Honduras: Coup d’état? No.

Virtually the entire world is condemning the “illegal coup” in Honduras. But this was not an illegal coup. To the contrary, what happened in Honduras was the legal removal from office of a president who was attempting to subvert the country’s constitution in direct violation of the orders of the Supreme Court. It was in fact, a triumph for the rule of law.

Moreover, this event highlights the continuing failures of Obama diplomacy, and it gives us the final piece we need to understand our new foreign policy. . . the Barack Doctrine.

Honduras The Country

Honduras, a banana and coffee exporting country of 7.5 million, has been a democratic republic since 1979. Its current constitution went into effect in 1982.

The Honduran government is broken into three parts: an executive, the judiciary, and a unicameral legislature. Constitutionally, each of these branches is independent, though historically the executive has dominated the other two.

The Honduran Supreme Court has fourteen constitutional duties. These include the power to declare laws unconstitutional and the power to try high-ranking government officials, including the president, when the National Congress declares that there are ground for impeachment.

Zelaya Becomes President

Recently deposed President Jose Manuel Zelaya Rosales first became active in the Liberal Party of Honduras in the 1980s. He served three terms in Congress, during which time he advocated decentralizing the government and giving more power to communities.

In 2005, Zelaya (left) ran for president. His campaign focused on a populist platform of “citizen power,” with promises to fight corruption, increase transparency in government, combat narco-trafficing, maintain economic stability, and reduce poverty. During the campaign, he often attacked the rich, despite being wealthy himself. He was elected on November 27, 2005, with less than a 4% margin of victory, the smallest margin ever in a Honduran election. His Liberal Party won 62 of the 128 congressional seats.

The Honduran president may serve only one four-year term. The constitution explicitly prohibits any attempts to amend this term limit. Thus, his term must end in November 2009.

Why He Became Unpopular

Zelaya’s government struggled from the beginning. He doubled the minimum wage, but businesses refused to pay it. Violence surged in the country by 25%, making Honduras one of Latin America’s deadliest countries. He also managed no appreciable reduction in poverty.

Zelaya’s government also has been dogged by allegations of corruption. Several officials are accused of accepting kickbacks. In 2007, Zelaya refused to submit a budget to the Congress, thereby eliminating all transparency with regard to the budget. This fueled allegations that his allies were stealing from the treasury.

In February of this year, the U.S. State Department, declared that “official corruption continues to be an impediment to effective law enforcement and there are press reports of drug trafficking and associated criminal activity among current and former government and military officials.”

In the last two days, foreign minister Enrique Ortez directly accused Zelaya’s government of involvement in the drug trade: “Every night, three or four Venezuelan-registered planes land without the permission of appropriate authorities and bring thousands of pounds . . . and packages of money that are the fruit of drug trafficking. . . We have proof of all of this. Neighboring governments have it. The DEA has it.” The DEA has refused to confirm or deny the allegations.

Zelaya’s Hard Left Turn

After being elected, Zelaya sought financial assistance from the United States. When his request was refused, he turned to Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who provided subsidized fuel and $300 million in aid.

Zelaya then steered Honduras into Petrocarbide, Chavez’s oil subsidy scheme, and the Bolivian Alternative for the Americas -- a Chavez-led trade bloc meant to counter-balance American influence -- even though Honduras had signed the Central American Free Trade Agreement in 2004 and even though the United States is Honduras’ largest trading partner.

When the media criticized his moves, Zelaya accused them of doing so for the sake of economic gain and he ordered all radio and television stations to broadcast each of his daily speeches.

His government also declared that it had a right to monitor phone conversations, though it claimed to stop this practice after a month of public outcry.

All of this even turned his own party against him. Roberto Micheletti, the Head of Congress and a member of Zelaya’s own Liberal Party, became his biggest critic.

The “Coup”

With his term nearing its end, Zelaya decided to hold a referendum on amending the constitution to let him stay in office. This was identical to the process used by the quasi-dictators in Venezuela, Bolivia, Nicaragua, and Ecuador, to gut their own constitutions.

To make this happen, Zelaya’s people went around the country getting signatures on a “citizen’s power survey,” upon which voters would indicate that they wanted to amend the constitution. Many of these were gathered by civil servants, who were told to bring in a quota of “voluntarily” signed requests or lose their jobs. Signers were told that if they did not sign the survey, they would be denied health care or needed medicine.

With the survey complete, Zelaya announced his intention to hold a referendum. However, Honduran law provides that only the congress can call for a national referendum. Thus, the Supreme Court struck down Zelaya’s plan as illegal.

Disregarding the Supreme Court, Zelaya asked Venezuela’s Chavez to provide the ballots, which he did. In response, the attorney general declared that he would prosecute anyone involved in carrying out the referendum. Regardless, Zelaya ordered General Romeo Vasquez, head of the country’s armed forces, to distribute the ballots. The general refused and Zelaya fired him, along with the secretary of defense.

The Supreme Court immediately ruled this illegal and ordered the General reinstated. Zelaya refused. Choosing instead to gather his supporters, lead a mob that broke into the military installation where the ballots were stored, and tell his supporters to distribute them.

The following morning, Zelaya was arrested by the army, on the orders of the Supreme Court, and sent into exile in Costa Rica. In accordance with the constitution, Roberto Micheletti (right) was then named the acting president.

Two days later, before the United Nations, Zelaya stated that he would not hold the referendum, if he were allowed to return, and that he would not remain beyond his first term, even if offered the chance. Micheletti, however, states that Zelaya will be arrested if he attempts to return.

Triumph Of The Rule Of Law

So was this a coup or was Zelaya impeached in accordance with the rule of law?

The army arrested him. But it did so under the Supreme Court’s order. The Supreme Court has the right to impeach the president when the National Congress declares that there are ground for impeachment.

In this instance, the grounds for impeachment were Zelaya’s violation of the constitution. Not only did he illegally attempt to amend the constitution, but he did so in direct violation of the Supreme Court’s ruling on the constitutionality of his actions. This violates his oath to defend the constitution.

Moreover, he gave the army an illegal order and then fired General Vasquez when he refused to carry out that order. He compounded this by refusing to reinstate General Vasquez in defiance of a second Supreme Court order.

Thus, the Supreme Court had the right to impeach Zelaya and it certainly had grounds to order him impeached.

If there is a legal infirmity here, it is that the Congress did not refer the impeachment to the Court. However, the Congress did adopt the Court’s action after the fact. Thus, while the form may not have been accurately carried out, the substance of the law certainly was. Also, there is no reason the procedures could not be repeated now if needed.

Further, the current government has strictly followed the constitution since the arrest. The Congress met in emergency session and designated its president as the interim executive as stipulated in by law. It also affirmed that presidential elections set for November will go forward.

Thus, the “coup” was in fact, done in defense of the rule of law and substantively followed the rule of law -- an opinion shared by Dan Taylor at the Huffington Post. Therefore, it is incorrect to call this action “illegal,” as Obama had done.

The World Reacts Ignorantly

At this point, only Israel and Taiwan have recognized the new government. The United Nations has denounced the coup, the Organization of American States has given Honduras 72 hours to reinstate Zelaya or be kicked out of the OAS, the World Bank has cut off financial support, and Hugo Chavez has threatened an invasion to stop this “yanqui coup.”

(** update ** Israel now denies that it has recognized the new government.)

Obama’s Position

Supposed-constitutional scholar Obama immediately described the coup as “not legal” and declared that the United States believes that Zelaya “remains the president of Honduras.” He declared his reasoning as follows: “It would be a terrible precedent if we start moving backwards into the era in which we are seeing military coups as a means of political transition rather than democratic elections.” Of course, as you saw above, this reasoning is backwards -- ousting Zelaya was the democratic process.

To apply pressure, Obama has threatened to cut off $215 million in aid and has cancelled joint military exercises. Though it is not clear what Obama would do if Chavez does invade Honduras, as the United States is bound by treaty to defend “the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Honduras.”

The Barack Doctrine

Interestingly, Obama had a chance to solve this crisis before it happened. Indeed, the administration has confirmed that they were in discussions with both parties for several days trying to prevent this. Yet, clearly, his efforts met with no success. Once again, Obama's talk-centric foreign policy is shown to be threadbare. One wonders why the supposedly influential Obama could not convince Zelaya even to delay his illegal actions to avert this crisis?

And since Zelaya is the instigator, why does Obama now blame the legal government that acted in accordance with its responsibilities under the constitution? And why does he mischaracterize what has happened?

During his campaign, President Obama made a big deal of criticizing leaders who are elected democratically but don’t govern democratically. He had a chance here to stand up for those ideals. . . but he didn’t.

Obama speaks of the rule of law, but he didn't defend it here. He speaks of freedom, but as with Iran and China, he backs the tyrant. Why?

This is the Barack Doctrine. I will outline this further next week, but suffice it to say right now that Obama wants no disruptions in foreign policy. Change is fine, so long as it is not disruptive. If you want to know how Obama will respond to a future crisis, know that (1) he will always favor the status quo and (2) he will always oppose the party that causes an issue to become of international interest. This is the Barack Doctrine: call it turning a blind eye, call it the “Current World Order” or call it the Doctrine of Hope for No Change.
So much for liberal idealism.

More on this next week. . .