Honduras This Week Opinions and Editorials

OPINIONS & EDITORIAL

Monday, September 27, 2003 Online Edition 38

EDITORIAL

Fifteen at last

Just fifteen years ago we were putting the final touches on the first weekly Honduran newspaper published in the English language.

The idea came to us when we were working at the Honduran embassy in Rome, Italy. We observed with envy that the rest of Central America had excellent information services. We saw the Sandinista flag in Plaza Navona and had to listen to the organized propaganda from the Sandinista government. The Honduran Embassy stood firm, telling us there was no budget to provide for an English speaking medium through which we could answer them and defend our country.

We returned to Honduras and began recruiting future collaborators to launch a series of activities to give out accurate information about Honduras. Armed only with the truth, we would fight back.

We were lucky enough to form our team of people. We had the support of our family and other willing participants. Our team understood the bigger message of creating a forum through which we could disseminate accurate information about Honduras. However, the lack of interest shown by the rest of the world in Honduras as a destination for tourists and investment made this a difficult task.

We never thought of becoming rich through this medium and the situation remains so. Unfortunately, we have been assaulted by immoral people who attacked our funds, but they have not altered our desire to spread information about Honduras.

Creating an English speaking medium to keep people informed about Honduras has been a big challenge, but it has helped us learn a lot. We must provide accurate information in which people can trust, and we must do it with sincerity and honesty, using any other effective element that helps people to see us as we are.

Bringing a Honduran medium into the international arena is difficult when not even our own government believe in our country. The country is divided into two political interests, and our medium belongs to neither. Each group ignores us. The present government is destroying freedom of expression by supporting those who collaborate with their political campaign and discriminating against everyone else.

The international interests of the country are being managed through international mass media. The national press is being deprived of the opportunity to provide information for its own public.

HTW has to expose a government that ignores its roots, and even ignores Honduras themselves... what a crime!

Just a few days ago, we met with one of the most famous functionaries of this government, to whom we made two points. One of these was a reference to the group of volunteers who collaborate with HTW and have a niche here with us, the second was about the discrimination against the media on the part of the central government. He responded to me “look, the first interests me; the second, I don’t care about.” However, when we called his secretary to remind him of his apparent interest in our volunteers, we found he didn’t really care about either of our points. We got no response.

In my years at school abroad, we learned that the most important public for a government is its domestic public. It is difficult to bring a country into the international forum when its own government does not trust its own mass media or its people.

Need a Tourist Visa to the USA? Don’t Expect the Red-Carpet Treatment

By LARRY SCHWARZ

All Hondurans who wish to travel to the United States as tourists must first obtain a visa from the United States Embassy in Tegucigalpa. However, the road from wanting a visa to actually getting a visa is a very long and bumpy one.

Most people don’t even realize that a visa merely allows travelers to go to an entry point to the United States and request permission to enter. Only the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has the authority to grant or deny entry into the country and determine the length of the visit. If admission is granted, the visitor is given a card - called an I-94 - which states how long he or she can stay.

Since people have a funny way of not showing up for their return flight, the process for getting a non-immigrant tourist visa (officially known as a B-2 visa) is expensive, grueling, and reportedly demeaning.

When a Honduran wants to apply for a tourist visa, the first step is to go to any computerized branch of Banco Atlantida and pay the non-refundable USa$100 application/processing fee. The bank issues a receipt with the date and time the applicant may physically enter the Embassy. Currently, the waiting period is approximately four weeks; on the day of the interview, it may take several hours to see a Consular Officer.

“Over the years, the Consular Section has worked very hard to provide quality non-immigrant visa services to the public,” The U.S. Embassy said in a statement released to Honduras This Week. “For example, it has moved from a first-come, first-seen interview system to an appointment-based interview schedule, which means that all applicants are interviewed on the day of their appointment.

“The long lines of previous years no longer exist. Additionally, issued visas are returned quickly and securely to applicants via express delivery service, precluding the need for multiple trips to the Consulate. These are just two of several improvements the Consulate has implemented to make the application process more user friendly.”

