Honduras This Week Opinions & Editorial

RETROSPECTIVE

Uncle Eric's strange encounter

In the tiny West Indian island nation of Grenada, a recent encounter with Eric Gairy yields fresh UFO sightings and new question marks

By W.E. GUTMAN
Special to Honduras This Week

ST. GEORGE'S, Grenada -- Willowy, almost frail, he shields glaucoma-blanched eyes with the back of one hand, stroking the amber smoothness of his walking stick with the other. He is nearly blind but he scans the northwestern horizon, pointing a knotty finger at a region in space only he can discern.

Baring a gilt-edged smile, Sir Eric M. Gairy, former-and-forever-hopeful Prime Minister of Grenada -- "Uncle" to his beloved followers -- pauses, deep in thought. If his inanimate gaze is fixed heavenward it is to acknowledge and expiate the gifts and affronts of time, for he has been visited by all -- adulation, power, fall from grace, penury and decrepitude -- and, if his once-seeing eyes served him well, by a flotilla of flying saucers.

It was during a September 1977 meeting in Washington with President Jimmy Carter -- also an avowed UFO buff -- that Gairy first called for a worldwide inquest. Indeed, Gairy had spotted a "covey of brightly lit elliptical objects hovering high over the ministerial mansion then darting silently at tremendous speeds toward the southeast."

Three months later, an impassioned Gairy urged the UN's General Assembly to investigate the phenomenon. "The sightings were so anomalous, their potentiality so out of character with the dignity of my office," Gairy told this writer, "that I felt compelled to rouse the world out of its torpor and exhort it to take a closer look. I was worried that these apparitions might seriously impact world security."

Acknowledging Sir Eric's concern, then-Secretary General, Kurt Waldheim, offered his sympathy and assured the Grenadian head of state that the matter would be addressed as soon as "126 global issues ranging from disarmament, to human rights and terrorism" had been shelved...."

Those were the good old days for Gairy. Credited for having yanked Grenada out of the colonial yoke in 1974 and led it to independence from Britain, the charismatic firebrand was still riding the crest of a 30-year political career.

But, ill-omened and immutable, the winds of change were gusting. Gradually rescinding all the positive social changes he had fought so hard to effect, the now despotic ruler had turned Grenada into an economic wilderness of poverty, unemployment and widespread discontent.

His 12-year regime ended in March 1979 in a swift coup engineered by Maurice Bishop, head of the leftist New Jewel Movement. Tipped off, Gairy had flown to New York a day before and was seeking renewed U.N. support for the investigation of UFOs (cynics say to divert attention from his wretched political record) when he was deposed in absentia. Bishop was assassinated in October 1983. His death and the turmoil that followed spurred the celebrated and often derided "U.S. invasion."

The only political event to stir controversy in Grenada following the raid was Sir Eric's return. For reasons which he fails to explain, the prodigal son began publicly denying a preoccupation with UFOs. Dismissing his critics as "a Communists" he turned to metaphysics, spiritual healing and magnetism.

Invited back to the United States in 1986 to judge the Miss World beauty contest, Gairy took a side trip to the U.N. and stirred the old UFO embers. In March 1990, claiming that "cosmic forces" had instructed him to seek reelection, Gairy made fresh attempts to form a coalition government. The bid failed and Gairy, now with less than 20 percent vision, settled in the dark shadows of his failing eyesight and in virtual political obscurity. It is in his pink Upper Lucas house overlooking St. George's old harbor that we met and that he agreed to reminisce.

"Many laughed at me, some applauded. The rest ignored me," Sir Eric told this writer in an interview televised by Grenada TV. "I'm not looking to revive interest in UFOs but to replay things past and to measure them against contemporary events. There have been hundreds, if not thousands of sightings all over the world since I first caught a glimpse of some very strange things."

"Several years ago," Sir Eric recalls, "American students at the St. George's University School of Medicine in Grenada spotted a number of saucer-shaped high-speed flying machines adorned with multicolored oscillating lights." According to Gairy, similar sightings were then reported from other parts of the Caribbean, including Antigua, Martinique, and St. Lucia. "Why is my onetime experience 18 years ago or so less worthy of note?" Gairy asks without rancor.

