would not be necessary.  The Honduran government has neither the structure, nor the constitutional separation of powers, nor the laws, nor the legal system to combat corruption and impunity.  Corruption is present in virtually all levels of government, from the military to the Executive branch itself.  It has lacked this institutionality since the 1981 constitution brought an end to military rule. It was designed that way.

In fact, we know Honduras was ineffective in fighting corruption because the US State Department scored it low in the fight against corruption and impunity in ranking it for possible inclusion in the Millennium Challenge Grants every year since 2010.

If MACCIH succeeds in its mission, Honduras might have an effective system to fight both corruption and impunity going forward. But all of its suggestions will need to be in place, including changes to the Honduran constitution, for it to work.

So Corrales was at best exaggerating in saying that Honduras's institutionality already exists to fight corruption.  It didn't, and still doesn't.

Honduran Supreme Court defines CIDH ruling

The government of Honduras, specifically its Supreme Court, has chosen to willfully defy an order by the InterAmerican Court of Human Rights (CIDH in Spanish)  to reinstate the 3 Honduran justices dismissed because they did not support the 2009 coup in Honduras.

The CIDH found on 2015 that the government of Honduras willfully violated the rights of Adan Guillermo Lopez Lone, Tirza del Carmen Flores Lanza and Luis Chévez de la Rocha to due process, and ordered that they be reinstated to similar positions with full back pay.  In addition, the court ordered the government of Honduras to repay the legal expenses incurred by the Centro por la Justicia y el Derecho Internacional (CEJIL) and the Asociación de Jueces por la Democracia (ADJ).

On November 10, the last day the International Court gave Honduras to reinstate the justices with full back pay, the court tweeted:  "The monies ordered by the the CIDH to be paid complying with the sentence in the case of Lopez Lone and others versus Honduras has been consigned to a bank."  It also posted to its website a statement that said in part:

"The statement made to the beneficiaries we undertook to inform them of the decision of the Justice Branch that it was not possible to reincorporate them because in actuality there are no open positions which are equivalent to those that they held at the moment of their firing, nor with their salaries and benefits.  [This is] because the positions they held are now occupied according to the needs of the Executive branch by individuals who have developed a judicial career.  Adding to this is the lack of positions that fulfill the parameters stipulated in the sentence.  Taking into account all the foregoing, there's nothing else to do but look to the alternate solution, contemplated in paragraph 299 of the [CIDH] sentence, given the impossibility of re-employing them, to fix the additional indemnitization for each of them for a year after they were dismissed."

In so stating, the Honduran Supreme Court chose to avail itself of paragraph 299 of the order which says if they cannot be reinstated to similar positions, Honduras must pay each of them the equivalent of $150,000.  In doing so, CEJIL alleges the Supreme Court of Honduras lied.  They have, all this year, been appointing justices to similar ranked positions in courts within Honduras that at any time it could have reinstated these justices.  In fact, in the month of October alone CEJIL says they appointed 4 judges of similar rank and benefits to two of those dismissed unjustly, to courts in San Pedro Sula.  

The Honduran Supreme Court could have complied with the order, but chose instead to prevaricate and avail itself of a monetary solution, doing further harm to those it denied due process.  This speaks to the corruption that is this Supreme Court in Honduras.

Ambassador Nealon doesn't get "democracy"

US Ambassador James Nealon seems to have forgotten that in a democracy, even a weak one like Honduras, you have to actually charge someone with a crime to detain them for long periods of time.  Today Nealon tweeted the word "Lamentable" with a link to a newspaper story announcing the release of Captain Santos Rodriguez Orellana from detention by the Honduran military.

The US Embassy named Captain Rodriguez Orellana along with six others in a press release, as persons the US was investigating for their links to corruption and narco-trafficking on October 7.  At that time the Honduran Military suspended him from his duties providing security to the Joint Command in Comayaguela and confined him to quarters.

They did not silence him however, and on Monday, October 10th he began talking with the press, calling in to the TV Program Frente a Frente and programs on Radio Globo to talk about why he was detained.  He said he went to the Embassy on Sunday, October 9 for questioning by 3 DEA agents.  At that time they asked him about his knowledge of a plot to kill the US Ambassador by bombing his house, and if he could tie President Hernandez's brother, Tony Hernandez to that plot.  Rodriguez Orellana told the Honduran press that he told the DEA he knew nothing about a plot against Ambassador Nealon, nor could he tie Tony Hernandez to such a plot.  He did allow that while he was part of the Honduran Army's security force engaged in drug interdiction in 2014 they confiscated a helicopter in Brus Laguna that tested positive for having transported cocaine, and that an informant told him the helicopter belonged to Defense Minister Samuel Reyes and Tony Hernandez.  That helicopter bore a valid Guatemalan registration with a fake US registration number decal covering it.

This is not the first time that the Honduran President's brother, Tony Hernandez, has been linked to narco-trafficking. We covered such a link in April this year.

Jenifer Lizeth Bonilla, the wife of Captain Rodriguez Orellana, told Criterio, a Honduran weekly publication, that the DEA asked her husband to connect Tony Hernandez to a helicopter captured in August, 2014 by the Honduran military.  It tested positive for drugs.  She said her husband knows nothing about it and has asked the Honduran Ombudsperson for protection.  She said:

"These problems for Captain Rodriguez Orellano come from the time he captured the helicopter, that according to sources, this helicopter was that of Samuel Reyes and Tony Hernandez"

Defense Minister Samuel Reyes challenged her to present her proof to Honduran authorities. Bonilla showed a Whatsapp conversation Rodriguez Orellana had with DEA agent Matthews in which Rodriguez Orellana said that the helicopter was one used by both Samuel Reyes and Tony Hernandez.  Rodriguez Orellana phoned in to Radio Globo and said that the day after they captured the helicopter, someone broke into his house and ransacked it.