Expedited appointments are granted only if someone needs to go to the United States for a dire emergency. These appointments are given for urgent medical treatment, the funeral of a close relative, or for an urgent trip for work or business.

A mountain of paperwork is required for the interview, and the chances of getting a visa will be greatly improved if it’s all in order. The Embassy suggests that applicants bring everything from tax documents to checking account statements. The complete list of requirements is available on their Web site usmission.hn.

However, ask any Honduran what they dread the most about the U.S. visa application process, and nearly all will agree that it’s the face-to-face interview with the Consular Officer. U.S. law requires that the applicant’s situation in his or her home country be the basis for the decision on the visa, but many complain that there is absolutely no rhyme or reason to the final decision.

“It can seem arbitrary,” said James P. Gagel, an immigration attorney in Coral Gables, Florida, “but you must understand that Consular Officers have an average of three minutes per applicant to make a decision, so it is not always accurate.”

For many Hondurans, that’s not even the issue. Apparently, what infuriates them is not the length of the interview, but the abusive behavior of the Consular Officers.

“It’s the way they treat you,” said a presentable, 27-year-old woman who called herself Suyapa. “The environment is scary and humiliating. It’s not a nice experience at all. I’ve heard stories about the people at the windows tossing papers back without even looking at them. I think they make up their mind just by taking one look at you. Why not explain to someone why they are rejected? It would save people a lot of money, time, and grief.”

“The visa application process can be humiliating,” said Mr. Gagel, who advertises his services on visas-america.com. “You have a tremendously overworked consulate staff that hears the same stories from applicants over and over again. Many of these stories either have no relevance to the prerequisites to obtain a visa, or they do not have the ring of truth to them.”

He said the officer listening to them may get a bit short-tempered at times. Members of the Consular Corps enjoy tremendous autonomy. Their decisions cannot be appealed the way administrative decisions can be appealed in most democratic countries.

However, there are instances in which there is no excuse for rude treatment.

“Unfortunately, most persons who appear before consular officers have none of the rights that would apply to American citizens,” said Mr. Gagel. “They are not on American soil at the time of the application. This in my opinion leads to abuse.”

Ironically, customer service in Honduras is virtually nonexistent, yet somehow, North Americans are held to a higher standard.

“The Americans should set an example,” said Suyapa. “People in Honduras think so highly of people in the U.S. Why be mean?”

“Consular officers represent the United States,” Mr. Gagel said, “and are under an obligation to represent the even-handedness and fairness that we espouse as a country. A lost temper on occasion can be forgiven, but hostility and abuse is completely unacceptable behavior for any representative of the U.S. to engage in.”

“Consular officials schedule over one thousand applicant interviews each week or a total of almost 52,000 interviews per year,” the Embassy said in its statement. “It is understandable that some people are disappointed when Consular Officers are unable to approve their visa requests, but the Embassy assures people that their applications receive serious consideration and that decisions are based on U.S. immigration law.”

Embassy policy states that applicants who feel that they have not received fair treatment during a visa interview may contact the Consular Section’s Non-Immigrant Visa Unit at the telephone numbers and e-mail addresses posted on the Embassy’s Web site.

The Consulate said it strives to provide the most customer-friendly service and will continue to improve the non-immigrant visa process to the benefit of the public.

Applicants who want to improve their odds of success would do best to buy a business or some real estate. The logic, it seems, is that someone is highly unlikely to abandon these things for a brand new life in the United States.

“The State Department maintains statistics regarding visa applicants who do not return to their home country,” said Mr. Gagel, “but you don’t need statistics to know that a single person with no financial ties to their home country may not return.”

Naturally, 9/11 has aggravated the problem making it more difficult for Latin Americans to get tourist visas to the U.S. Additionally, the serial rapist arrested in Miami last week was a Honduran with an expired visa.

Gagel said there are currently more sophisticated background checks in place and increased scrutiny.

“I recently spoke to an official at the Colombian Embassy who told me that 80% of applicants are now being denied. A few years ago that denial rate was more in the neighborhood of 60%.”

Hondurans are also heavily affected by the suspension of the Transit Without Visa program, and the International to International program. Both allowed foreigners to transit the United States on the way to another country without a visa. The U.S. Government has promised to reinstate these programs when proper security measures are put into place. However, it doesn’t appear that’s going to happen anytime soon.

As for Suyapa, she has several years remaining on her visa but admits that she is concerned about getting it renewed down the road. Now her mission is simply to get the U.S. Embassy to treat applicants like human beings.

“You can say anything to anybody,” she said, “if you say it nicely.”

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Congratulations on our 15th birthday

Congratulations on the celebration of 15 years of publishing Honduras This week. The newspaper plays an important role in informing people who speak English about Honduras. The high number of people who read the newspaper over the Internet shows the importance of the newspaper. I am happy and proud to have formed part of the team that writes for Honduras This Week.

Wendy Griffin

Via Internet

Always look forward to each issue, especially when away from Honduras. I've always appreciated the stories on Honduras history. Keep up the excellent work and am looking forward to your 50th anniversary. Congratulations Mario, Rosibel and Staff, Abrazos,

Paul J. Holsen II

Via Internet

All the way from Washington, DC, I send my heartfelt congratulations to Honduras This Week and its staff for completing 15 years of publishing. It is primarily through HTW that I have "reconnected" with my native country and been inspired to get involved in helping make it a better place in this world.

HTW is truly a lifeline of information about Honduras for thousands of "friends of Honduras" whose primary language is English. Keep up the great work! My best wishes,

Marco Caceres
projecthonduras.com

Monday, September 22, 2003 Online Edition 37

EDITORIAL

It’s Your Border but don’t hit me, Daddyo

The border dispute between Honduras and El Salvador continues its legal course but yet again in The Hague representatives of both countries are caught in a verbal war to obtain more territory.

Last week we explained that since Honduras responded to the pretensions of El Salvador she lost no less than 109 km of her territory, two islands and the entrance to the Pacific Ocean where she retained only a 1 km strip to get out to high seas. In Honduras it is publicly stated that we have won the trial over El Salvador....maybe because giving away these lands we guarantee that perhaps El Salvador will not invade us again.

El Salvador’s belligerent behavior continues, while in Honduras long term memory runs short, as happened with the case of the Salvadorian spies that went almost unnoticed. El Salvador appointed as their Ambassador one of the most fearful Colonels of Salvadorian intelligence, Sigfredo Ochoa Perez...why won’t they send us a civilian ambassador? Why a counterspy ambassador? Why is our government forced to accept with humiliation these impositions... Why does our Ministry of Foreign Affairs let them get away with this?

El Salvador’s pretension is to demand no less than the Valley of Goascoran, arguing that the position of the river’s basin changed due to a hurricane that is not registered anywhere. Besides this, our countries did not draw political borders because they were unspoken and the prerogative belonged to Spanish crown... give us a break...all these territoriality and expansionist Salvadorian pretensions are what motivated them to invade us in 1969. In our opinion, Honduras is within her rights to demand damages and reparations for the horrors committed in our country...why not? Furthermore, they should pay for the 1992 trial because they won our territory.

The Salvadorian agent Mauricio Gutierrez Castro tell us: “Given some of the points that they could seek and some emotional blows, I do not see much room for action,” page 11, Diario La Prensa, September 12, San Salvador. The Salvadorian intention to invade our territory again is still a possibility.

We do not understand what individual or group empowers the Salvadorians to make claims that favor them. In El Salvador they are already celebrating a new victory over Honduras.
The new demand from our neighbors is the demand of a new border, wow...the guts.

In a private conversation with members of the Foreign Ministry we pointed out that Honduras has never claimed territory from her neighbors, yet the whole neighborhood has pretensions over ours. In responding to their claims, we have lost territory, while the reality is that we have never claimed anything.