Sir Eric, the architect of the 1st World UFO Congress in Acapulco in 1975, insists that there are "other beings in the universe, other universes in space-time. I would be very naive, if not guilty of cosmic egocentricity, if I fancied that mankind is the whole of God's domain. I have so stated repeatedly but my detractors, for reasons only known to them, chose to disregard this argument and continue to mock me for having brought the matter to the UN. I have spoken of many other matters before the world body, including God -- the most impenetrable of all mysteries -- and yet, no one ever cracked a smile. Skepticism takes on such curious form!"

Predicting that UFOs "won't die an easy death -- the phenomenon can only gather momentum" -- Gairy, (who also believes that "electricity can be generated from trees," and purports to be in touch with "a cosmic divine intelligence") claims that the hoax theory, "so vehemently upheld by UFO debunkers is itself part of a massive cover-up." Why? "Who knows?. We humans, in our blissful myopia, simply can't bear the notion that we may not be the Creator's sole handiwork. Religious dogma and international politics may one day be blamed for this conspiracy of obfuscation."

Sir Eric sighs wistfully and shifts his colorless stare toward the open window. The TV lights have been dimmed. Crews and newspaper reporters are gone. We are now alone in his ramshackle villa overlooking the bay, suspended between the sea of time and the turquoise waters of a sun-drenched coral archipelago. This is where the once-formidable Sir Eric, now deposed head of state and self-proclaimed messiah, sorts out the tangle of past and present, glory and disfavor, illusion and perceived reality, perhaps an inaccessible fact or two. "I may be sight-impaired but the truth no longer blinds me," he says as we part.

A week after the televised interview with Gairy was aired, two people burst into the office of the editor of the Grenadian Voice and reported sighting a UFO over St. George's. An independent dispatch filed by my friend, Capt. George Smith, master of the sloop, Reggae Music, described large formations of migratory birds vectored on a southerly course and transiting for a brief rest on the island's coastal marshlands. Ah, that devil rum.

Gairy, who is 75, lost a valiant bid for reelection two years ago. He blamed his defeat on "cosmic forces" beyond his control and vowed to try again. None is so blind as he who will not see. He has since climbed down from his aerie on Upper Lucas and settled in more modest quarters at the bottom of the ravine. I found him there in late May when he named a successor -- Jerry Searles -- who promised to revamp and revitalize Gairy's old Grenada United Labor Party. Searles, a practicing attorney, concedes he has never seen a UFO.

"Many are called, few are chosen," Gairy whispered in my ear, chuckling, as we parted.

A Connecticut-based journalist, W. E. Gutman is a regular contributor to Honduras This Week.

EDITORIAL

Poor Tegucigalpa

Tegucigalpa has just said goodbye to yet another Mayor, yet another leader who has failed to honor the historic downtown area with the upkeep it deserves, yet another politician who has closed his eyes on the past.

Untouched by the earthquakes and wars that have ravaged so many other Central American capitals, Tegucigalpa is one of the oldest and most beautiful cities in the region. But rather than renovating, maintaining and promoting the wealth of historic buildings that can be found all over the downtown area, outgoing Mayor Roberto Acosta and his predecessors -- many of whom were not even native to these silver hills -- allowed developers to topple colonial buildings and replace them with parking lots and high rises.

Granted, Tegucigalpa is a modern capital and is deserving of its 20th century skyscrapers and landscaped boulevards. But progress should not come at the cost of history. Put the boulevards, tall buildings and modern architecture on the outskirts of town, create new areas away from the heart of the city. But let us not modernize ourselves into a spot where our history becomes oblivion.

Tegucigalpa, originally called Las Reales Minas de San Miguel de Tegucigalpa, has tremendous potential to draw tourists. But those who come are looking for a city with flavor, culture and history. Tourists can stay home if they want superhighways and tract housing. But those in charge of the city don't seem to be aware of this. The fact that the budgets of the Culture Ministry and the Institute of History and Anthropology continue to shrink while officials channel everything they can into building a new highway that circles the city tells the whole tale.

Either we still have a lesson to learn or we've got more beauty and history than we know what to do with. Either way, if we don't learn how to take care of what we've got, we'll soon end up with nothing.