Captain Santos Rodriguez Orellana returned to duty today after the military found it had no reason to keep him confined to quarters.  There were no formal charges brought against him.

Honduras Still Ignores ILO 169 Requirements

The Government of Honduras made some misleading and false statements in its recent submission to the International Labor Organization (ILO).  In May-June of this year, the ILO held an international conference on Labor, during which the Government of Honduras submitted a report on its compliance with ILO 169, a treaty it signed in 1995.  By Honduras's own claims, it only began to implement the treating in 2011, and the Honduran courts claim that even that statement is false.

You can view the ILO report submitted by the Government of Honduras here on the ILO website.  The Honduras specific section begins on page 152 of the report.

First up is Article 15 reporting, where Honduras reports on its consultations with interested indigenous groups before starting or authorizing any mineral prospecting or exploitation in their territory.  This is what the government of Honduras wrote and submitted (page 153):

"Natural Resources:  In the maritime zone of the Mosquitia, as part of the process of realizing a project to explore for oil and gas, a process a consultation during the period September to November 2013 was adopted; there were 10 consultative meetings with the territorial councils of the Mosquitia.  This practice of previous free and informed [consent] has been implemented since 2011.  Initially it was applied to hydroelectric projects in the Lenca indigenous zone (Intibuca and La Paz).... "

If you didn't know the actual timetable or anything about recent Honduran court decisions, you might be tempted to take those statement at face value.  The government of Honduras did undertake a consultation, staging 10 meetings in the area of the Mosquitia where it planned to carry out oil and gas prospecting, during the months of September to November, 2013 as stated. 

However, ILO 169 Article 15 requires that consultation to take place before any such exploration project is authorized or started.  The Honduran Cabinet voted to approve a contract with BG group, a British oil and gas exploration company now a part of Royal Dutch Shell,  to carry out oil and gas exploration on the 9th of April of 2013, a full six months before any consultation took place.  The Honduran Congress approved the contract in May 2013, five full months before the first consultation.  Thus the entire authorization process took place before any consultation took place, violating the intent and the letter of ILO 169 Article 15, which, to reiterate, calls for prior, free, consultation with interested groups prior to the start, or authorization of any such exploration or exploitation of a mineral resource.  During the post-approval consultation, the Garifuna and Miskito communities involved soundly rejected the project.

Did Honduras carry out consultation? Yes.  Was it as Article 15 requires, prior to the start or authorization of any such mineral exploration or exploitation? No.  Honduras did not lie in its submission.  It did however, stretch the truth to make it sound like it complied with the consultation requirements when it did not.

The government of Honduras goes on to state in the next sentence:

This practice of previous free and informed [consent] has been implemented since 2011.  Initially it was applied to hydroelectric projects in the Lenca indigenous zone (Intibuca and La Paz)....

This time we have the word of a Honduran court and the Public Prosecutor's office that this is not true.

This year, the Fiscalia de Etnias, a part of the Public Prosecutor's office that is supposed to defend the rights of the indigenous peoples of Honduras, took the former vice head of SERNA, Marco Johnathan Lainez Ordoñez, and the Mayor of Intibuca, Martiniano Dominguez Meza to court over the approval process for the Agua Zarca dam.

A Honduran court ruled there was no prior consultation in the case of the Agua Zarca dam on the border between the municipalities of Intibuca and San Francisco de Ojuera.  The court said that SERNA did carry out consultation with the residents of San Francisco de Ojuera on December 8 and 9, 2010, but they live downstream from the project.  The residents of Rio Blanco, in Intibuca, where the dam was to be constructed, were never consulted, nor were they invited to the consultation session in San Francisco de Ojuera. On March 24, 2011, SERNA issued a 50 year Environmental License for the Agua Zarca dam without consulting the resident of the town most impacted by the dam.

This may have been because DESA, the company petitioning for the rights to build the project, listed its location as San Francisco de Ojuera, but the maps submitted with the project clearly show it being built on the border between the two municipalities, with most of the disruption falling to the upstream commmunity, Rio Blanco.  Only the actual power generation facility was located in San Francisco de Ojuera.  The dam, and a diversion canal that took water out of the river for power generation, were in Rio Blanco.

Ordoñez was convicted in June of this year of illegally giving the Agua Zarca project its environmental license in violation of the ILO 169 rights of the residents of Rio Blanco.  A second charge of abuse of authority has been filed by the same Fiscalia de Etnias against Lainez Ordoñez in a second Lenca dam dispute, this one on behalf of the Lenca community of Gualjiquiro in La Paz. 
The mayor was charged with abuse of authority for having given the municipal permission to construct the dam without consulting with the people in Rio Blanco.  His case is still pending. 

So the Honduran Courts demonstrate that the second statement, about beginning consultations in 2011 with the hydroelectric projects in the Lenca region is false.  As the UN Relator on the Rights of Indigenous People noted in the ILO report (page 155):

even in the cases where the indigenous people have title to their lands, they are menaced by claims from third parties who make claims over indigenous land and protect park lands for development of mineral and energy projects, model cities, and tourism.

The ILO commission which took this testimony issued a set of conclusions that noted that in the 20 years since Honduras signed the treaty, there has been no progress to formalizing rules for prior, free, and informed consultation of the indigenous peoples of Honduras when development or exploitation projects will impact their communities (page 182).  It urged the government of Honduras to develop policies, rules, and procedures to guarantee the prior, free, and informed consultation of indigenous groups in all cases where it applies.