We have warned that the best defense is always to attack and that if we claim territories from others, it will take us to a more favorable position. This is how El Salvador acted in claiming legitimately Honduran territories, and they won because in the distribution of these territories the juries sought to please both sides. Of course our neighbors ended up quite happy with the land that they received.

Hondurans still need to wake up. They only accepted the judgments in exchange for peace and to avoid the invasion of the neighboring countries. They still have not realized the magnitude of their loss.

The so-called historical facts claimed by El Salvador are very dubious as are their precedents, and in their cunning, they will provoke doubts and may motivate a reopening of the trial. The logical answer from Honduras is to accept this new challenge, which stems from totally ignoring the previous determination, and to assign a more responsible study group to the search for our true national borders.

It has been said SOTO VOCE that the Honduran defense team has been spied upon and this advantage has proved useful to El Salvador....

Besides calling President Ricardo Maduro a liar, Minister Maria Eugenia Brizuela has made an excellent gain for El Salvador by forcing Honduras to accept as a fact the border adapted by The Hague, which gives 109 kilometers of land, two islands and the entrance to the Pacific Ocean to Central America’s Thumbelina.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

More Thoughts on Plato’s Cave Metaphor

Dear HTW

Amen,
In reference to "Plato's Cave," indeed the metaphor fits our current educational situation in Honduras. It seems to me that the "Cave" is by design, to keep its inhabitants in their place, which would explain the beating of the chest about the malnutrition and any other excuses. You are right, malnutrition does not explain the problem of mal-education but it is a nice way of keeping the mal-educated off the real issue..."chained inside" the cave of ignorance for the few chosen ones to keep a way of life.
My opinion,

Swany Blanco
Via Internet

Free Medical Screenings in Roatan

Dear HTW

My name is Therese Bennet. My husband is the director of the Dr. Polo Galindo Clinic, here on Roatan, and I am assisting the clinic. No newspaper is as widely read on the islands as HTW by ex pats, whom we hope to serve in the clinic, along with native islanders.

We are offering free Medical Screenings in Roatan on Sept 24 at the The Doc Polo Galindo Clinic near Punta Gorda, Roatan. The free screening is for diabetes and high blood pressure on Wednesday, September 24, 2003, from 8:00 AM to 4:00 PM
No appointment is necessary.

Therese Bennett
Dr. Polo Galindo Clinic
Roatan

Monday, September 15, 2003 Online Edition 36

EDITORIAL

Bordering On the Edge

The Republic of El Salvador, our honorable neighbor, has called us again to The Hague to persuade the sovereign magistrates of the world’s highest court at reopening, on the pretentions that they, the Salvadorians, have “irrefutable proof” to get the Goascoran Bolson. The “move” (movida) is not exactly to get (or
not to get) the mentioned Bolson, which, if granted, would of course be welcome.

The Salvadorians are wise and know exactly that this is a lost cause and that they have already won, not only cornering us in the Fonseca Gulf and taking over two 100% percent Honduran
islands, but also taking 109 km of land thanks to the inefficiency and weakness of the analysts assisting the border dispute. The “move” then, with their non bordering policy and this claim,
makes the careless Hondurans confirm the already
existing re-limitation, not denouncing to the Hague this demarcation in support to the truth, which implies the illegal concession of totally Honduran lands and seas to El Salvador.

We have not yet listened to a debate about this in the National Congress or in the Communications Media. And it seems non patriotic not to do this, especially if we know that we lack a proper team of investigators in the foreign relations office, and the worse is that the only ones we had are already retired,
without training the ones that have replaced them.

The Salvadorians are serious in their arguments if they are able to demonstrate that if we falsified a map, they will have grounds to get at least 50 centimeters for free. It is easy to negotiate with things that do not hurt , and for this we want to remind you that it is not possible to hide the sun with one finger. If certain government official thought that we know nothing of his businesses he is wrong. Truth has mercy on nobody.

We do not believe that the magistrates at The Hague are going to allow themselves to fall into the Salvadorian game of pressing new charges in exchange of the admission of the Hondurans of
the current and erratic border delimitation.