Preserving the historic buildings of downtown Tegucigalpa wouldn't take a magic formula. Instead of allowing those who own historic buildings to believe it's worthless to maintain a structure that's eventually going to be destroyed anyway, we should be giving them the funding they need to restore their buildings to their original splendor, or at least offering them attractive tax breaks.

History amounts to very little if it is forgotten.

OPINION

Human rights, U.S. State Department reports challenge paid ad praising Reina

By W. E. GUTMAN

Coincidence or stratagem? One day after Dr. Leo Valladares, Honduran Commissioner for Human Rights, released his pessimistic 1996 state-of-the nation report, outgoing President Carlos Roberto Reina was the object of a laudatory paid ad in the May 21 edition of the Washington Times, the right-wing newspaper owned by Rev. Sung Myun Moon's Unification Church.

In language betraying the subliminal voice of damage control, Dr. Reina was rhapsodized as the Honduran president "most devoted to rooting out corruption," and as "the strongest defender of democracy and human rights." Said to have "personally felt the suffering of the Honduran people," the chief of state was also praised for initiating a "moral revolution" aimed at reducing corruption and impunity of the elites. Strengthening the independence and effectiveness of the judicial branch, the ad further claimed, "led to a judicial climate more conducive to a 'justice-is-blind' approach."

These assertions, while legitimate in a strictly relativistic context, are in sharp contrast with Dr. Valladares' findings. Published in a 108-page report released to the National Congress on May 20, the commissioner's analysis concludes that "impunity, corruption and violence INCREASED in 1996." Citing the assassination of a Chortí leader, the expropriation of ancestral lands by foreign developers and local tourist interests, and yet another attack -- the third -- against the DIC, the report targets a diseased and malingering judicial system deaf and blind to the "impunity of the military and public servants."

The report also deplores "the insecurity, skepticism and discontent now gripping Honduran society," and warns against "the ill-effects of a deteriorating socio-economic climate -- poverty and unemployment in particular --" which Dr. Valladares concludes, "lead to an anti-culture" that promotes a cycle of violence and abuse of authority." His call for "more transparency in economic, political and environmental affairs," and his plea for "humanistic principles that favor strategies designed to combat poverty and inflation," clearly underscore the persistent problems afflicting Honduras.

Other phenomena blamed by the report on the prevailing "anti-culture" include narcotrafficking, auto theft, bank robberies, weapons contraband, extra-judicial executions, violence against women, oppression of indigenous peoples and other manifestations of social and cultural bias, including habitual persecution of homeless children.

The U.S. State Department agrees. Conceding that Honduras' has articulated a willingness to move toward meaningful judicial reform, the U.S. government report unambiguously remarks that words have not given way to action. "Efforts to provide universal justice did not yet come to fruit in 1996."

U.S. analysts further point out that:

the military plutocracy tolerates little or no civilian oversight and is not likely to respond to criticism;
government and civilian elites continue to enjoy widespread impunity;
over 90 percent of prisoners in the dilapidated correctional system have yet to receive a fair trial;
the courts are weakened and compromised by inadequate funding and powerful special interests.

In political life, not doing much worse than one's predecessors is useful but historically irrelevant. Not doing infinitely better is infinitely less commendable. In Honduras, as is the case in the rest of Central America, this may be less a reflection of the statesman than of the establishment within which he must function. Indeed, Honduras' political waters are infested with sharks. Negotiating the abyss is further imperiled by shoals of indifference and greed that forever threaten to rend the ship of state.

The mark of a noble government is to consider itself a public trust granted by the people for the good of the nation and not for the benefit of individual, group or party. Ultimately, President Reina's successors may wish to ponder the axiom that reform must always come from within, not from without. You cannot legislate for virtue and civil order, nor can you secure the fruits of liberty, equality and fraternity when the few feast on the many. Every unpunished injustice threatens the justice of all. The pricetag for a healthy society is a government immune to disease.

A Connecticut-based journalist, W. E. Gutman is a regular contributor to Honduras This Week.

EDITORIAL

What's a savings account?

Every June, Honduran workers receive a bonus check equaling a full month's salary. They call this bonus el catorceavo mes (the 14th month salary) because it comes in addition to an employee's regular 12 monthly paychecks, plus the aguinaldo (a 13th month bonus) that comes around Christmas. Although it may seem illogical that workers get their 14th month salary (in June) before their 13th (the following December), this is explained by the fact that the aguinaldo has existed for decades while the catorceavo was implemented just a few years ago. In the mind of Hondurans, if not chronologically true, the aguinaldo will always be their 13th salary and the June bonus will always be their 14th.

Both private and public sector employers are required by law to pay the aguinaldo and the catorceavo to all of their full-time employees. This amounts to millions of lempiras of extra cash in the hands of Honduran consumers every June and December.

And the nation's stores and shopping centers know this. As soon as June arrives, Hondurans are inundated with advertisements offering this item and that at bargain prices. Ad copy tells buyers they'll get more for their money at one store or another and photos show shiny new microwaves, state-of-the-art television sets, trendy clothing and even gourmet restaurant menus.

On one hand, this is great marketing. And if consumerism is what you're after, the aguinaldo and the catorceavo are great for business. Hondurans are happy because they get a few extra goodies and businesses are happy because they make a few extra sales -- and the economy thrives in the meantime.

But is all this spending a good thing? Why aren't we emphasizing saving as much as we emphasize buying? In a country like Honduras, this is an important question. We strive to reach the standard of living of more developed countries, yet we hesitate to make the kind of sacrifices it takes.

We ooh and aah at the clean streets, healthy diet, impeccable urban transport systems, beautiful homes and thriving economy of the Japanese, for example. But when we hear that the Japanese are among the greatest savers in the world, we turn a deaf ear and head to the department store.

Hondurans work hard and deserve a few luxuries every now and then. But rather than placing all of our emphasis on spending, spending and more spending, we should equally promote the benefits of good savings. Then, not only will we enrich our material comfort, but we'll enrich the nation's economy as well.

EDITORIAL

A helping hand

Last Wednesday (June 11) the Tegucigalpa Rotary Club welcomed an unprecedented donation to the national police force from a fellow Rotary Club in the U.S. state of Oregon. The donation was organized by U.S. Rotarian Michael F. Carrick -- already known in Honduras for selling a number of weapons from his extensive gun collection and using the funds to build a drinking water system in the village of Lepaterique.

After reading a January HTW editorial about the 21 police officers who died in the line of duty in 1996 due to lack of sufficient equipment, Carrick began to contact police departments throughout the United States and in other parts of the world asking them to donate any equipment they no longer used. Many of the police departments responded favorably to Carrick's request and by the time he finished rallying up support he had collected more than $100,000 worth of second hand police equipment.

Although the weapons, bullet-proof vests and other items may have looked used and obsolete back home, in Honduras they appeared shiny, new and ready to be put to good use fighting the criminals that have become as well armed -- and in some cases even better armed -- as the police themselves.

Michael Carrick obviously understands the value of a helping hand. Thanks to him, Honduras' police are now better equipped to keep themselves -- and the Honduran people -- safe.

But Carrick is only one of many friends to Honduras. Other recent donors include Texan architect Jim Davis and Dr. George Chillinger, the Honorary Consul of Honduras in Los Angeles, who himself organized the donation of four motorcycles to the Honduran police. There is also the Rotary Club of Milan and the Honorary Consul of Milan who have donated 107 beds to Tegucigalpa's Hospital San Felipe. And these are just a few of the many individuals who have donated their time and effort into making Honduras a better, safer, healthier place.

It is better to give than to receive and here in Honduras we're well aware of the fact that rather than waiting for handouts we're better off learning to make things work with what we have. Nevertheless, when it comes to making Honduras a better place for our children and our grandchildren, efforts like these are a welcome thing indeed.

OPINION

Indian land conflict has roots that run historically deep

By FERNANDO CRUZ SANDOVAL

Recently, hundreds of peacefully demonstrating Chortís were forcibly removed from the grounds of the Presidential Palace. This treacherous move -- treacherous because it was carried out with excessive force and in total darkness -- was the government's way of bringing to an end negotiations that had already dragged on for ten days with the Chortí. Whatever the motive, this eviction implied serious risk to lives, including those of women and children. Was this necessary?

