NATIONAL NEWS

Quality control and trained workers to
improve competitivity

Anette Emanuelsson
Honduras This Week

A technician calibrating scales as part of last year’s standardization of industrial equipment.

Reduce the time it takes to start a business from 44 to 19 days, create a national system of quality and improve the skills of the Honduran workforce. These are some of the immediate goals of the National Commission for Competitivity presided by presidential
commissioner Virgilio Umanzor.

Since 2004, the Commission has been working to improve Honduras’ position in the global indexes of competitivity, focusing its effort on eight fundamental pillars. The improvements achieved by
the commission so far have started to reflect themselves in the global indexes of competitivity such as Doing Business, published by the World Bank, which measures the time it takes to open up a
business. Last year, Honduras improved from 66 to 40 days. During the coming four months Umanzor hopes to get the process down to 19 days by speeding up the allocation of operation permits in the municipalities of Tegucigalpa, San Pedro Sula and La Ceiba.Today it takes an average of 30 days, but digitalization of the process combined with new equipment and training of personnel is expected to reduce the time to a maximum of five days. For certain companies, the permit could be obtained in as little as one hour. “That would be the shortest time in the entire Central American region and would represent a very, very significant improvement,”
Umanzor said. He labels the simplification of the registration process as essential. “It is a all encompassing component since it helps all the productive sectors.” That the improvements are reflected in international competitivity reports is almost as important as the improvements themselves. “We are aware that they are consulted by international investors before making a decision,” Umanzor said.

A second priority of the Commission this year is the passing of the law that is set to create a National Institute of Quality. Last year saw the creation of the institute’s three main bodies: The Honduran Organization of Normalization, the Honduran Office of Accreditation, and the Honduran Center of Metrology.

The creation of voluntary norms for Honduran products, services as well as management is already underway. The first sector to be regulated is the bee product sector, which includes honey, pollen and propolis – the latter two with medical uses. The participating producers will be accredited by the end of 2007.

The next sector set to introduce norms is the coffee sector where an increasingly competitive market calls for differentiation of the products. “Such a differentiation is no longer based on the price, now it is quality,” said Cristina Rodriguez, Director of Quality at the Honduran Council of Science and Technology (COHCIT), which will be the headquarters of the Institute of Quality.

A third project is being developed in cooperation with small producers of rosquillas, a traditional Honduran bread that is increasingly being exported to Honduran immigrants in the United
States. These producers generally lack education and financial resources and therefore need information on the preferences of the client.

The norms, which include guidelines on how to handle and pack the products according to international standards, are all voluntary. “But in the end they become obligatory because if you don’t produce better quality products, they won’t enter the international market,”
Rodriguez said. Also areas such as social responsibility and energy efficiency are being normalized.

Quality production also includes trustworthy measuring methods. More than 500 pieces of equipment such as scales and thermometers were calibrated during 2006, to make sure that products sold had the indicated weight and that food stuff was produced at the correct temperatures.

A final component of the National Institute of Quality is accreditation. In order to make sure that the new norms are being
fulfilled, quality controls are vital. However, results from Honduran
laboratories are often not trustworthy, which is why COHCIT is
working to accredit them according to ISO norms. A pharmaceutical
laboratory will be accredited in the coming months, to be followed by laboratories for testing food products later this year.

Umanzor lists training of the Honduran workforce as a third priority of the Commission. “We want the country to be competitive
not only because of the cost of labor but also thanks to other factors, and therefore the investment in human resources is fundamental,” he said. Also, studies show that a better trained
workforce is a critical factor for the competitivity of a country.
According to the 2006 Global Competitiveness Index published
by the World Economic Forum, an inadequately trained workforce is
one of the top five problems when doing business in Honduras.

The training of the workforce is overseen by the organization FIDE Investment and Exports, which is developing new curriculums for a selection of public and private training centers. Apart from specific knowledge needed in the respective professions, Rosa Anatrella of FIDE lists knowledge of English, ability to work in a team, honesty and decisionmaking as sought-after qualities by employers. The education is mainly practical, confronting the students will real life events and training them in making decisions.

FIDE is also lobbying the government for changes in the Honduran labor laws, for example making it possible for a worker to change duties within a company without it being considered as an indirect firing.

Umanzor feels that there have been important improvements
in Honduran competitiveness lately but he acknowledges that the efforts must be even greater. “In the last report on competitiveness published by the World Economic Forum, Honduras had advanced four positions, but there are countries in the region that are making bigger leaps. The improvements must accelerate because the competition is fierce.”

National University tries to find a way forward

Alvaro Morales Molina and
Alex Jones
Honduras This Week

Commission of Transition.

Last week the Comisión de Transición, the body initiated to reform the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Honduras (UNAH) in 2004, held a conference to inform the public on what “has and has not been done.” The conference comes with much skepticism as to whether the members are adequately fulfilling their roles, especially from organized groups of students who arrived in mass to make their feelings clear.

Before 2005 the National Autonomous University of Honduras had complete autonomy from the government, and the national constitution dictated that they were entitled to at least 6% of GDP each year. The internal government at the university, who decided how to spend this money, was split equally between students and authorities.

Marlon Samayoa, an external student leader, recounts how this “autonomous power led to a great deal of corruption and mal practice… as there was no one able to check on it.” “If you wanted to get power within the university,” he said, “you needed students…for this reason they became politicized and student bodies started to form, aligning themselves with the left or the right.” Among these student bodies were the Fuerza Universitaria Revolucionaria (FUR).

One “consequence of this came out during the 80’s”, says Samayoa, “in response to issues concerning the Cold War.” He explains how “within the university, people who empathized with communist ideals were able to express themselves, because they had the power to be independent from the government.” However “government officials began working with right handed authorities and students within the university, and during this time many students from FUR and the other major left handed student body, Frente de Reforma Universitario (FRU), disappeared.”

Another problem with the old system, says Samayoa, was that students were “frequently corrupted by the process, and acted with only their own interests in mind…some students were able to earn a lot of money through bribes coming either from the authorities or outside the university.

”Talking at the conference last week Dr Haddad, President of the commission, explained how “seven years ago there were requests for change at the university, as it had left behind its principles,” referring to “a student sector that used to be belligerent and agitated.” In December 2004 national congress created the Comisión de Transición with the “sole objective of organizing a new university government to promote and accomplish
all the principles of the concept of national university.” On May 18 2005 the commission took effect in the university, relieving the previous student bodies and authorities of their power. The commission aims to apply the adequate reforms within a designated
timeframe, and then hand over management of the university to a rector, whom they will appoint.

“We found a university of the past century” said Haddad, “but there are still 14.5 months of life for the commission…and there are four
fields in which we want to make reforms.” He cited administrative,
political, judicial and academic reform, commenting how they had
begun with administrative reform and now wanted to make a start on
academic reform.

Also talking for the commission was Dr Calderon. She proposed that “any academic reform has to recover the sense that we are a public university. We must in fact be The National Autonomous University of Honduras…it is time to rid the university of personal
interest and convert it into a university of public service.”

In this she pointed to three criteria that the university should adopt. “Firstly”, she said, “the university should adopt a sense of duty, a sense that it owes itself to the people. Secondly, it should adopt a principle of universality, such that everyone has the chance to study here. And thirdly, and least importantly, the university should aim to be competitive.” But she was keen to stress that “this should be thought of as a compliment of the first two and not be privileged above them.”

However protesters at the conference, representing FUR, were not so convinced by what the commission had to say. Karol Rodriguez, a member of FUR, when asked whether or not she thought that the commission will deliver, answered “no, especially as their government is almost over and they haven’t delivered so far.” She also felt that “eventually they will make the university private, regardless of what they say.” She argued that a better government
would be a “constituent one, with power divided between the authorities and the students.” Though she also agreed that “the parity didn’t work before, so the division of power would have to be set up differently.”

In a press release, FUR wrote that “the Comisión de Transición has tried to make Honduran society believe that it has made positive advances in the highest house of study. However it has taken a series of measures that, on the contrary, are backward steps and
which have violated the rights of thousands of young people and will
have dramatic repercussions within our society.”

In response to the commission’s presentation of UNAH as a public
university, FUR point to both the new online enrollment and new admissions tests as rebuttals. They argue that “the great majority of potential university applicants don’t have access to internet…much less so in the countryside than in the cities” and that “the admissions exam does nothing more than prohibit thousands of
secondary school graduates from being able to afford to enroll in
university education.” According to them, the exam indirectly signifies an increase in the cost to enroll at UNAH of L.225.00. “Of the 63,000 students that graduated from secondary school in 2006, only 8,300 continued their studies at UNAH. This means that more than 50,000 young people had to search for either a place at a private university or find employment - drastically increasing the cost of private university education.”

They also claim that “the Comisión de Transición has tried to convince the public that the poor academic level at UNAH is the responsibility of the students, and that this is a complete lie.” They look instead to “the disastrous management of the administration
department, last year’s corruption scandals: for example students paying money into personal accounts to use laboratories, a university authority that has misinformed people on procedures of application, withdrawn resources, online enrollment when even UNAH has no access to the internet, laboratory equipment and books that date back to the 70’s, no personal evaluation of teachers, the lack of protection students are afforded against assault, increased costs to do things in the university while the authorities are prescribing themselves large salaries, and no official method of resolving worker conflicts” as possible causes of a low academic level.

FUR claims that “in the last three years students have been marginalized in the conducting of the university, and that, still, the
problems are not being addressed.”

New Hondutel manager set on increasing revenue

Anette Emanuelsson
Honduras This Week

A Hondutel tower.

An expert in restructuring and rescuing companies has taken over
the position as General Manager of the Honduran state owned telecommunication company Hondutel. Jacobo Lagos’ predecessor Jacobo Regalado was moved to a different government position as part of President Manuel Zelaya’s massive government reorganization in January. After 40 days on this post, Lagos is clear about his two most important challenges: increasing revenues and introducing Hondutel on the cellular telephony market. And the two are intimately related, although Lagos doesn’t want to comment on how much Hondutel is expected to earn from mobile telephony. The company is investing 60 million dollars and the launch of the new service is planned for the final trimester of 2007. Lagos is convinced that there is enough space for a third competitor on the Honduran cellphone market, where Tigo and Claro are the sole operators today. “The market penetration is approximately 30 percent so there is an unsatisfied demand,” he said, unwilling to talk about Hondutel’s strategies. He just says that they will be competitive through offering clients options from “the best service to the lowest price.”

Another strategy for increasing Hondutel incomes is reducing the illicit traffic of international telephone calls. The estimated loss of 15 to 20 million dollars annually wasn’t recognized as a major problem until Hondutel lost its monopoly on international telephony in 2005 and so one of its major sources of income. Lagos also emphasizes the need for more efficient charging, making sure that clients pay on time. Flawed charging practices as well as delays in the cutting of the service of defaulting clients have resulted in large outstanding debts. “We have a considerable quantity of overdue payments but I’d rather not mention any numbers at this point,” Lagos said.

The policy of the government is clear: Hondutel won’t be privatized.
Instead the company should be strengthened, allowing it to function on a competitive market. Lagos wants Hondutel to become more proactive, using market intelligence. “We can’t just react to market developments; instead we must offer a more efficient service with better deals. We shouldn’t wait for people to come to us but instead approach potential clients.”

The new Hondutel Manager Jacobo Lagos will introduce cellular telephony in 2007.

The new telecommunication legislation expected to be passed soon will allow Hondutel to respond quicker to market developments. “The traditional government bureaucracy can be a significant obstacle. In the time it takes one of our competitors to make ten purchases, we make one,” Lagos said. The new legislation will allow swifter contracting and biddings.

Hondutel is also planning to increase their share of the internet market, where they currently have only seven percent, through investments in broadband.

The traditional fixed telephony will see a 40 million dollar investment and is expected to increase by 100,000 telephone lines, 25 percent of which will be cordless.

Lagos admits that he doesn’t have any expertise in telecommunications, but in managing, negotiation and restructuring. “And this company needs a restructuring.”

President to be part time manager of electricity company

Álvaro Morales Molina
Honduras This Week

Personally going after the debtors of the Empresa Nacional de Energia Electrica, the National Electric Power Company of Honduras,(ENEE), is the new and unprecedented strategy that Manuel Zelaya, President of Honduras, is using to save it from bankruptcy. In a press conference earlier this week Zelaya assured
journalists that, starting Sunday 25th, all of his high staff members,
including the Secretaries of State, will share the responsibility to
develop new strategies for saving the ENEE from bankruptcy.

“Everybody in the government should buy their own ladder, because from Sunday on, all of us are going to climb on the posts, to cut out the service from the debtors” claimed Zelaya, sarcastically according to La Tribuna. “This is a message to everyone” he says “please save me the effort of embarrassing you, and come to pay
before Sunday” he said, referring to the long list of energy consumers that do not pay.

According to the technical staff of ENEE, some 13,000 big clients,
representing more than 70 percent of the electricity consumed, don’t pay accordingly, causing the company some three billion lempiras per year in losses.

Another action to be taken by the new part time manager of the ENEE will be to oblige all governmental dependencies to pay for the
energy that they use. Secondly, an independent audit will take place after an order from the National Congress to revise the contracts of producers of thermal energy, especially those representing a high cost for the company. Third, a revision of the contract with the private Empresa de Servicios de Medicion Electrica de Honduras (SEMEH), which is in charge of revising the consumers accounts, will be carried out.

At a meeting held earlier this week between Alpha Castillo, Manager of the ENEE, labour union representatives and President Zelaya, the president was briefed on the reasons for the crisis in the company, which produces some 900 megawatt per month but is only being paid for 600 megawatt, creating a deficit of 300 megawatt per month. Zelaya said that if no action is taken, the company would definitely collapse in no time.

In La Tribuna Zelaya explained his radical and unusual decision to personally become a part time Manager of the ENEE. “I called
Alpha Castillo and asked her how the ENEE is doing? And she said
that ‘I’m going to tell you that the energy system of Honduras is
rotten’,” the President said.