We think that it is time that a group of Honduran investigators begin to seriously analyze and validate what we have done wrong in the past. The two islands, our exit to open sea
in the Gulf of Fonseca, was taken not only by Salvadorians and Nicaraguans, but also by a group of Hondurans.

And being that we also participate in this bordering with the help of Italian maps it is very important for us to say that justice is
justice and that there is nothing to worry about if It is in good hands. The jurists at The Hague are incorruptible, for Hondurans’ sake. It is necessary that the whole world begin to realize
that Honduras has documentation and that the exit to sea is a universal right and that the countries that deny this are poorly seen, as is the case with Bolivia.

We have to believe again in our luck, but it is time that new scientific investigations be carried out, or it is clear that El Salvador will not rest on its “Movida”.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Dear Mr. Editor:

I was reading the publication Honduras This Week online for September 1st in which an article appears on the work the Peace Corps has made in this country.

In my professional career I have had the chance to know and work with excellent processionals that have arrived in the country through the Peace Corps, especially on the natural resources field which was run until a few months ago by
Honduran Jorge Beta court who, from my own point
of view, is one of the most committed persons in this country on natural resources in the country. The contribution that these professionals have given to the country has been priceless in different fields within the conservation of these resources.

I disagree with what Ron F. “Cisco” Ruybal, General National Director of the Peace Corps expressed when he said that The Peace Corps itself has established protected areas in the
country. I am transcribing his words: “Since the Peace Corps arrived in Honduras, they have established nationally protected areas…”.

I refer to the former not in an intention to create controversy but to call to attention the following… “although it is true that the Peace Corps’ contribution has been valuable in the formulation of proposals to create protected areas, it is also true that in these initiatives valuable professionals have also fought and keep
fighting for the conservation of the country’s natural conservation; many times against the politicians (not policies) of the government
itself.

Once the proposal for the creation of a protected area has been passed, this proposal is sent to the Department of Wild Life and
Protected Areas from ACE COHDEFOR to be revised
and sent to the National Biodiversity Direction so that it submits it to the National Congress for its approval.

I insist on admiring the job the members of the Peace Corps volunteers, but I also admire the silent job many good Hondurans carry out, often without support, carrying out impressive tasks in favor of the environment,

Sincerely.
Marco Tulio Lopez
Via Internet

SPLITTING HAIR

Ralph Nelson has a habit of taking things out of context and using them to launch ad hominem attacks on those whose insights do not match his perception of reality. Of course, chronically malnourished children will not learn and
pedagogically challenged teachers will not teach. But that was not the thrust of my opinion piece. What I attempted to convey — and still firmly maintain — is that:
1. Culture breeds culture.
2. A culturally rich home environment sparks and
nurtures a love of learning.
3. A full stomach does not necessarily translate
into a fertile intellect.
4. Education in Honduras is not a priority. It
is, at best, a perfunctory process further
degraded by the exigencies of abject survival.
5. An undereducated nation led by an educated
plutocratic minority can expect to wallow in
poverty and ignorance.

W. E. Gutman
Los Angeles, California

Thoughts and ideals that remain valid today

By ALEJANDRA PAREDES L

To read Jose Cecilio del Valle is to dive into the thoughts of a man devoted to Central America, the American continent, and the full development of its land and its people. El Sabio Valle (Wise Valle) as he is remembered, was a gifted writer, statesman, and politician. Honduran by birth and Central American by conviction, he wrote the 1821 Act of Independence of Central America at a time when the region’s greatest minds were devoted to creating new nations and developing the ideals behind them.

Del Valle was born into a wealthy family in the Villa de Jerez de Choluteca, in southern Honduras. His father, José Antonio Diaz del Valle, moved his family to Guatemala to provide José with a proper education at the Universidad de San Carlos. At the time Honduras lacked a formal schooling system, the only institution
being a Tridentine college of theology and philosophy, from which illustrious Honduran names like Juan Lindo and Jose Trinidad Cabañas emerged.