INDIANS AND LAND RIGHTS

Since 1823 (the date of absolute independence for Honduras), government management of state lands has taken many forms, but little has been included to defend the land rights of the indigenous populations. For example, Honduras sold many unoccupied lands during the last century, a normal procedure for increasing scarce treasury funds. Before and during the second half of the 19th century broad concessions of timber lands were granted to foreign nationals. By the end of the century foreign interests entered into conflict for the first time with the municipalities. In this case the municipalities defended their right to tax the exploitation of natural resources for the benefit of the local communities. The government of Honduras arbitrated this conflict...in defense of the interests of the Rosario Mining Company.

During the presidency of José Santos Guardiola in the 1860s, the Tolpanes of Yoro and a few Pech from Olancho were granted land titles through the initiative of a priest and missionary named Manuel Subirana. The Wyke-Cruz Treaty, signed during the previous decade between Honduras and Great Britain, secured the lands of the Honduran Mosquitia for Honduras. For the Indians this treaty secured guarantees of their right to benefit from the lands of the region, rights that are valid even today.

The Liberal Reform, which began in 1876, did not directly impact the communal or municipal lands under indigenous control, but it did open the door to legislation that benefitted the private ownership of land. As a result, the tenure of communal and corporate lands became vulnerable, especially those in the hands of Indians. That is, this strategy allowed individual owners, frequently under severe economic pressure, to sell off and break up what had been secure communal property.

During the first decades of the 20th century Honduras granted broad land concessions to multinational banana companies in the belief that opening the North Coast by rail would do wonders for the country's development. The expansion of the banana enterprises directly impacted lands of the Garífuna, who had been settling since 1830 the north coastal strip with a string of permanent villages east and west of Trujillo. In Yoro, the expansion of the banana companies impacted more than a few communal lands of the Tolpan. As a concession, the Government legalized Tolpan land tenure at Montaña de la Flor, also in the first decades of this century.

The growth of the rural population, the scarcity of land (felt for the first time in our history) and the legacy of agrarian reform here and in neighboring countries built to a climax in 1969, prompting the expulsion of Salvadoran peasants and provoking the so-called "Soccer War." The agrarian law at that time reaffirmed the priority for private ownership, once again weakening the tenure of indigenous communal properties. The most recent agrarian legislation tends to stabilize tenure by granting titles to land planted in coffee. The impact of this legislation on indigenous lands has been no different. The application of agrarian reform during the period of military revision from 1970-1980 also failed to benefit the indigenous populations.

GOVT WASHES ITS HANDS

In the absence of systematic legislation to protect the vulnerable relationship between indigenous peoples and their lands, it should come as no surprise that the sporadic efforts of the government have not had any significant or long-term impact. It is also important to emphasize that Honduras has rejected for several decades now the need to generate legislation in defense of indigenous groups. Was the government of Honduras aware of the growing concern for Indian rights? The Honduran government was represented through a permanent delegate at sessions of the Inter-American Indigenist Institute (III) that have been held since 1941 in Mexico. This position was normally held by the Honduran Ambassador to Mexico. Honduras has also sent representatives to the United Nations and its special commissions, including the International Labor Organization (OIT).

Where does the government stand today? The Honduran media has expressed a supposedly "representative" opinion. That is, since the Honduran ladino also suffers from land shortages, the Indians have no right to parcels larger than those doled out by the National Agrarian Institute (INA). This argument self-destructs on at least three counts: 1) it ignores the socio-cultural needs of the non-ladino communities, 2) it underestimates the prevailing ecological circumstances and 3) it disregards the legal indigenous rights that precede and pre-empt the agrarian reform. Furthermore its application would be disastrous for the conservation of the country's human and natural resources.

WINDS OF CHANGE

The process of change had its seed in the Great Strike of 1954 and intensified during the following decades. The most significant agents of change have been the "Indianist" and Black African organizations. The latter, especially the Garífuna, have antecedents that go back to the 1950s and the former, to the 1970s and 1980s. More recently the Tawahkas, Lencas and Chortí have formed Indianist organizations with timely support from national, regional and international Indianist organizations.

The legal context began to change in the early 1980s with the inception of the new constitution and the reopening of the National Congress, both part of the return to civil order. In 1990 the Federation of Tawahka Indians -- FITH -- presented a petition before the INA to legalize their territorial rights in a broad area centered on the middle Patuca River. This petition was based on the Wyke-Cruz Treaty. In an act of justice and in defense of national interests, the then-Director of the INA, Juan Ramón Martínez, brilliantly promoted what would become the Tawahka Asangni Biosphere. (This project still awaits publication in the official daily La Gaceta.)

