OPINIONS & EDITORIAL

Monday, January 28,  2002 Online Edition 3

FACT OR FANTASY?

Dear HTW:

This is in response to Lorenzo Dee Belveal's letter to the editor (HTW 1/19/02) . Belveal seems not to be able to sort out reality from his fantasy.

Here is the reality: In 1991 Honduras was selling citizenships to foreigners at $25.000,00 each.These legal transactions were initiated by the government of Honduras for these reasons: First to get $25.000,00 to augment federal expenses, lessen budget deficits and also to invite people whose drive and know-how would promote real estate development, create demand for tourism, and would be capable to assist this country out of its well documented third world status. Just as Honduras welcomed peace core workers and missionaries they needed business expertise and investment capital.

Clearly, this was creative thinking on part of those who were involved in this governmental plan. It helped eliminate cumbersome red tape and jump-started a process beneficial for the sluggish economy.

Consequently Rita Thompson Silvestri was one of the people who followed a legal procedure and did not "fraudulently" obtain a Honduran citizenship for Arnold Morris. She followed an accepted procedure. 

Rita and Arnold are now married, that is true and is not one of Belveal's lies. But I think it is worth mentioning that they and many others like them have diligently worked to help the people of Honduras. I know from personal observation that both Rita and Arnold are taking great interest in the education and welfare of Honduran children by providing scholarships, healthcare and often financial aid and support to parents or extended families.

I can not address myself to `the accusations Belveal levels against former president Rafael Leonardo Callejas since I don't know the facts. 

I do know that Roatan and consequently Honduras has greatly benefited from the diligence and devotion - not to forget business expertise and investment capability - of both Rita and Arnold and others like them. 

Eva L. Brooks, 
Bahia Magazine 
Roatan, Bay Islands 
Via Internet

Lorenzo Dee Belveal and Yellow Journalism to the nth degree

Dear HTW:

A financial writer tries to get even for his failures and vows to smear Honduras for his failures. I am referring to Lorenzo Dee Belveal who in the 1970s bought and leased large tracts of land on Roatan in his own personal name. The land purchases were than as is the case now in violation of the Honduran constitution. The constitution prohibits foreigners from owning land within 40 kilometers of the boarders and in the Bay Islands. The land lease was a tool used by foreigners to try and get around the law. Lorenzo Dee Belveal was one of those investors that tried unsuccessfully to circumvent the law. Lorenzo Dee Belveal also failed as a developer on Roatan when his hotel the Spy Glass hotel in Punta Gorda Roatan failed and was foreclosed on by the Bank. Against this setting of failures Mr. Belveal set out on his well stated journey to try and destroy his perceived enemies.

As for the facts as they exist, exactly opposite to those of Mr. Belveal, Roatanians, especially, identify, former president Rafael Leonardo Callejas as their hero. This former president was instrumental in helping Roatan with major improvements such as the airport, cruise ship dock, and roads amongst others. Whenever former president Callejas speaks publicly it is evident that he is held in high regard by the people not only of Roatan but of all Honduras, as is demonstrated by the overwhelming accolades of the crowds. Lorenzo Dee Belveal in order to accomplish his ends has used this newspapers forum in order to weave a web of some truths mixed with half truths and then full mistruths [lies]. Belveal has stated on many occasions that in 1994 a so called purchase of a Honduran citizenship was arranged. Belveal knows the real truth as his attention was called to copies of the application for Honduran citizenship presented on Mr. Morris's behalf in 1991 [ and not in 1994] copies of these documents are on file at the office of immigration and also published on the web site www.arnoldmorris.com. Mr. Morris received his Honduran citizenship in 1992 and Belveal knows this. Belveal through innuendo has you thinking that U.S.$25,000.00 was some kind of pay off for Honduran citizenship. This money was paid into the Central Bank of Honduras as part of an economic stimulus program, the records are all there. Belveal on countless occasions uses the term that the money as well as a Cadillac sedan was the price paid for safe-haven and to quote Mr. Belveal authoritatively and constantly reported. However the only one doing this so called reporting was Lorenzo Belveal. Mr. Belveal has no evidence of any monies paid by Mr. Morris in 1994 as he alleges or any Cadillac sedan used to obtain citizenship. On several occasions Mr. Belveal was asked to document these allegations and he has failed to do this
In Mr. Belveal's continued effort to mislead the public he has alleged on many occasions that former Judge of Letters Fernando Azcona Schrendel was fired from his judgeship for collusion with Morris in a variety of real-estate scams. The former judge was never fired or asked to leave Roatan as Mr. Belveal alleges, however he did take a leave of absence in order to study for the notary exams. While on Roatan judge Azcona never presided over any case involving Mr. Morris. Again if Mr. Belveal has any evidence of any collusion of wrong doing between Judge Azcona or Mr. Morris other than those he perceives in relation to his illegal land purchases he can present it to Honduras right here for public scrutiny.