Jose Cecilio devoted his life to the study and defense of the ideals behind the independence of Central America. Rafael Leiva Vivas, a recent biographer, describes how del Valle believed in protecting the local artisans from international commercial laws. His constant defense of national products against those imported from abroad is one of the main and lesser known
causes for which he fought. This may well be a reason why today’s globalization-oriented mindset tends to forget him as one of this country’s most brilliant minds.

“Do we want our land to be free, independent, and master of its own destiny, or a colony of some other people?” del Valle asked. His insightfully recognized economy and politics as mutually interdependent long before his European
counterparts reached similar conclusions. He was also a strong defender of the rights of the oppressed, particularly of the American people. He is best known for having asserted that “the most dignified study of an American is America.”

Del Valle’s ideals and strong opinions helped him become a strong political figure, and he ran for president of Central America in the first ever elections in 1824. The election was won by Manuel Jose Arce, whom del Valle accused of fraud. He lost his second election to Francisco Morazan in the popular vote of 1830, but was appointed Minister for Foreign Affairs in 1831. He later became president elect of Central America, but died during a trip to his homeland before taking office.

Jose Cecilio del Valle’s philosophy is still valid, as was demonstrated at Zamorano Agricultural School last week, where Dean Mario Contreras quoted him in his opening speech:
“Time is precious; life is brief; young people have their rights and the nation owes them the best teachings. If perfection is not possible, we should at least try to get close to it.”

Monday, September 8, 2003 Online Edition 35

EDITORIAL

Salaries: A Responsibility
Pact for Development

The Honduran presidency of the republic has prepared in July this project to face poverty and social instability. Related to salaries we read: frozen salaries to all public employees (except teachers) on the year 2003 and a raise for awaited inflation for 2004 to 2009.

Freezing of age based benefit for some of the public employees (excluding teachers). Salary raise to teachers based on the government-teacher agreement. Increase of teacher work posts. Increase for job opportunity to doctors. More jobs for policemen. And for the rest of the government no more jobs are to be created.

This is how the new government is planning to face the deterioration of its capacity to govern. To increase or decrease the salary tariffs represent the band of the patron’s power.

The government can raise, keep or reduce the salary scale under different optics. Being that it also refuses to increase the salaries of its current personnel it cannot approve the conservation of its current status but admits to uphold the appointments in predetermined sectors, considered the rowdiest of the administration. It also refuses to give up his costliest employees. This last action fits only one option, and that is to indirectly fire these employees to be rejected by many to keep receiving their juicy salaries.

This government must keep a permanent watch on the investment of the private enterprise’s resources. To invest in government personnel is a fundamental task for the executive as it is to reorient this good personnel into the private sector. The other part of this personnel is one that will make the public sector its career arena, this part of the spectrum should always join due to their competence and under norms that guarantee that their career in Public Administration be permanent according to the laws of the land.

In Honduras one of the toughest problems is to seek for and pick out completely nonpolitical people and that this is also a two bladed knife because, who does not respectfully follow national politics is far from being oriented towards national interest. There isn’t , then, large possibilities to find people chemically non politic and if they existed, it would be extremely important to get them properly involved in the Honduran political arena.

We find, then, that the government, making use of its attributions is totally independent from sectorial interests. The government should sponsor the interest of the majorities being its decision of not being political but technical unappealable..
Overcoming these hurdles can mean amplifying the working possibilities and giving the working class a new chance to liberate the employer from some responsiblity including retirement funds and place them on the until now useless Honduran Institute of Social Health. In this sense employee and employer would protect the employer with a new kind of insurance that removes the criminal, fearsome and terrible compensations, at least those used for this purpose.

The government should have a larger authority or else it could keep losing its grip on the executive control of the state as mediocres taken on strength. No one that holds a stick to destroy public property must be benefited with a public job ever, under any circumstance. We cannot keep tolerating groups trained for evil.

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

GOOD NUTRITION KEY FOR LEARNING

W. E. Gutman takes a jab at an editorial in the mainstream Honduran media calling it factually flawed. Yet Gutman's article is the one that is factually flawed.