At the end of 1993 the Law for the Public Ministry was signed, giving power to the nation's Attorney General to protect the human rights of our ethnic groups. This power has been delegated to a Special Attorney for the Ethnic Groups, which has been operating now for several years. In 1995 the Government of Honduras subscribed and ratified the agreement known as 169 of the International Labor Organization "On Indigenous and Tribal Peoples in Sovereign Countries." This, which has been legally in force in Honduras since that time, defends the Indians' rights to maintain their identity and traditional ways of life.

In other words, a public structure now does exist, in both institutional and legal terms, to respond to the needs of the non-ladino ethnic populations. This structure includes the Public Ministry; the Congressional Commission on Ethnic Affairs; decentralized government offices for agro-forestry such as INA, AFE-COHDEFOR; the Ministry of Culture, Arts and Sports; the Honduran Institute of Anthropology and History and a law (OIT Agreement 169) with national and international validity. If we now have the institutional apparatus and the legal tools, why does the government constantly find itself responding to sudden crises? Why not develop medium- and long-term programs and projects that respond to the needs of the non-ladino ethnic peoples? Finally, the government does have a binding obligation to the Indianist position that is expressed in OIT Agreement 169. Why have the terms of this agreement not been circulated among the Government offices and the general public through the media?

Fernando Cruz Sandoval is a professor of Anthropology at the National Autonomous University and an active member in the now-forming Honduran Association of Anthropologists.

OPINION

Spite not principle at root of Francois' release

By W. E. GUTMAN

"Rancor and vengeance inspired the release of former Haitian police chief Joseph Michel Francois -- not concern for justice," asserts an immigration specialist in the Dallas District Attorney's Office.

Francois, a suspected narcotrafficker granted asylum in Honduras, is wanted in the United States on charges of gross human rights violations -- murder, rape and vicious beatings -- in the wake of the 1991 overthrow of constitutionally elected President Jean-Bertrand Aristide.

"The ruling to disavow an extradition request by the U.S. is a travesty and another example of Honduras' corrupt and capricious judicial system," the attorney told this writer on condition of anonymity. "Politics, not law, vindictiveness, not principle, motivated this latest charade. It is clear that the U.S. is being spited for its new immigration and welfare reforms."

Indeed, since April 1, when tough legislation went into effect, many Hondurans, like hundreds of thousands of their Guatemalan, Nicaraguan and Salvadoran compatriots, have been ordered out of the country. For poor nations still struggling to recover from a decade of civil war, the prospect of having to absorb large numbers of returning citizens is causing both panic and hostility.

Governments, on the one hand, have not yet figured out how to assimilate a reverse exodus of indigent, and largely unskilled, nationals. The families of the returnees, on the other hand, ill-equipped as they are to survive increasingly predatory economic policies, face an even bleaker future now that the modest extra income their relatives used to earn in the United States is no longer available.

Tragically, although welfare reform is likely to expand the pool of low-wage job applicants, it will not increase the supply of jobs. As a result, the jobless rate among Hispanics is expected to rise. Desperate, many may opt to return to their countries of origin, thus adding to the burden of the thousands of families they once helped support while causing governments major headaches.

There is little doubt that the new measures will seriously impact large numbers of Latin Americans in the United States. Those targeted for deportation face calamitous odds. But to allow resentment, however justifiable, to subvert national policy, as Honduras seems to have done in the Francois case, is both politically crude and inauspicious. The claim by the Honduran Supreme Court that "crimes subject to extradition must have been committed in the jurisdiction of one or both parties to the extradition treaty," flies in the face of the copious and hard evidence against Francois. Such punctilious attention to detail on the part of a nation that habitually violates its own laws is, at best, frivolous. Harboring thugs for spite is one way for a nation to alienate an old ally and benefactor. The price tag for malice can be steep: Hard lines beget hard lines. Those who sow the wind often reap the tempest.

A Connecticut-based investigative journalist, W.E. Gutman is a regular contributor to Honduras This Week.

