Editor's note:
Jorge Dávila Miguel has a degree in Journalism since 1973 and has maintained a continuous career in his profession to date. He has postgraduate degrees in Social Information Sciences and Social Media, as well as post-university studies in International Relations, Political Economy and Latin American History. Currently, Dávila Miguel is a columnist for El Nuevo Herald, on the McClatchy network, and a political analyst and columnist for CNN en Español. The comments expressed in this column belong exclusively to the author. See more at cnne.com/opinion
(CNN Spanish) --
And it has returned as a family karma. Because there is a new president in the country, Xiomara Castro, who is not related to Fidel, but is related to Manuel Zelaya, the president that the coup plotters took from his house, at dawn, on June 28, 2009, in his pajamas, tip of M-16 and shooting, to Costa Rica, according to Zelaya, passing through the airport of the Honduran military base with US operations in Palmerola, Honduras – the US government has denied its participation in the flight – always in pajamas, and no one can yet understand what that plane was going to do there, as the kidnapped president has claimed.
And so it returns now, twelve years after the coup against Zelaya, his wife Xiomara Castro, as left and right periodically and inevitably return in that ritual swing that democracies offer to satisfy each one for a while.
To millions I meant, who suffer so much when the opposite party is in power, that they usually pray to the Almighty if they are from the right, or to history if they are from the left, that their people be forever free and sovereign, full of hopes and riches, through the simple, definitive and permanent defeat of the opponent.
Political tension prior to the inauguration of Xiomara Castro as the new president of Honduras
The alternation of power – they say that in democratic language – which is precisely what many want to end.
The new president, who describes the previous Honduran government as a dictatorship, returned thanks to said alternation, guaranteed under the previous government in decree No. 35-2021.
I know of no such democratic dictatorship.
Castro will take office on January 27 in a sports stadium.
And he says that there will be no government spending – arguing that there is no reason to make superfluous expenses – and has inspired a popular collection to cover the expenses of the presidential inauguration, which he also assures will be sober.
Honduras' external debt in 2009 reached US$2,444 million and at the end of 2021 it amounted to US$11,321 million, something that former President Zelaya attributes to corruption in the three governments that succeeded him.
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The coup against Zelaya aroused considerable worldwide rejection. Even the OAS condemned it, suspending Honduras. When that was not Luis Almagro in charge of the organization, but José Miguel Insulza, a prestigious Chilean politician, who was its general secretary from 2005 to 2015. President Barack Obama also condemned the situation, but later he stopped mentioning the subject of the coup of State. Then Zelaya accused him of changing his position "relegating an agreement with the legitimately recognized government [his] to the background."
Although very close, Zelaya is not the chosen one but Xiomara Castro, in reality. And what does the elected president announce in her government? The construction of a democratic socialist state, the defense of human rights, with the Honduran human being at the center and participatory democracy as its functional mechanism, different from the conception of representative democracy, where the voter will directly decide on the fundamental changes in the country instead of its representatives, who after being elected often forget about the voter.
It is true that participatory democracy is charming in its presentation and essence, although it remains to be seen how many referendums would have to be called to fulfill the purpose of an Executive with a well-defined policy, and according to its quite extensive and detailed government program in 68 pages .
The first act that the elected president announces, for the same day of her inauguration, is a proposal for a constitutional referendum, to change the Honduran Magna Carta.
Something similar to what Manuel Zelaya intended to do, a few days after his kidnapping, with his "fourth ballot box" and which was the reason why the Honduran Supreme Court, in a blunt measure, declared his disqualification, "legalized" the action of the troops - which Zelaya affirms were hooded - and deport the president of his country, his home and his position.
There are similarities in the projections of the governments of Manuel Zelaya and Xiomara Castro, who won after two attempts, but 2022 is not the same as 2009. The social components of the Free Party coalition, which has won the elections in alliance with the The Salvador Party of Honduras, led by Salvador Nasralla, is different from the Liberal Party that accompanied Zelaya in 2006, because now the business and industrial sectors, the middle class, and numerous professionals, with different ideas and positions, are in government.
Former President Zelaya, involved in a confusing episode for allegedly carrying thousands of dollars while leaving the country
To what extent Xiomara Castro's government will radicalize remains to be seen. What importance will your husband, coordinator of Libre, have in the decisions and final orientation of the Government? For now, Castro has already announced that he will establish relations with Beijing, against the grain of what Washington favors, which is the traditional relationship with Taipei, something that China will not accept. Venezuela will attend the inauguration on January 27. It remains to be confirmed whether the president of Cuba, Miguel Díaz-Canel, will attend the ceremony. Zelaya never hesitated to recognize his friendship and collaboration with Fidel and Raúl Castro, Cuba supported Zelaya with teachers and doctors. And one of the striking slogans of the president-elect is the Guevarian "Hasta la victoria siempre",which became a main part of the ideological phraseology of the Cuban Revolution after the execution of Che in La Higuera, Bolivia.
How rosy will the next tide be in Latin America?
Xiomara Castro