Gutman discounts the effects of "lousy teachers" and malnutrition on scholastic performance based on his observation of one student's performance. In the United States, studies on the Federal, state and local levels have all conflicted with Gutman's nonscientific study concluding that adequate nutrition improves scholastic performance and, in many cases, I.Q.

It's not even a question in the education community that malnutrition is detrimental to the scholastic, social and cognitive development of children.
Gutman's comment with respect to the absence of adverse effects of "lousy teachers" on student performance doesn't even deserve to be addressed.

Gutman himself should be taken with a grain of salt if not completely ignored. In a previous article in HTW he attributed quotes of Dan Quayle to George W. Bush. Last February, he reported that 44 percent of foreign-born Hispanics living in the United States "harbor hard-core, fossilized anti-Semitic convictions." The report on which he based his statement stated that the 44 percent only have "anti-Semitic propensities." There is a wide gap between "hard-core convictions" and mere propensities.

Articles in HTW by Lisa McKiddie, Olivia McGill, Larry Schwarz and others are insightful, well-written and without question well researched. Basic knowledge of facts would be a good foundation on which to form insightful opinions. I'd rather to see what the other contributors to HTW have to say on the Op-Ed page.

From
Ralph Nelson

WHEELCHAIR FOR MAN IN TELA

I am a social worker who recently returned from a trip to Honduras. When I was in Tela, I met a man who runs a gym (Mauricio) there who is trying to help a young man find a new wheelchair. The young man not only has a broken seat on his wheelchair but was put out of his house by his father, who is an alcoholic. Mauricio's church is putting the young man up. However, he has asked me to try to find a wheelchair that could be donated (or if its low cost, I will be happy to pay) for the young man.

I told Mauricio about the First Lady's project, but he does not know how to cut through all the bureaucracy to apply for one. Maybe you can give me some further leads. Is there someone in the area that can help either find a wheelchair or repair the current one?

Thanks so much. I'm running out of ideas and don't have enough money to buy one at a regular price.

Sincerely,
Ginger Holman
Via Internet

Monday, September 1, 2003 Online Edition 34

Education key to nation’s future

By W. E. GUTMAN

I have learned to take what I read in the mainstream Honduran media with a very large grain of salt. A recent editorial, otherwise well-intentioned, was factually flawed. It attempted to link malnutrition (not starvation), uninspired teachers and “irrelevant curricula” to poor scholastic performance by Honduran students.
I disagree. Culture, in its strictest interpretation — the cultivation (and fruit) of intellectual pursuit — can only take place where there already exists a long and strong tradition of culture and intellectual curiosity. This tradition must first be nurtured at home. Absent in the home, it has little chance of blossoming out of it. My father, born in a poor but intellectually inquisitive milieu (his father was a Talmudic scholar and Kabbalist) was malnourished during his entire childhood, adolescence and early adulthood — until he graduated summa cum laude from medical school in Paris. To pay for his studies (his parents could not afford the tuition), he worked as a waiter, dishwasher, elevator operator, delivery man and tutor. He even sold his blood and often skipped meals.

Conversely, I have known many young people born and raised in affluent families where “learning” was neither a way of life nor a priority. They eventually grew up into wealthy dunces.
An empty stomach, while painful and debilitating, has never stopped a strong-willed, motivated individual from enriching his or her intellect. Culturally fallow families that do not put a high priority on education will most likely produce generations of idiots. Nor does a full stomach guarantee academic excellence. In the U.S., a nation still struggling with a tradition of anti-intellectualism, schools keep breeding successive generations of marginally educated, not to say semi-illiterate, adults who never went hungry as children. What I am trying to say is that culture breeds culture, that without culture there is no culture — full stomach or not.

I would also suggest that there are no useless topics in education. The concept that education ought to be tailored to the life experiences, traditions and ethnic idiosyncrasies of a given minority is myopic as it ultimately keeps these people fettered to a past without future. Every snippet of knowledge acquired ultimately adds to a rich tapestry of culture, much of it useful in the workplace, some of it intellectually nourishing and enlightening. Education is an exercise and a discipline that uplift the spirit and enrich life.

Last, I believe that lousy teachers, while uninspiring and ineffectual, have never stopped motivated students from excelling. And, to complete the dialectical circle, I suggest that such motivation can only be instilled in the oxygen-rich atmosphere of households that value education — their economic status notwithstanding.

A high school student who throws an empty can of soda out a bus window “para no ensuciar el bus...!” as I once witnessed on a trip from SPS to La Entrada, lacks, in my opinion, intellectual maturity and suffers from a misplaced sense of values not conducive to cerebral development. My observations, after more than 13 years of regular travel to Central America indicate that education is NOT a priority, except among a very small elite. For the masses, this is tantamount to slow suicide by default. A nation of undereducated people governed by a schooled oligarchic minority can never advance.

Official map of Honduras. Updated 1994; Honduras-El Salvador border. Scale 1/500,000. Packed in its own special tube. $100.00 Contact Honduras This Week, P.O. Box 1312, Tegucigalpa, Honduras CA.E-mail: hontweek@hondutel.hn

BILINGUAL JOURNALIST WANTED.
SEND RESUME TO : HONDURAS THIS WEEK, P.O.BOX 1323, TEGUCIGALPA, HONDURAS

Many new ads in classifieds!

EDITORIAL

The Economy in a Cherry Tomato Basket

If finances are a race for solution, then it’s a deal! Let us keep financing. However, if finances are an instrument of the world, then they are an instrument of chaos.

The calculation of finances must be based upon results, repetitive experience on time and space. A methodic analysis allows us to understand over time the existing problems based upon data quantity and quality.

For the Honduran economic sector, things are not easy. Not only must the pretensions of the rich countries towards our local economies be fulfilled; we must also comply with what the non-rich countries expect from us.

In this context, our majestic contribution to world economy consists of the postponement of all mathematics by the brilliance of the Dean of the Faculty of Economy who will be historically remembered for making his decision. His vision of the world is very particular.

Maybe he is right. For if we begin thinking in mathematical terms, our future economists will be confused. For example, if someone from the World Bank came and we showed him numbers of the needs of this country, he would probably distort the numbers in order to avoid the improvement of our development and our sovereignty. Then, the benefits would be reaped only by the wealthiest countries, in a way that makes our local economists look like a non- transcendent professional mass.

The modern world evolves technologically at amazing speed. Computer chips improve almost daily. At this same speed the World Economy moves as a complicated braid of individual and corporate interests that are impressively inhuman.

Our country’s public spending has gone from 1.3% in 1998 to 5.3% today. It is clear that experienced Honduran economists and politicians do not know how to project finances over time and are severely compromising them.

It is frustrating to look at the operative costs of the Honduran government. Even more frustrating is to see that the ones who are benefiting are the poor and the opportunists, not those who pay. Given that the poor are imposed on by the rich countries, and the opportunists are the same patio politicians, well then, it would be very good for the government. For example, the rich and poor should be treated at the same place simply because they are contributors to the same hospital.

The Honduran government must have limitations regarding contractors. It should be illegal to compromise the governments that follow. Statutes and collective contracts must be revised to allow Civil Service Law with its reforms to create a valid framework for all public employees. But for the rest there are non-negotiable things like, for example, strikes on the public services because taking roads and bridges violates the rights of others. We have created an insufferable working class, and we are going to pay for this by having to close down our businesses.

Got something on your mind? Put it in writing...
Honduras This Week welcomes letters to the editor. Please include your name, address and phone number, if possible. Letters exceeding 200 words will be edited for size and content. We do not publish anonymous letters. Send to hontweek@hondutel.hn

All original articles and photographs published in Honduras This Week are protected by international copyright law. Reproduction, in whole or in part without prior written permission, is strictly prohibited. Published online by Marrder Omnimedia. Comments or suggestions regarding this web site should be addressed to the webmaster, Stanley Marrder at stan@marrder.com . Letters to the editor should be addressed to: hontweek@hondutel.hn .