The Crisis As I Am Seeing It

I feel that many of the news organizations have been misrepresenting the situation here--at least from where I see it here on the ground level. It seems that no news agency--either here or abroad--is able to take anywhere near a neutral stance on the crisis here and only paint one of two extremes. I will try to state what I am seeing with as little personal opinion as possible (though I do preach a little bit at the end). I am not a politician; I am not a human rights activist; I am a pastor/teacher. Most of my life is spent around Hondurans and I have a front row seat downtown in the capital. All that being said, here are my humble (hopefully) comments. Honduras is stuck between a battle of egos amongst self-interested politicians and are having to take sides between two corrupt evils. Though (at least here in the capital) a large majority are still choosing the new government.
Mel Zelaya was voted in as a center candidate from the liberal party. He remained a fairly bland president without people hearing too much good or bad about him for the first two or three years. During this last year of presidency, he has moved along more socialist ideals making decisions to join ALBA (a Latin American leftist trade agreement), making use of a lot of rhetoric, and making good use of his Leftist connections (Chavez gives us gas.) His most recent hoorah was the "Cuarta Urna" (the referendum to change the constitution). The Cuarta Urna was a vote (or better said, a survey) to see if the Honduran people would like to vote to have a committee rewrite the constitution. If the Cuarta Urna passed, they would add this vote along with the electoral vote this November. If that vote passed, they would scratch the rest of the election and start over. The specific part that Mr. Zelaya wanted to change is one of the four unchangeable parts of the Honduran constitution--one term limit for presidents. A lot of Latin countries have this specification (or did) as somewhat of a response to elected leaders holding on to power. However, it has never been specified what all this committee would change in the constitution.
The week before the vote of the Cuarta Urna (scheduled for June 28th) things became tense. On Tuesday, the Supreme Court declared the vote unconstitutional. Mel Zelaya declared that he was going through with the vote anyway--meaning he was ignoring the checks and balances of the three branch system and acting illegally. He asked the head of the armed forces, Romeo Vasquez, to assist him in the vote on Sunday. Mr. Vasquez said that he could not follow an illegal order. Zelaya then fired him. Three other leaders of the military resigned in support of General Vasquez. On Thursday, a plane came in from Venezuela with boxes of voting "materials." The vote being illegal, Mr. Zelaya was not allowed to retrieve them. National TV showed Zelaya entering the air force base in a mass of supporters and taking the boxes. That night, Congress met on national television (not a custom here). They re-hired General Vasquez and then discussed in length on whether or not they were going to throw a coup ("golpe de estado"). This was Thursday night. By Saturday, it was estimated that 80% of Honduras was against the Cuarta Urna and people were getting tired of Mel Zelaya. After Congress's meeting I heard people talk of the possible coup very hopefully.
Then came Sunday morning. As you are aware, the vote didn't happen. The military came into Mr. Zelaya's house and arrested him and shipped him to Costa Rica. However, this was not a military coup. The military was only following orders. It was technically a coup--it was certainly not an impeachment!--but it was ran by the government. This had become a showdown between executive branch and the legislative and judical branches. Technically, coups are not illegal in some Latin American countries. I had been told that of Guatemala (Rios Montt still has a position in the government) while living there and also of Honduras long before this current crisis became underway. I am not sure if they have a clear impeachment system. Regardless, they handled it all very poorly. While they arrested and exiled the president, they shut off power for the entire country. We woke up to absolutely no news or lights with military planes flying over head (which we still have flying over the capital throughout the day). They also instituted a curfew and we are still under it (it was 9pm-6am and is now 10pm-5am; this last Sunday night it started at 6.30pm) They turned the power on at noon, and then news channels started to drop like flies. Monday there was only one newspaper on the stands--a popular rag that doesn't have much substance. Now, at least most of the newspapers are back and I think one or two of the tv stations. Though the news has been obviously muted. The news are vastly one sided and often the channels are oddly lacking in any news. However the local ones that they shut off were often propoganda for the other side. There are no center news agencies here.
However, the international news has not been fair on what they have reported from Honduras either. Everything they have been saying is true, but they are leaving out some big truths as well. There have been lots of pro-Zelaya protests--some of them semi-violent (throwing rocks at store windows, robbing Duncan Donuts of their...donuts, that sort of thing). They have not been showing the anti-Zelaya, pro-government protests. These are much, much larger and always peaceful. I have seen both sides demonstrate here downtown and I feel perfectly safe with the latter but the former are very loud and all the shop keepers roll down their gates (sometimes with customers inside) to keep from getting hit with rocks. Though I am against many of the things the new government has done, a majority here (though by no means all) are ok with it if it means no more Zelaya. The new president by the way, Roberto Micheletti, was the President of Congress and the next in line for the presidency legally (Elvin Santos, the former VP, recently resigned so that he could run for president this November). Micheletti is the same party as Zelaya. The other major party and thier candidate (Pepe Lobo) have been oddly silent during the whole crisis. Many of the people here fear that Zelaya was on his way to be like that of his companions--Chavez, Ortega, Castro. Micheletti (though known for being a corrupt man himself) has promised he will not run in November (and we all know promises mean so much in the mouths of politicians...).
Now, many Hondurans feel outraged by the light that they are getting portrayed in the press and by the countries that are condemning them. The shame here is that many of these countries are threatening to cut aid (the US and World bank have already started giving less) and put sanctions. Honduras is the third poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. How does that punish the people who made the coup? The poor suffer for the sins of the rich and powerful. That is injustice. People like Micheletti and Zelaya and politicians using Honduras as a podium for their party, are using the poor of Honduras as tools for personal gain while they suffer. That is sinful.