Mr. Belveal continues to allege that Mr. Morris has participated in Real Estate manipulations and scams in order to paint a picture of wrong doing in order to mislead the public again. A check of court records. on Roatan has failed to produce any such evidence. Nor of any such accusations of ever being lodged against Mr. Morris or his wife Rita or his stepson Emilio. The records do however indicate that in ten years on Roatan there has never been a report of any customer complaints against Mr. Morris or his wife or stepson. Mr. Morris as well as his wife have always paid for any lands they own and have public registered documents for them, it is Mr. Belveal that has the illegal land documents in violation of the Honduran constitution. It is Mr. Belveal that is trying to manipulate the court of public opinion in order to as he has said, to get even with Honduras. It is Mr. Belveal who illegally converted a land lease from the Cooper family into a brand new and fresh Dominio Pleno in order to sell the land. Copies of these documents along with detailed instructions on how to circumvent the law as sent by Lorenzo Dee Belveal to his representative on Roatan, are reproduced on the web site www.arnoldmorris.com. As for Belveal's allegations regarding Rumors of payoffs to top political figures for protection, these rumors are and continue to be spread by Mr. Belveal without any truth in his hope that if in print long enough perhaps someone will believe him.

Rita Morris
Via Internet

SUPER FARMACIA
AN EXEMPLARY BUSINESS

Dear HTW:
I have lived on the island of Guanaja for almost five years and have been a diligent reader of your newspaper. For the most part, when people write letters to the paper it is to complain about living conditions, lack of law enforcement, poor government, teachers without pay, etc. There are many problems in Honduras and I only hope that the president-elect can help bring the country around.

I want to comment on one of the most impressive businesses I have come across in Honduras. Even for the United States, this company would stand out as exceptional. I have been dealing with Super Farmacia out of San Pedro Sula operated, in part, by Javier Siman. I have been impressed with the attention to detail by Sr. Siman, the fast and courteous service and the fine products he carries. I recently had a bad bout with bronchitis and after a series of four penicillin shots the Doctor on the Cay stated I needed stronger medication. 

I have always dealt with Super Farmacia and in the past have ordered all medicines by e-mail, followed by a transfer of money to their account, then transmitting a fax confirming the transfer and in turn receiving a confirmation of my transfer along with the bill of lading number for the airline taking the product to Guanaja from Sr. Siman. Sr. Siman always follows up with an e-mail message to make sure that we received our medication. Anyway, this time I was too ill to make the money transfer and Sr. Siman obliged me by shipping the needed medications along with a bill. This was a Friday and I promised to pay on Monday. Because of his commitment I made sure that the money was transferred on Monday. Sr. Siman went out of his way to accommodate me and true to form sent the medicine followed up with a message inquiring as to my state of health.
If many of the businesses in Honduras operated on the level of efficiency that Super Farmacia does it would be a step in the right direction at least for the consumer. It is very difficult to get parts or goods to our island and many times after receiving the item we find out it is not the correct part but the company involved has our money and we are out of luck. This has happened many times and ordering from the mainland is a Russian Roulette situation until Super Farmacia entered our lives. At least we have one company that is trustworthy and operates a business in an efficient and effective way.
Thanks to the entire staff at Super Farmacia and especially Javier Siman.

Sincerely,
Sharon Jones
Guanaja 
Via Internet


   

Futuro seguro/A safe future

He made the best offer of the presidential candidates. 
The offer was from the wounded father of a young Honduran, killed by kidnappers just a few years before. His cry allowed him to break layers of tradition built up in this country over decades. And the Honduran people responded.

His campaign focused on the offer of 'Un Futuro Seguro, a safe future, a right which was snatched from the life of the new president and his family. The campaign promised an end to insecurity and rampant crime. And that message entered the hearts of the Honduran electorate. It's not that Professor Rafael Pineda Ponce ran a bad campaign, it's just that Maduro planned his campaign and message with the help of creative consultants, delivered his message well, and his own history makes him a walking message to Honduras. He brings with him a mythic aura, with a Panamanian touch, successful businessman, a good father and grandfather, many international contacts, strong alliances with Central American businesses, an answer to the lost credibility of National Party candidates, and Maduro's own word.

