Hondurans Pour into the Streets Demanding Zelaya's Return

[Joanne98]

The day started out full of joy, as thousands of Hondurans converged in
front of the National Institute of Pedagogy, intent on marching about
three miles to the airport to greet the plane that was supposed to
bring deposed President Zelaya back to Honduras.

"Our
president's coming home today, this is going to be a great day," said
Jose Rodriguez, a campesino who came from Santa Barbara with his
farmer's group to join the anti-coup movement. The military tried to
stop them from getting to the capital, so they had to divide up and
take local buses from town to town. "It took us two days to get here,
and we slept outside in the forest last night, but we had to be here,"
said Rodriguez.

A group of young girls came with their church
from Olancho. They were determined to greet Zelaya, who they said was
sent by God to be president. "The Cardinal is against our president,
but he doesn't represent many of us in the religious community. Our
pastor is against the coup and so are we," said Alejandra Fernandez, a
23-year-old university student.

I asked why she supported
Manuel Zelaya, or "Mel", as his supporters call him. "The government
said he broke the law and is guilty of 18 crimes," she said. "Do you
know what they are?" She pulled out her cell phone and started to read
from a list: He raised the minimum wage, gave out free school lunches,
provided milk for the babies and pensions for the elderly, distributed
energy-saving lightbulbs, decreased the price of public transportation,
made more scholarships available for students." Suddenly a crowd
gathered around us and started chiming in. "He fixed the roads," said
one. "He put schools in remote rural areas, like my little village,
that never had them before," added another. "He let anyone go into the
Presidential Palace and converted it from an elite residence to the
people's house," said another.

"You see?," Alejandra smiled.
"He is guilty of even more then 18 crimes. That's why the elite classes
can't stand him and why we want him back. This is really a class
struggle."

The march wound its way through the streets of
Tegucigalpa, gathering more and more people along the way. The massive
crowd sang and chanted slogans like "No somos cinco, no somos cien.
Prensa vendida, cuentenos bien" (We're not five, we're not 100, you
sold-out press, count us well")-referring to the fact that the
mainstream press has been ignoring or grossly undercounting the
movement that had been holding street demonstrations every day since
the June 28 coup.

"I've never had anything like this in my
lifetime," said an ecstatic Miriam Nunez, a 46-year-old teacher from
Tegucigalpa. "Look around you-you can't even see the beginning or the
end of this march! It's full of teachers, students, campesinos, union
workers, indigenous people. One thing the coup succeeded in doing is
bringing together the social movements in a way that never exited
before in this country."

What made the march particularly
exciting is that as it approached the airport, there were rows and rows
of soldiers and police in riot gear blocking their path. Each time the
security forces tried to stop the crowd, there would be negotiations
with the police, who would finally back down and allow the protesters
to get closer and closer to the airport.

Luis Sosa, a
university professor and anti-coup leader, was one of those negotiating
with Police Commissioner Mendosa. "Mendosa and I went to school
together 20 years ago and we play soccer together every Sunday. So he
knows that if his men get rough with us, there will be hell to pay next
Sunday," laughed Sosa. "But seriously, we're trying hard to maintain
discipline among our ranks-taking sticks and rocks away from people who
want to provoke violence-and the police say that as long as we are
peaceful, they'll let us go all the way to the airport."

Sure
enough, the crowd made it to the airport peacefully and waited
patiently for Zelaya's plane to arrive. Suddenly, a plane flew in low
and circled around the airport. The crowd went wild, cheering and
jumping up and down, but became angry when they saw that the plane was
not able to land. Military vehicles and soldiers were on the runway,
making it impossible for the pilot to maneuver safely.

On the
far end of the airport, a group of mostly young people tried to get
through the fence to make their way to the tarmac. According to Al
Jazeera cameramen Alfredo Delara, some of them started throwing stones
and bottles at security forces. The troops responded by lobbying tear
gas and then firing their weapons in the air. Suddenly, at least one
soldier pointed his weapon directly at the crowd.

"A young boy
was hit right in the head, his brains gushing out. He was killed
instantly," said Delara. "His mother came running, screaming
hysterically 'My son, my son, they've killed my son.'" Others in the
crowd were wounded and it was reported that another person was killed.



Between
the violence and the fact that President Zelaya was forced to fly on to
El Salvador, the crowd became despondent. The organizers tried to keep
up their hopes. "Perhaps the United Nations will send peacekeepers,"
one of the leaders shouted through the sound system. The crowd cheered
and yelled, "We want the blue helmuts, we want the blue helmuts."

"Can
you believe this?," asked indigenous leader Berta Caceres, her eyes
welling up with tears. "Now they are killing our people. Where will
this end? We need the international community to step in and stop the
crazy people who have stolen our country."

Meanwhile, another
piece of news circulated-that the government had just moved up the
curfew from 10pm to 6:30pm. The crowd rushed to disperse, fearing they
could be arrested for violating the curfew. But they vowed to keep up
the fight. "We will be marching again tomorrow, come join us," the
leaders announced. "This struggle is not over."

"If they think
that were are going to give up, they are badly mistaken," said Caceres.
"The events of today make us more determined than ever to overthrow
this terrible coup."

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http://www.opednews.com/articles/Hondurans-Pour-into-the-St-by-Medea-Benjamin-090707-944.html

[fascisthunter]

1. I Think the Hondurans will regain Power

and reseat Zelaya

[Joanne98]

2. I hope so. The coup leaders are speaking at the National Press Club today.

The nerve.

[fascisthunter]

3. they learned hubris from their American counter-parts=neocons

once again Judi, thank you for posting on Democratic Underground. You are a treasure...

[struggle4progress]

4. knr

:kick: