Honduras: Campesinos Expelled Like 'Vermin'

[Judi Lynn]

Honduras: Campesinos Expelled Like 'Vermin'
Written by Giorgio Trucchi, Translated by Peter Lackowski
Wednesday, 15 December 2010 21:59

Soldiers and police armed to the teeth violently evict defenseless peasant families. The presence of human rights organizations and national and international journalists prevents, this time, a new blood bath in the Bajo Aguan.

The dawning of Thursday, December 9, brought terror to dozens of campesino families of the Bajo (Lower) Aguan River Valley. Several contingents of soldiers and police, armed to the teeth, evicted them without any judicial order, nor the presence of an administrative judge, from the settlement of Paso Aguan, on the left bank of the Aguan River.

The delegation of human rights organizations and national and international journalists arrived at the place just as the the repressive forces of the state were finishing their "work."

Dozens of troops, armed with M16 rifles and even with an M60 machine gun were forcing men, women, and children to abandon the place that they had recovered some months ago from the hands of Miguel Facusse, a wealthy landholder who grows oil palms.

More:
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/honduras-archives-46/2820-honduras-campesinos-expelled-like-vermin

[Judi Lynn]

1. A State of Siege in Northern Honduras: Land, Palm Oil and Media

A State of Siege in Northern Honduras: Land, Palm Oil and Media
Written by Peter Lackowski
Tuesday, 30 November 2010 18:42

Palm oil is a convenient source of biodiesel, and oil palms grow very well in the valley of the Bajo (Lower) Aguan River of northeastern Honduras. This valley is the home of some of the poorest people in one of the poorest countries in the Americas. Their poverty is due, in large part, to the fact that most of the land in the region has been appropriated by powerful corporations controlled by members of the Honduran oligarchy, led by one of the richest and most ruthless of them all, Miguel Facusse.

Facusse owns massive tracts of land throughout the country, much of which he has obtained by fraudulent deals made possible by the corruption of government officials. In the early 1990's, 5000 acres in the Bajo Aguan was awarded to peasants after the closure of a military base on which personnel were trained by the USA in the use of torture and other methods of repression. Facusse bribed "community leaders" to make deals to sign this and other land over to him for bargain prices. He also employs hundreds of heavily armed "security" personnel who are used to intimidate and murder those who stand in his way, so any peasants who objected to this process were "neutralized." (resistenciahonduras.hn November 16)

One of the reasons that President Manuel Zelaya was deposed on June 28, 2009 was the fact that he was actively carrying out a program of land reform, implementing laws that were on the books but never enforced, actively investigating and rectifying cases of fraud and corruption that had deprived campesinos of their land. Miguel Facusse was a prominent supporter of the coup, along with other members of the oligarchy who opposed Zelaya's land reform, his raising of the minimum wage, and various other things he was doing to benefit and empower the popular classes. Zelaya's ouster put an end to these efforts.

With or without the help of president Zelaya, the peasants of the Lower Aguan were living in such extreme poverty that they had no choice but to continue with their struggle for land. Around the beginning of 2010 they began invading the land in question and planting subsistence crops. Facusse's thugs moved in and began killing and beating peasants and destroying their property. But the current president, Porfirio "Pepe" Lobo, who came to power in an election tainted by repression, censorship, and massive abstention, was faced with the task of obtaining diplomatic recognition for his post-coup de facto government, and this did not look good to international observers. So Lobo began negotiating with Facusse and the campesinos to use public funds to buy him off. Meanwhile, he moved thousands of Honduran troops into the region to set off fears of a massacre that might be carried out under the cover of clearing out "illegal squatters." The clear intention was to motivate the campesinos to accept the terms of whatever deal he struck--or else. Of course the troops were said to be there in the interest of public safety, to prevent acts of "terror" by those lawless, land invading peasants. In April 2010 Lobo announced a deal according to which the campesinos would get a lot less land than they were demanding, with the added requirement that half of that land would have to be used to grow palm oil, and that the palm fruits would have to be sold to Facusse for processing.

More:
http://upsidedownworld.org/main/honduras-archives-46/2800-a-state-of-siege-in-northern-honduras-land-palm-oil-and-media

[Judi Lynn]

2. Don't forget what US ambassador Hugo Llorens said about the illegal coup.

From the same article:

The power of the corporate media was demonstrated at the time of the coup that deposed Zelaya, when the corporate newspapers constantly ran stories about how he wanted to change the constitution so as to be president for life. While this could conceivably have been in his mind, what he was actually calling for was a poll to ask whether the country needed a new constitution. The possibility of his being re-elected was no more than a hypothetical proposition, and it would only have been possible after a new president and a new constitution would have been in place. But by constantly repeating the claim that he wanted to be re-elected for life, they introduced enough confusion so that people who didn't like his policies had a superficially plausible reason to accept a blatantly illegal military coup.

One of the secret diplomatic cables made public by Wikileaks was an analysis of the legal basis of the coup sent to Washington by the US ambassador, Hugo Llorens, in July 2009. He described it as illegal and unconstitutional, saying that "...the actions of June 28 can only be considered a coup d'etat by the legislative branch, with the support of the judicial branch and the military, against the executive branch." The revelation of the ambassador's honest (though secret) assessment of the coup has caused quite a stir in Honduras.