Honduras: Elections as coup laundering
by TRNN

On June 28th, 2009, the elected President of Honduras, Manuel "Mel" Zelaya, was removed from office. The day was significant because it was to be the first day that all the people of Honduras would be asked their opinion by the government. They were to vote on whether or not they wished to see a question on the upcoming general election ballot regarding re-writing the country's constitution, a document which severely limits public participation.

 

Five months later, the election is going ahead, but Mel Zelaya is pinned in the Brazilian embassy and the resistance movement that rose up by the hundreds of thousands in the days following the coup is almost invisible after more than 4,000 documented human rights abuses including: assassination, rape, torture, illegal detention, and repeated attacks on anti-coup media outlets. The regime is looking to renew itself through Sunday's elections, and is preparing to lock the country down militarily in order to do so. But while the movement is not as visible as it was before, this report shows that it is very much alive in the minds of the capital's inhabitants who are boycotting the elections.  

 

 

 

Report from Tegucigalpa: Coup regime rides police state repression into elections hoping for clean slate