He takes the reigns in a country hungry for answers to poverty and underdevelopment, worried about rising crime and delinquency that have an effect on everyone.

Put all the questions of the country together, and Maduro listens.

We will never know the pain and tears caused by the loss of a son, the wound Ricardo Maduro carries in his heart. But there is hope that from this pain something good can arise for our country.

Maduro is a successful man, and there is hope that this success can be shared through the presidency with the entire country. His ideas of order and work, expanded opportunity and development are worth fighting for and shine a light of possibility for Honduras.

Ricardo Maduro was knocked down and could have stayed down, but he has chosen to rise up and fight for another future, un futuro seguro.

We know the experience of President Maduro in managing his business as well as in private and national banks. We know our country's limitations, but our requests are fair; peace among Hondurans, honesty in public administration and management, and expanded opportunities for all.

We hope that President Maduro and his administration take the right road and lighten the load for Honduras and her people.

Monday, January 21,  2002 Online Edition 2

Between safety and district attorneys

We have found hard to accept the fact that the Ministry of Public Security, Gautama Fonseca has faced, not for the first time, the nation's Attorney General, Roy Edmundo Medina. 
The causes of these disagreements can have diverse origins and we can only notice: an adjustment in the role of these institutions; jealousies amongst team members; and the manipulation of information that creates desired reactions from the general population, and among some specific sectors.

It is hard to pick healthy fruit in this climate. Deep inside this noisy, turbulent controversy, we perceive a subliminal message, a warning that future law offenders will be treated with the noise of the same trumpet.

Last January 12, the La Tribuna daily pointed out in its editorial that the whole problem revolves around an absurd confrontation, and it concluded saying that the creation of a common front against delinquency is being hindered. A very timely call in the face of strange behavior.

These attitudes aimed at cleaning up and legitimizing the performance of the public organisms in charge of providing law order and fighting delinquency, have resulted in insecurity and an improper relationships between government institutions that are forced to concentrate their efforts on achieving their objectives at the lowest cost possible.

These damaged relationships are very expensive and are ultimately paid for by the private sector. Indeed, the national bureaucracy has not established the cost of their acts. It is important to remember that their badly guided efforts can be faulted in two different ways: for their form and for their cost. No matter how much we think about it, at the beginning or at the end, the tax payer is the one who pays for these faults and his demands are not satisfied.

In light of the above, it is necessary to have a superior authority watching over the state's investment, so that the river resumes its correct course.

We won't be able to evaluate the work of both functionaries for a long time. To establish efficiency, by inclining the balance towards that works according to his budget, is an insurmountable task.

Some information from the "low world" must be established and classified. There is a lot of work to do in this sense, for it is not possible to publicize the "modus operandi" and technology required to have dirty jobs done. Divulging this disgrace would do a great harm to the national and international society, and it would only benefit a few perturbed groups.
In summary, these functionaries have begun a new era of efficiency, and for that reason we should forgive them. But we must also warn them that they should not count on the State's teams for purposes of revenge. Moreover, their working period is about to end. If this is inevitable, a deserved rest is the best recommendation. Their lawyers also have the right not to let anyone rot in jail, considering their defendants are both in their sixties. 
No principle says that the State can not act against itself. By allowing unbalance, organization and the direction of the objectives they were created for lose stability.



Letter from Honduras: A trip in the country

By NIGEL POTTER

I think I know Honduras as well as my own country, at least geographically. In the beginning, I got to know one area, through my work, knew it better than a lot of the locals, but had little time to explore elsewhere. It took me four years to get round to visiting Copan Ruins, the famous Mayan site, which most visitors see in their first week and which many Hondurans have never seen. Then I was involved in a project which took me nearly all over the country and I have got to know it well, though as in the United Kingdom, there are still plenty of places I have not been to. So when my wife told me she had a meeting in some remote part of the department (county, province) where we live but which neither of us knew and invited me to go along for the ride I agreed at once.

We left the house at 4 a.m. paying a man with a pick-up to take us up to the main road, a good hours walk away. We shivered in the chill and mist waiting for a bus once we were there. A lorry passed, skidded to a halt and a door opened. It was a friend who invited us to jump up and join him. An hour later he dropped us off as another turn-off where we waited for another lift. Soon the pick-up with my wife's colleagues turned up and we climbed into the back. It was dirt track all the way, mostly in reasonable condition, which took us through the villages of Humuya, San Sebastian and San Juan. We sped along the flat but it was slow-going climbing up, easing across many small rivers and streams. 

The countryside was magnificent as it was always in Honduras, impressive mountains and forest sometimes lush and green with the recently arrived rains, sometimes so rocky and barren as to be almost a hilly desert though, also now touched with a thin fuzz of green. After a good three hour jolt we reached our destination, a small town, a little Honduran paradise in that there were few signs of poverty anywhere, rather a modest prosperity. It was like one of the traditional paintings you see everywhere here, on sale to tourists and natives alike, hanging up in class - rooms, banks, hotels, sometimes beautifully done, often hack work, but always with the same motif; an idealized Honduras, a romanticized, certainly sentimentalized, village life with traditional adobe and tiled dwellings, outside mud ovens, women walking with loads on their heads, men on horseback and not a glimpse of rubbish anywhere. In this every Honduran's vision? A rejection of the modern, urban world, sticking to the rural, the small slow, unsophisticated self - sufficient community but without the grinding poverty? 

The reality is very different of course, garbage strewn everywhere, too many tumbledown shacks instead of decent housing, foul streams of waste seeping the earth, disgustingly thin and mangy dogs everywhere, drunks lying unconscious in the dirt, filthy, ragged children running about the ubiquitous cement block and tin roof beginning to replace adobe and tiles (a sad loss) or straw roofs (a big improvement), yet the reality is not THAT different, the life portrayed in the pictures is easily recognizable, if it wasn't I could not bear to live where I do. 

But arriving in San Antonio del Norte, one got a glimpse of what things could be like. The heat was humid and oppressive but the houses were large, airy and cool with extensive verandas, beautifully decorated in the traditional manner with the varnished wood and patterned tiles for the floor and parts of the walls. Shops and stores were within, inside a private living room open on the street. You entered a home rather than a business to buy your bar of soap or sack of corn. I joined a family watching a dreadful T.V. soap, swinging in their hammocks. They offered me a chair as I drank a beer and cooled off. They took no more notice of me for which I was grateful while they continued their family - life and watching the Tele. (The secret of their success is not, of course, in such businesses or the fat cattle roaming about but the dollars sent home from migrants and wetbacks from the U.S.).

Outside again, I noticed no one was walking: some were in pick-ups, but most were on horses or donkeys, young and old, female as well as male, alike, often two or three to a horse, taking life slowly and leisurely The dogs were big with shiny coats. It made me almost want to pat one rather than kick or stone it away. There was a little rubbish and it was actually a pleasure to sit in the shade of a large tree in the village square and read a book. My wife's meeting was a long one, so I strolled out of town, down to the river to another shady spot where I continued with may book, accompanied by the music of water rushing over the stones and round the rocks. 

I was reading "Anna Karenina", a big a beautiful novel, a masterpiece indeed. It has, I reflected, more humanity, more wisdom and, come to that, more sex not to mention enjoyment, in two pages than in the whole of "Ulysses" with which I struggled last year, a classical to boredom and pretentiousness.- I am ever the literary Brit no matter how Honduran the context. I look up at the sky where monstrous black clouds threaten a mother of a storm and walk back into town to meet my wife and her colleagues, wondering if we will make it back if all those fords we crossed swell and flood with the rain. We are in luck, the clouds roll away, the sun returns and six hours on, a pick-up, bus-ride and a walk later, we're outside our house, in the dark, knocking on the door, waiting for someone to unbar it and let us in.





   

HARSH OPINION CONCERNING EVANGELICALS

Dear HTW

Mr. Potter assures us in his letter of 29 December, that when the "blessed creeping nuns" and later on the evangelicals took care of his wife and son, it was just another "public relations" exercise on their part. This same harsh logic could also prompt his readers to conclude, that when in the same letter he writes about "doling" out medicine to his neighbors, it is just a ploy used by an arrogant expatriate (self-described on 22 December as "whitey-pink, high brow, firm jaw"), to ingratiate himself with the local indigenous population.

Tom Noonan
Comayaguela

MEDICINAL PLANTS MAY BE ONLY CHOICE AVAILABE TO POOR HONDURANS

Dear HTW:

Michael McGuire (December 15, 2001) is too hard on medicinal plants. Of course, there are risks but his warnings are too alarmist. Most herbal plants are taken in the form of teas or used as ointments and poultices and generally their action is gentle. The toxicity of some medicinal plant such as apazote is usually well known and they are used with care and caution. Besides, what are the alternatives? For vast numbers of Hondurans the only form of medication are herbal medicines. Modern pharmaceutical products are often unavailable and when they are, are far too expensive. This ironically may be one of the few advantages of being poor as such modern drugs are often far more toxic and dangerous than any medicinal plant. I am often horrified by how those who can buy their medicines from pharmacies, abuse and misuse them, injecting them or gobbling them down like candies with reckless abandon. Doctors themselves must take some of the blame for this as their prescription policies are sometimes not far short of murderous. It is well known that in the developed world where the control of medical drugs is greater, there is still a terrible price to pay for the use of such powerful medicines in the form of adverse reactions often leading to permanent disability and death. For all their risks, we are much better off and safer for using medicinally plants.

Nigel Potter
Marcala, La Paz

HARVARD MODELS COULD BENEFIT ECONOMY

Dear HTW:

Harvard boys study the successes and failures of economic models as they are applied around the world. While Brenda and Honduras don't benefit from economic models in the papers of Harvard boys, the application of the more successful of those models in Honduras would benefit both greatly.

Brenda might be interested in knowing about other "models" who, decades ago, may have washed windows on street corners or performed some other labor. Some of those "models", when they were older, went to other countries to work as maids cleaning the bathrooms and dirty underwear of the wealthy. These "models" were from places like Hong Kong, Singapore and South Korea. Today their grandsons and granddaughters are accountants, business executives or factory workers, and, while they're hard at work, someone from another country is in their comfortable homes cleaning their bathrooms and dirty underwear.

Brenda, when she gets older, might be interested in knowing how those people went from cleaning bathrooms and dirty underwear to having their bathrooms and dirty underwear cleaned in two generations. Too bad the elected officials and journalists in her country aren't interested.

Ralph Nelson
Via Email

CALLEJAS GOING TO COURT

Dear HTW,

Hopefully the readership of this publication will forgive this reporter's reticence to accept the news blurb in La Tribuna cited in the January 12 edition as presaging a meaningful end to the cloud of suspicion that has hovered over Rafael Leonardo Callejas since his departure from the presidency of Honduras.

No less an experienced Honduras-watcher that Jesse Helms, long-time Chairman of the U. S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, is on the record as having identified Callejas as the man who gave Honduras "the most corrupt government it has ever had in its long and sordid history of official corruption".

In addition to the damages inflicted on Honduras by the ill-advised "floating" of the Lempira, credible well-placed informants insist that a minimum of 12-million dollars went the way of Callejas bank accounts when he vacated the Presidential Palace. Others put the total higher. Much higher!

Roatanians, especially, identify Callejas as being the moving force that, in 1994, in response to entreaties from Rita Thompson Silvestri, arranged a purchased Honduras citizenship for Arnold F. Morris, who was in flight from a U. S. 26-count federal criminal indictment for commercial fraud and money-laundering. The price paid for this safe-haven was authoritatively and consistently reported as being US$25,000.00 and a Cadillac sedan. Morris and Silvestri are now married. That fraudulently obtained Honduras citizenship has recently been revoked by Presidente Carlos Flores Facusse, but during the intervening period, while enjoying Honduras' sovereign protection, his real-estate manipulations have made him infamous on Roatan. Former Roatan Judge of Letters, Fernando Azcona Schrendel was fired from his judgeship for collusion with Morris in a variety of real-estate scams. (HTW 10-15-97) The American Embassy has recently revoked the U. S. visas of both Rita Silvestri de Morris and step-son Ernie Emilio Silvestri for association with a known and notorious criminal. In spite of all of this cause for action, Morris continues to unauthorizedly reside on the island. 

Rumors insist that he is still paying his protection money to top political figures. Perhaps incoming Presidente Ricardo Maduro will get serious about removing this blot from the Roatan escutcheon.

As Rafael Callejas presents himself before a court of his peers and purports to accept the ramifications of newly enacted Penal Process Code, it will be interesting to see if he does so without the overall protection of the Constitutional Immunity Blanket that protects all elected and a great many appointive political functionaries. Callejas is still the beneficiary of this immunization from all Honduras laws, by virtue of his ongoing function as President of the National Party's Political Commission.

Only if he waives this protection from legal processes will he truly render himself answerable to charges pending against him, and so long delayed. If he goes to court firmly wrapped in his immunity blanket, his appearance will be no more than one more sleight-of-hand trick at which he has repeatedly demonstrated his consummate evasive skills.

Lorenzo Dee Belveal
Via internet

EXCELLENT CONTRIBUTION
Dear HTW:

I can not do more than agree with this excellent article, "Foreign affairs and diplomacy in Honduras in the 21st century" by H. Roberto Herrera Caceres, I hope our new government is thinking the same and planning to do so. Congratulations.
Alma Garcia
Via Internet

KEEP HONDURANS HOME

Dear HTW:

President-elect Maduro is scheduled to visit U.S. president Bush Friday, January 18, to request an extension allowing undocumented Hondurans to stay more time in the U.S. 
With all due respect, wouldn' t it come as much better news if Maduro announced that he was going to make living conditions better in Honduras as an incentive for these people to return to their home country and families, to find work, security from street and governmental crime, better health services and education? Despite the income derived from money sent from abroad, it is far better & cost-effective to work on providing solutions at home than to run away from one's problems to another country. If these undocumented people can work, why not work in Honduras where we need it most?

Sincerely, Ed Elsner
Via Internet

Monday, January 14,  2002 Online Edition 1

GUEST EDITORIAL

A contradiction in terms 

By Lorenzo Dee Belveal 

In reporting the proceedings of the December 17, seminar/workshop entitled "The Supreme Court of Justice in the XXI century", Maria Fiallos cited one of the essential codicils as declaring that a Supreme Court Justice should be:
"Apolitical, without prejudicing their right to belong to a political party.

No reasonable citizen can possibly disagree with that doctrine. Yet, from the standpoint of political pragmatics, the process of selection and determination of tenure, stands in diametric opposition to the forthright rule cited above.

The Chamber of Deputies clearly stands as the personification of political power, political competition and political manipulation. This reality is too obvious to require argument. Yet it is in this body that selection of the nation's highest judges reposes. The debating, wangling, trade-offs and slick political "adjustments" that take place in determining the people who will comprise the nation's highest tribunal are legendary. Will anyone who is privy to the judicial "horse-trading" that is the hallmark of the process, undertake to describe it as apolitical, above politics, or free of the taint of partisan influences and prejudices? I think not.

And the matter of political selection is just the first fatal flaw in assembling this august body charged with dispensing the ultimate statutory justice to all of the people who may come before it.

Bear in mind that the tenure of the Supreme Court judges is currently exactly the same as the term of the diputados who select and confirm them in their lofty positions. This is a process that begets, invites and encourages political obligations and reciprocal payoffs. Who can possibly doubt that a Labor majority in the Chamber of Deputies will assemble a Court biased to Labor?

This is the way politics has always worked - and always will, unless he opportunity for partisan advantage is removed or stringently curtailed.

High court judges in most enlightened societies are screened by learned panels of respected barristers. Then the names of chosen candidates are passed to the highest federal authorities for their consideration. Only then are the selected candidates referred back to the legislative body for its binding confirmation.

Under the above-outlined procedure, once appointed to the High Court, a justice serves for life. His or her term on the 'bench' may only be terminated by his own resignation, death or impeachment for judicial misconduct.

This procedure is set up to safeguard both the judicial virtue of the Court, itself, as well as to render the individual members of that body politically "untouchable".

Such a process insures that the highest court in the land is, indeed, above political influences and out of the reach of the partisan "fixers" and influence peddlers. And it deserves to be since, in a nation of laws, the Supreme Court is the crown jewel!

The Honduras Corte Suprema de Justicia will never enjoy the public trust and professional prestige it must have to satisfy the high expectations its role in the federal structure demands until it is totally removed from the sphere of presumed political influence.
As a very wise and distinguished barrister once said, "It is not enough that a judge be merely above reproach, like the Queen's virtue, he must above question". This test applies equally to the Court as a principal mechanism of a functional democracy.

The current method of selection and confirmation leaves every member of the Honduras Supreme Court under the dark cloud of suspicion that he takes his or her seat burdened by heavy political obligations to the people who put him there. True or not the possibility brings with it a serious disability.

It's time for Honduras to remove this anomaly from its system of justice.




Letter from Honduras: A woman's death

By NIGEL POTTER

Special to HTW

It was a typical peasants wake. All those from the scatter shacks, hovels, and houses that makeup the small hamlet of Limon were there. People were standing round two fires lit on the bare earth outside the house, flickering across their faces as they chatted or played cards. Others crammed into the small room that had been home for Dona Mercedes, her husband, Miguel and their eight children. 

Now she lay on a bed, dead, covered by a sheet to keep the flies off. Candles had been stuck both at her head and feet, guttered, and burned fiercely with the breeze though the room was oppressively hot with so many in attendance paying their last respects. Miguel was away organizing a coffin and getting drunk. The two oldest girls, 17 and 14 were standing in a corner sobbing. Two of the little ones were at the foot of the bed playing with dirt and pine -needles on the floor. 

A small group of women were singing tunelessly, others trying to join in at times but never at the same time. This ragged dirge seemed more in keeping with the poverty of the mud hut and the neighbors saying goodbye than a soaring soprano and penetrating tenor with uplifting choir. 

Whatever medical condition killed her (there's no death certificate of course) I don't have much doubt she died simply because she had decided singing some majestic Mozart mass. I pushed my way through the crowd of breast feeding women, silent men, children playing and fidgeting and dogs prowling, hoping the smell of dead meat meant something unusual but good to eat. I stood by the bed and gently pulled the sheet back and gazed on her face, beautiful, young (32), sullen, tired, thin and fragile, just as it had been in life she had had enough. She always seemed a delicate flower and the harshness of the desert in which she lived was just too much for her. She did not have that bitchy toughness to survive. Eight children with another apparently on the way took their toll too.

She had more support than most, however, a husband who is not a bad sort as husbands here go, he didn't hit her or not as far as I have heard and came home drunk only two or three times a week and ready no doubt to satisfy her physical needs. However, that's about as far as the support went, she was basically on her own. I had passed her house, coming and going every day for five years, but until tonight, had never been inside. I doubted too if many now alongside me had either. It's not the custom to invite friends or neighbors back to your house, even for a coffee never mind a meal. Only in death can you freely enter a house, never in life. 

Only once had I seen Mercedes face animated. We were returning from a workshop that I had helped organize. How she had ever got permission from Miguel to go God alone knows, perhaps because other women in the village were going too. Anyway it was the first and only one she ever attended. I asked her what she had thought of it. I got the reply I expected. It was fine, because nobody would ever tell me anything different even if they had been bored stiff and had hated every minute of it, but her reaction was completed unexpected. She smiled, her whole face lit up, there was enthusiasm in her words, and it was fine, great! She loved it; she wanted to go to more. Almost for a week afterwards as I passed her house and called out good morning she shouted back in friendly greeting before relapsing back into the frowning, sullen grunt. And now as I looked at her, I hoped she had found the rest she seemed to crave and wondered who would be mother now (almost certainly her two oldest lassies). I placed the sheet back over her face and withdrew.

Next morning we followed the rough coffin, painted a dark green, to the graveyard. We reached the chapel (not much more than a shed), which stands at the entrance. Rosaries rattled and some women sang, waiting for the local priest. He arrived in his 4-wheel drive, said mass for our sister Mercedes, and then sped off. The singers exhausted, stayed silent, and we all searched for a bit of shade from the hot sun while we waited for the sombrero and sandals that would be put on Mercedes for her last journey, which Miguel in his grief and hangover had forgotten. He waited with us, mostly dry- eyed though every now and then a tearful spasm shook his whole body. Mercedes old father tottered about looking even worse than his daughter in her coffin. Miguel at once took command when the sombrero and sandals arrived and we helped him put them on. As he held his wife in his arms for the last time as the hat went on, he shook her gently and whispered fiercely, "Oh, speak to me, my love," and then laid her back. The coffin was nailed down and then we struggled out with it to the grave, slipping on the dry grass, tripping over other wooden crosses protruding out of the ground and we buried her. 

It's been a week of dying. A few days before, news came through that companero I had worked with had been murdered in a town some miles away. I still don't know the details but he had apparently been battered to death, a contract killing in a political assassination. He belonged to one of the small radical parties and I had met him working with the largest peasant organization here on a health project. Apart from his Lenca Indian peasant background with its dire poverty, he didn't have much in common with Mercedes. A masterful man (who no doubt kept his own wife in order) he had taken every advantage of every project and workshop going, learned, studied, analyzed and understood the desperate condition of his people. Mercedes had stayed mired in her poverty and despair, he had fought to get out of it, change it and both have paid the price. We last met a week before he died. We had a good chat but we both had other commitments so parted on the understanding that next time we met we would have a beer or two when "we had a bit more time. " I was making breakfast when I heard the news. I was shocked and shaken but carried on with my day and was up all night with the runs.