According to Castillo, the problem with being manager of ENEE is that changing many contracts, concessions, laws, arrangements and agreements made in the past, “is out of my reach - they need political power to be changed.” “After I heard the words ‘rotten system,’ that really made me react,” Zelaya was quoted as saying in La Tribuna. An example of the problem, described in La Tribuna, is the fact that some days ago a temporary commission that administrated the ENEEsigned a contract for the production of thermal energy, in which the ENEE is going to pay 19 U.S. cents per kilowatt while it will be sold to the public for 9 cents, adding more waste to the free fall catastrophe.

Zelaya’s controversial decision was immediately applauded as well
as criticized by different sectors of society. Juliette Handal, who
resigned from her position as an Honour Witnesses for the fuel bid
process on Wednesday, said that Zelaya’s action is nothing more
than a populist act and a smog curtain to distract attention from the almost failed fuel bid process, which she thinks might be the worst political error of this administration.

“This is not a show, this is not populism,” reacted Zelaya in La Tribuna. “I have too many problems as a President to be fighting for the attention of the cameras. Now, my historic responsibility as a citizen is to really search for permanent solutions for the country. I am taking a big risk in this decision and you (the public) are going to evaluate it later,” said Zelaya.

According to Arturo Corrales, owner of SEMEH, a four billion lempira investment is needed to stabilize the ENEE financially, as well as a redesign of the policy to buy thermal energy. Corrales claims in La Tribuna, that of the 1.8 billion lempiras in unpaid debt, some 800 million are owed by government institutions, 500 million represent interest over interest, and another major part of it belongs to lost accounts that have been unpaid for a long time.

The real causes of the crisis, according to Corrales, are the unrecorded energy, the stealing of energy, the under-measurement
due to the bad shape of measurement devices and losses due to bad cabling.

Conference combats rising figures in
child execution

Louise Wallace
Honduras This Week

The summary killing of children and adolescents in Honduras damages the democratic processes of this country.” Such was the
sentiment that dominated the conference lead by Casa Alianza on Tuesday, in treatment of the violent deaths and execution of minors in Honduras.

The conference, held in the Hotel Plaza San Martín, Tegucigalpa, was organized by the charity in reaction to new statistics that show a total 494 young people were killed through extra judicial killings in the first year of Manuel Zelaya’s presidency. Of this number 375 were perpetrated against citizens between the ages of 18 and 22,
representing 78% of the figure.

“Over half our population is composed of children,” said Vilma Cecilia Morales, President of the Supreme Court of Justice and just one of a distinguished list of speakers that included the German
ambassador and the Head of UNICEF in Honduras. “They are the future of our country and we need to protect them.” 22% of the victims were under the age of 18.

“The problem is wide ranging and comes from many sources,” added Alvaro Romero Salgado, Minister of Security. While 71% of
the 494 murders were committed by organized criminals, another
16% were committed by gang members, 3% by unspecified individuals and 3% by members of the police. 433 of these murders
were enacted using fire arms, the majority in Tegucigalpa and San
Pedro Sula.

Particularly sinister are the illegal executions of suspected young gang members by the police forces - a trend that started in 1995
when ideas of ´social cleansing´ entered the armed forces. “This is a problem that is hard for a country like ours to admit,” said Jose Manuel Capellin, chief of Casa Alianza in Honduras. “Yet we could
only think of ourselves as a bad country if we ignored the problem,
rather than openly accept it and strive for change.”

“We can’t continue with thisculture of violence,” agreed lawyer Ana Pineda.

Poverty, corruption and poor education were all identified as factors that contributed to the high rate of assassination. The conference
was dominated by talk of social responsibility, particularly in relation to statistics that showed that though only 10% of the victims were female, they had almost unanimously been victims of sexual abuse.

Yet Salgado, Minister of Security and Leonidas Rosa Bautista, General Attorney, pointed to Honduras’ institutions. They held up the United Special Investigation into Death in Minors (UEIMM) as a body used by the government to tackle the problem, promising stronger investigative forces, improved protection of witnesses and greater collaboration with the community.

Despite these pledges, there was clearly an underlying feeling of tension at the conference. “Casa Alianza has been denouncing this
violence for seven years,” said Jose Manuel Torres, who works with the charity. “The government has made many promises. Yet still nothing has changed.” Understandably, the issue is frustrating for Casa Alianza. Rather than see an improvement, the number of killings has increased by 20% since the presidency of Ricardo Maduro.

“You talk about investigation. But by the time you investigate the children are already dead! What are you going to do prevent this happening in the first place?” demanded members of the audience.
“How can we believe that anything will improve?”

Morales, however, remained optimistic, particularly when challenged
with figures that showed that though 935 cases were investigated by the UEIMM between June 2003 and December 2005, only a very small proportion of them had actually been solved. “There is still hope for these cases. You must not expect these institutions to fail.”

The conference came in synchrony with the challenge of another 15 human rights organizations, who demanded that the President introduce reforms to the police and security forces. In addition to highlighting the problem of child executions, they stressed the investigation into the unsolved disappearances of the eighties as equally important to the establishment of civil security. “It is a bestial, violent system,” said Ana Pineda, in evaluation of the child murders. “And one that our country needs to address.”

Adoption laws working to the interests of abandoned children?

Sasha Arms
Honduras This Week

Just 50 adoptions took place in Honduras in 2005. There are 40,000
children in orphanages and temporary custody in the country, yet the Honduran Institute of Children and the Family (IHNFA) claim that
there are always more potential parents than there are available children. There is no official adoption law in Honduras, just a set of
guidelines which were formed in 1958. There have been cases where
it has taken parents up to eight years to adopt their child. Is there a brighter future for abandoned children in Honduras?

“It is absolutely critical that the Honduran State passes the ‘Special
Law on Adoption’,” pronounces Marta Obando Salgado, Child Protection Official of UNICEF Honduras. “We are talking about the lives of children here and no-one else other than the State should decide on the futures of these vulnerable children,” she adds. In fact, the fourth draft of the adoption law is currently being reviewed and is due to be discussed in civil society forums later this year. However, the international UN Convention on the Rights of the Child has made an urgent recommendation to Honduras this month that the process to adopt the Adoption Law is speeded up as a matter of absolute priority.

The matter is so urgent because the current system is in disarray, even by the admission of Doris Garcia, Director of IHNFA: “IHNFA have not been handling the adoption process in Honduras effectively until now. Improvements need to be made to the whole process and once the new law is implemented we will have guidelines to make this happen.” At the moment, IHNFA follow a standardized set of procedures. When IHNFA has a potential candidate for adoption, they first search for close or distant relatives of the said child. If no family is found, the child’s case is presented to a Judge, who then has the power to declare a child as officially ‘abandoned’. The abandoned child is then sent to a temporary family and IHNFA meet
with the children individually to find out more about them to ensure
their needs are met – how they grew up, if they’d like to live with a
new family and their aspirations for the future. IHNFA then searches
for a suitable adoptive family – suitable adoptive parents must be aged 25-50, register the correct moral values, be able to provide an
adequate family environment and be Honduran by birth. A family
court can than pronounce an adoption as ‘legal’.

“There are not many changes we need to make to the current rules when the new law is passed, “Garcia maintains, “but the biggest
problem we have to tackle is the length of time it takes for an adoption to take place,” she adds. Marta Obando of UNICEF agrees with this point: “The long period of time involved in the current adoption process seriously affects the emotional health of the child. This new legal bill has been discussed for 5 years now, and one thing that has not been agreed on is how long the process should take while adequately guaranteeing the rights of the child during the
proceedings.” It takes an average of 16-18 months for an adoption to
be completed, although it can as easily take years. “There are obstacles everywhere,” Garcia states, “Judges, attorneys, and in IHNFA itself.” IHNFA has a particular problem when potential adoptive families live far away from IHNFA headquarters in Tegucigalpa.

Garcia explains, “IHNFA does not have the financial resources to send staff to investigate potential adoptive families who live far away, for example in La Moskita or the Bay Islands. Sometimes those families offer to pay the transport costs for IHNFA, but IHNFA is not allowed to accept money from them. So these families have to wait for a time when IHNFA does have the resources, which can also take years.”

A key question that remains to be answered is why so few adoptions take place, when there are so many children in temporary homes and orphanages in Honduras. Again, Garcia puts this down to the current system: “Before a child can be declared eligible for
adoption, a Judge must pronounce them as ‘abandoned’ – either if they are orphans or if their family has signed papers to agree to this.” Many orphanages do not know that they could present a child’s case to a judge, but a greater sticking point is that someone needs to pay for legal representation for this to happen. Resource-strapped orphanages simply do not have this kind of money.

Another paradox is the position of foreign nationals who wish to
adopt Honduran children. Although the current guidelines explicitly
stipulate that abandoned children should go to Honduran families,
80% of adoptions are actually to foreign nationals. “We always look
for Honduran families first, but if we can’t find a suitable family we look at international applicants,” Garcia states. However, the process for foreign applicants can be even more grueling. Pastor
Marlene Alfaro has a stream of North American parents who want
to adopt Honduran children come to stay with her. They go through
the same lengthy processes as Hondurans, except it is often the
US Embassy that causes problems in the adoptions. Alfaro explains: “The US Embassy will not issue an exit visa to children who are over the age of 16. I had a North American couple stay with me as they wanted to adopt Jessica. It took them years to go through the procedures, which they finally completed. However, their appointment with the US Embassy was on Jessica’s 16th Birthday and so she was denied entry into the States. Now Jessica lives with
me.” She goes on to say: “It is heart-breaking. These people from
abroad want to help our children, we should be making it so much
easier for them.”