   

Great expectations for the new government

By DON PEARLY

With the election of Ricardo Maduro as President of Honduras, expectations are running at an all time high. People are feeling that he will keep his campaign promises and bring Honduras out of its present slump. What we must take into consideration is that we as a nation in general, are not in very good shape. However, with President-elect Maduro s personality and good intentions working for him, we feel he will be immediately accepted by the United States and other countries in a position to help us.

Put yourself in his place. He has promised, among other things, to clean up the image of the government by installing honest hard working cabinet members, clean up the gang influence on the streets by concentrating his police and military resources on that task, invite foreign investment into the country and make tourism one of his foremost priorities. How long will it take before we feel and see a difference? It may take his entire four year term in office, but I personally feel we will see the first improvements immediately. Why, because of the psychological influence the new government will have on the people of Honduras. If they think he is keeping his word then they will pitch in and help him achieve his goals. Whether you voted for him or not it is now your duty as a Honduran and foreigner living in Honduras to do your part. He cannot do it alone, he needs all of our assistance.

How specifically can you help? By being his eyes and ears. Don’t just overlook an infraction of the laws because in the past no body listened to your complaints. Take offenders to the proper authorities and see if things are not different. Report wife beaters, mistreated or abandoned children problems, petty theft incidents, prowlers, gang members pushing people around, don’t just let them get away with it. Even if it is not your immediate problem but rather a neighbors, report it.

Fix up your cars, replace those worn out mufflers, repair those smoke making machines. write down the license plate and or identification number of a taxi that drives down the wrong way on a street, the bus that fouls up traffic to pick up a passenger, that blows his horn incessantly for no good reason. These may seem like small things that we have to live with but not anymore. Give the new regime a chance to show you they are keeping their word. maybe paint your house and clean up your front yard to show your neighbors you have a brand new outlook on life in Honduras. Just look around for ways you can contribute to your neighborhood.

If you have been thinking about going into business but wanted to see how the atmosphere was going to change, just do it. Invest in our new machinery, open that hotel or shop and get to work on your new career.

Oh yes, and one other thing, declare and pay your income and sales tax obligations. the country cannot run on fumes and contributions it needs it’s people to pay their share. In the past you said my neighbor doesn’t file taxes so why should I? A good point but now things are different so do the right thing yourself and report others that are just free-loading.

On Guanaja

All of the above suggestions apply except of course for the car and bus situations. Let’s get going on that chamber of commerce for the bay islands. Let’s fix up and paint up and get ready for the foreign travelers, they are soon coming and we must be ready as first impressions are the most important. a warm friendly island with an obvious desire to entertain tourists from every country. 
Do you caracoles remember when you used to host masses of visitors from El Salvador? You would take them into your personal homes and party for ever. Contact them again and lets get some outside money flowing into our island. the same goes for your good neighbors in the Cayman Islands. Convince them to come back here for their vacations, we need their support.

Celtel

Have you considered how much income Guanaja can produce for you? We are an island that needs good communications. Everyone is going to cellular. People like being able to be contacted while they do their shopping. It works wonderfully well in the big cities, you see ladies shopping and talking, business people eating lunch and talking on their wireless phones. We want that too. There have been many promises of another cell that would reach all of Guanaja. I believe it was tested in December of last year and it worked, what happened to it? Come on Celtel, cover us and we will show you some good steady income you never saw before. Of course you might trim you prices a bit don’t you think it is ludicrous to charge us for dialing time and for unanswered attempts? Get more competitive and give us our coverage and watch that bottom line grow.

SMELLING THE ROSES?

Dear HTW:

After reading Nigel Potter’s Letter from Honduras, December 29, 2001 published in Honduras This Week, I though his bookshelf must be full of Franz Kafka or else he had just finished reading Dostyevsky’s Poor People. When he smells a rose with his sister-in-law he is being narcissist and when criticizing church’s and missions sort of nihilistic. When he concludes he sneaks out at night to pick his beans, so that the real thieves will not know there is something out there worth stealing, well I wonder who or what he is? Anyway just who is Shostakovich, whom somehow got into the story of smelling the roses? Perhaps he could tell us whom in a future letter.

Cornelius Groothousen
Siguatepeque