However, UNICEF have a different view on international adoptions. “The reason the guidelines stipulate that adoptive parents are Honduran is for cultural reasons, but also for systems of monitoring the children,” Salgado identifies. “As Honduras has not signed the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, the government has no
rights to monitor the progress of children who are adopted and live
in other countries. There have been cases where Honduran children
have died in their new foreign homes, or have been victims of
abuse. This is why it is so critically important that Honduras ratifies
this treaty, as all signatories of the Convention have to monitor crosscountry adoptions.”

The adoption process in Honduras is currently a tangled web of obstacles, miscommunication and red tape. The lack of legal status for adoption in Honduras is the reason many people blame the
chronic problems on, so once the new law is passed there are high
hopes that the system will witness a complete overhaul. Additionally
however, there are other points that UNICEF think need monitoring.
There is a tendency when talking about adoption to focus on the troubles of parents trying to adopt. “We need to keep a focus on children waiting to have parents and families, rather than parents waiting to have children,” Obando reminds us. “There is also a tendency for people to think that poverty should be a reason for
adoption, but it should not be at all,” she ascertains. “It is a common cultural opinion that if a mother is poor and doesn’t have the economic resources to maintain her child, then it is acceptable for her to put the child up for adoption. But in fact the government should be trying to strengthen family ties and support families by implementing micro-business opportunities for example.”

It is often the case that children simply live with carers rather than
going through the whole adoption process, and from the state of the
adoption system, it is easy to see why. Nevertheless, it is imperative that children are adopted, so that they acquire the legal rights associated with having a legal guardian. Now only time will tell whether the new law will be sufficient to give the thousands of needy children the homes they deserve and desperately need. Adoption laws working to the interests of abandoned children? Natalia Sandoval According to UNICEF, the focus needs to shift from couples wanting to adopt to children needing a family.

Asociación San José Obrero: A beacon of hope

César J. Baldelomar
Honduras This Week

Since its humble beginnings in 1971 as a small clinic in the marginalized southern city of Choluteca, La Associación San José Obrero (St. Joseph the Worker) now operates several small factories, a clinic, many housing projects, a cemetery, a reforestation nursery, and an ecotourism site on the Pacific Coast.
The founder of the association and long time resident of Choluteca,
Cuban-born Catholic priest Father Alejandro López Tuero said, “what
inspired me to start this association was the extreme poverty of my
parishioners in Choluteca.”

While administrating the small clinic during the early 70’s, Father
Alejandro quickly realized that many of the patients suffered from what he called “sicknesses of poverty.” In response, he developed
a small factory, Gunates de Centro América (Gloves of Central
America) that offered moderate employment to the impoverished men and women of Choluteca. Since then, as already noted, the San José Obrero Association has expanded to include several micro-enterprises which provide employment to over 300 individuals as well as a variety of goods and services to the community of Choluteca.

Two of the association’s most important enterprises are “Incatec” and “Survivienda.

”Incatec, a technical school, was developed from necessity. “When the association’s many small factories began to appear, there was much output, but the quality was poor,” said Father Alejandro. “So we created Incatec to help workers become competent professionals in their field.” Currently, Incatec is averaging 300 students per year, with the majority specializing as computer and refrigerator technicians. Others are preparing for careers as electricians, plumbers and carpenters. “The point of Incatec is to help workers become skilled professionals so that they may hold a job anywhere, anytime,” said Incatec manager Saúl Baca.

The association’s housing project, Survivienda (Southern Housing), has also had a significant impact within the Choluteca community. Survivienda provides two types of micro-credit loans. One loan gives low-income families who wish to improve their households a maximum of 10,000 lempiras. The second type of loan is for families who wish to purchase a house in one of the enterprise’s seven colonies. “Our mission is to help our people live better, live healthier, and live happier,” said Survivienda manager Jorge Alberto Vásquez. “Many have improved their homes, and still many others have purchased a home for a reasonable price thanks to the work of our organization.” Indeed, in its 23-year history, over 38,112 individuals have directly benefited from Survivienda’s 6,500 micro-credit loans.

The San José Obrero Association continues to grow today thanks to the support of the Catholic community in Miami, Florida. Twice a year—in May and November—Father Alejandro and a band of workers travel to two of Miami’s Catholic parishes to collect discarded and donated goods that are then shipped via 40-foot cargo
containers to Choluetca. During his November 2006 visit, he managed to fill 52 containers with discarded items such as faded clothes, wornout shoes, broken computers, various metallic products, and canned foods.

Once they arrive in Choluetca, the goods are taken to the association’s main warehouse to be categorized and later redistributed to the association’s many micro-enterprises. For example, the medical equipment is sent to the association’s San Francisco de Asís Clinic, while the metallic products may be sent to the association’s “El Jardín de Paz” (The Garden of Peace) cemetery, where workers will then transform seemingly useless metals into an elaborately decorated tombstone. “Our association prides itself on not emulating the lifestyles of many rich countries,” said the Director of the association’s El Jardín de Paz cemetery, Dielman Herrera. “Those rich countries just throw away everything; they don’t see the value of recycling.”

Although the association has become an economic haven for
countless families in Choluetca, Father Alejandro insists that “the
association has not lost its original focus, that is, to help the citizens of Choluetca grow in their faith.” The association fosters spiritual growth by organizing several religious ceremonies that are considered “popular.” “Popular religion is the traditional religious customs of the town, so they are not official Catholic Church celebrations,” said Father Alejandro, who was recently busy preparing a popular nine-day (16 Dec to 24 Dec) religious celebration called “Las Posadas,” in which the faithful reenact the conception and birth of Jesus Christ.

Interestingly, there is no priest required for this celebration. “Due to the shortage of clergy,” according to Father Alejandro, “the people of Choluteca, and all throughout Latin America, need to learn more about their faith in order to grow and teach others.”

Summing up his view of the association, citizen of Choluteca Jose Ríos said, “The San José Obrero Association is unique because it works with the poor to bring about economic and spiritual transformation. It is a beacon of hope in a place where hope is all but lost.”

Choluteca is an extremely impoverished city with a seemingly
insurmountable unemployment rate. Further, any prospect of progress was severely hindered by Hurricane Mitch, which nearly
destroyed Choluteca. “But we keep striving toward excellence in all
that we do,” said Father Alejandro. “Hopefully the people of Choluteca will follow the example of our young professionals.”

For more information on Asociación San José Obrero:
www.sanjoseobererofoundation.org

The Mighty Pupusa

Louise Wallace
Honduras This Week

Though arguably a delicacy of Salvadorian origin, the mighty pupusa has been a staple of Honduran life since long before the opening of Paseo Universitario. Yet it is this very brand that has transformed the pupusa, breeding the healthy commercialism of the US fast food restaurant with the local delicacy of Central American cuisine. As the first Paseo Universitario opens in Miami, Florida, tasting the heady lights of international success, the question remains whether Honduras’s US neighbors will be equally enamored by the pupusa’s taste.

It was with great difficulty that this paper obtained the secret pupusa recipe. “There are two traditional types of pupusa,” whispered Olympia Irias. “Pork and cheese. Personally I prefer cheese.” The pupusas, basically a type of stuffed tortilla, are composed from a corn dough which is rolled into a ball. A hollow is made in which is inserted the cheese or pork paste, the tortilla rolled, flattened and cooked on a hot plate. “We use oil to stop the pupusa from sticking,” confirmed a second Paseo Universitario employee, who
prefers to remain anonymous.

The popularity of the pupusa in Honduras is hard to negate. “The
restaurant is almost always full,” boasted a Paseo Univeristario
manager. There are booths for young lovers and even a take out
service for the more lazy pupusa enthusiasts. “The normal number
of pupusas a person eats ranges between two and four,” according
to pupusa chef Viranda Sanchez, whose favorite pupusa is also
cheese. “Though I’ve heard of people who have ordered twenty!
That’s a great deal of pupusa considering the pupusa is served with salad.”

When asked whether Paseo Universitario will be able to compete with McDonalds, a Paseo Universitario employee shakes his head solemnly. “They are too different. They serve too different types of food.” Yet there is no doubt that the pupusa is an export that Honduras can be proud of. And with Paseo Universitario already owning five stores in Tegucigalpa and five in San Pedro Sula, there is no doubt that the mighty pupusa’s popularity will only continue to grow.

Wilmer Velásquez:
Scoring goals and praying

Alex Jones
Honduras This Week

Born in San Pedro Sula on 28th of April 1972, Wilmer Velásquez began kicking a ball around at school, playing with mates for high
school clubs. Now he his captain of the Honduran national team, and least week led them to the Copa de Naciones in El Salvador.

Shortly after he was born he moved to Tela, and there he went to school. It was at school that he learnt to play and became obsessed with football, picking the Argentinean born Gabriel Batistuta as a role model, and beginning his life long support for Real Madrid. He was always tempted by the option of continuing his studies, maybe to go on to become an engineer, but after competing with his high school side he was picked for some youth teams and taken away from that world almost entirely. Whilst
playing in various youth selections he was spotted by Olimpia, a top
team in the national league, which is where he has been based since 1990. A number of times he has been out on loan, which is something he enjoys and hopes may happen again. In 1996 he spent a year in Chile. He says this was “the best country to play in.” Then, in 1999 he spent a season in Brazil and in 2001 a season in Mexico.

His 17 year career as a footballer has, naturally, been laden with ups and downs. When he broke his collar bone he was out for seven months, and three times he has had to have operations on his left knee. “Just not being able to play is one of the hardest things,” he tells me. But, on the other hand, one can offset these setbacks against his massive 11 league titles with Olimpia, selection and armband for the national team, three awards for top goal scorer in the Copa de Naciones and three opportunities to play abroad - it is clear that he is doing something right. And all along he talks in a cool and modest way, like it is nothing special!

Wilmer’s life, however, is by no means just about scoring goals. For the last twelve years he has been a devout Christian. Indeed it is through “giving life to Jesus that (he is) driven on in football.” It gives him “the motivation to keep doing better.” “My life,” he says, “used to be in complete disorder. Then some of the players at Olimpia told me that I could change that…As humans we all need a savior, Jesus Christ is my savior.” Now Wilmer spends a lot of his spare time with the church, preaching to people who need help. “Of course,” he agrees, “people listen more to a famous footballer more than they might otherwise, I should take advantage of this.”

An ideal day for Wilmer is spent with his family. He feels that, for him, “there is nothing more beautiful that sharing time with his wife and three kids.” Maybe he would listen to a little music, some “religious Christian songs.” I ask him about his favorite food and he laughs, lightly, saying that “as footballers we always have to eat
beans, beans and more beans…but really I like spaghetti.” The diet
of beans is part of a routine he has to live. “We must be disciplined
with our bodies and take care of them…we cannot go out all night,
party and drink a lot, moreover we must rest and relax.” Everyday
before a game the team come to this Hotel where we are now, for
precisely this reason - to de-stress and prepare. As we speak they are getting mentally psyched for an eliminatory game in, what he calls, “the world cup for clubs” against the Washington based team, D.C. United.

“Admittedly,” he says, “last weeks Copa de Naciones wasn’t what we had expected.” Honduras won one, drew one and lost one,
meaning they never even left the group stages. “We had hoped to
achieve more…but we didn’t take advantages of many of the opportunities we were given to score and do better throughout the games.” Wilmer was pleased to receive his third top goal scorer title for the competition, but said that “what is more important is that we have secured a place in the U.S Gold Cup, which is a much bigger and more prestigious competition… with the help of God, we will get a good result there.”

Olimpia 1, DC United 4

Unfortunately for Olimpia, the Argentine midfielder, Christian Gomez, scored twice in a DC United thrashing of the Velásquez captained side last Wednesday. 4-1 was the final score in
Tegucigalpa, which means a hard come back is needed in Washington if our Olimpia are to stay in the CONCACAF Champions Cup quarter-final.

Gomez started the scoring when he gained possession and curled the ball past Ricardo James from just outside the penalty area in the 29th minute.

Five minutes later Juan Carcamo headed the hosts level. However the U.S. team took the lead again just one minute before halftime, when Brazilian Luciano Emilio scored with a sly back heel.

Gomez powered in United’s third spot on the hour, and his fellow countryman, Facundo Erpen, finished off the scoring seven minutes from time when he headed home from a corner.

Witnesses of fuel bid resign

Some of the witnesses who were involved in watching the fuel bidding process have resigned, as they disagreed with the way that Christian Democrat Arturo Corrales Alvarez negotiated with the transnational companies who were bidding. Those who resigned are: Juliette Handal, Emilio Larach, Daniel Durón, Oswaldo Canales and Rossana Guevara. There exit is also said to be related to their feeling that the government would have come to an agreement with the transnational companies themselves, making the bidding process worthless anyway. The winning company of the process
is the American Conoco Phillips. Nevertheless, have not been able to sign the contract so far because the government still does not have the required storage tanks.
El Heraldo

Kidney transplant
rescheduled  

The first kidney transplant in a public hospital was suspended last week, but officials hope to have set a new date in the next few days. The postponement of this operation on future kidney recipient, thirteen year old Fernando Barahona, was said to be due to a lack of correct medical equipment to perform the procedure. The lack of equipment was in turn due to a lack of finances for the hospital to buy it. The health authorities have been met with weighty criticism following this cancellation. Jenny Meza, holder of the ministerial portfolio, is due to meet with hospital authorities this week to find out the real reasons for the suspension of the surgery. The delay will affect Fernando’s chance of being able to survive and will also delay surgery for 10 other children in Francisco Morazan waiting for kidney transplants.
El Heraldo

Fewer cases of rotavirus

It was reported this week that there is a diminishing number of cases of rotavirus being presented each day. At present, the average number of cases being presented each week is twelve, whereas during the beginning of February the figure was at forty per week. To date a total of 392 cases of the virus have been reported, although no deaths have been announced. These new figures show that the disease may be stabilizing, although it has not yet disappeared completely.
El Heraldo