EDITORIAL

A threat to CA peace

The Gulf of Fonseca -- the outlet to the Pacific that is shared by Honduras, El Salvador and Nicaragua -- has transformed from ecological zone to danger zone and is now at risk of becoming a war zone.

Nicaragua has found it a very lucrative operation to send its navy out into Gulf of Fonseca waters in search of humble Honduran fishermen. When they find these fishermen, at sea trying to eek out a subsistence living, they arrest them, confiscate their fish, put them in jail and wait for their family members to make the long journey from Honduras to Nicaragua and pay hefty fines for their loved ones' freedom.

The fishermen themselves can do little to protect themselves. The Honduran navy, already small and facing severe budget cuts, can do little more. So there are no obstacles between the Nicaraguan authorities and their humble victims.

Nicaragua possesses extensive sea and coastal territory. But they concentrate their fleets in places they know they'll find Honduran fishermen because that's where the money is, like any good business.

And that's the problem. Nicaragua is interested in business. Not neighborliness, not dialogue, not justice, not peace. Plain old businesses. Making money.

Despite the fact that the matter has been reported to the Central American Human Rights Commission, Nicaragua continues its hunt. Will it take the intervention of the Organization of American States or the United Nations to return a sense of brotherly peace to the isthmus? Do we need outsiders to come and tell us how to behave?

Nicaragua says it has a right to detain the Honduran fishermen because Nicaraguan waters converge with Salvadoran waters at the mouth of the gulf and, therefore, any Honduran boat caught fishing there is beyond its borders. Not only this position is a relic from our military past and not a part of our peaceful, united future, it is also simply untrue. Honduras has always had the right to the open sea. And if this weren't enough, the International Court of Justice ruled so just a few years ago when making its decision on border issues in the region. Didn't anyone tell Nicaragua?

It's time Nicaragua stopped thinking about the bottom line and started thinking about unity. If Central America can't cooperate within its own region, how are we going to convince the rest of the world to have faith in our peace?

ONLINE READERS' FORUM

LOWER FUEL PRICES COULD INCREASE AIR TRAFFIC
Dear Editor:

The price of 100 LL aviation gas is US$ 1.35/gal in Pleasanton, Texas. It is US$ 2.20 in Chetumal, Mexico; US$ 3.40 in Belize; and US$ 3.84 at Toncontin [in Tegucigalpa]. Perhaps lowering the price of aviation fuel may increase the level of general aviation into Honduras.

Frank Pallares
pallares@worldnet.att.net P.S. The gas in Pleasanton is self serve.

GREAT WEBSITE
Dear Editor:

What a great website you are producing! I look forward to each edition and print and mail each one to my daughter who is a volunteer with the U.S. Peace Corps in Honduras.

Your site keeps us informed and up to date with the events of the day in Honduras. I worry less and feel I am very well informed (probably more than most residents of Honduras) about what is happening in country.

Keep up the great work!

Bob Ackerly
backerly@earthlink.net

Webmaster's Note: Thank-you very much, Bob. If you are using Netscape Navigator you might want to try the Honduras This Week Direct service. For more information, follow this link.

GUEST EDITORIAL

The UNAH: living in a fantasy world

By RAQUEL ANGULO

As I participated in the recent elections for the new rector of the National Autonomous University of Honduras (UNAH), I expected to receive four votes of the possible 58. When the votes were counted, I found that I had received five. These results are consistent with the current conditions of the University. My attitude was nothing more than a symbolic protest against the current crisis being faced by the UNAH, a University that is currently living in a fantasy world. Eighty-eight percent of the representatives in the General Assembly are content with the current climate or "peace", "tranquility", idleness, partying, games, entertainment, indifference and conformity.

It was astonishing to hear the way some voters "justified" their votes by saying that the professional training provided at the University is more than good; that scientific research is being done; that there is no corruption; that everyone who criticizes the Alma Mater is the enemy; and that their votes were a conscious effort to continue with the academic reforms of the current administration. They never specified which reforms they supported, not a single one.

During the final hours of the election, I observed the following:

1. Perfect understanding and harmony between students and authorities. There wasn't one voice of dissidence among the students, much less the professors. The spirit of the right to student parity, which is granted in the constitution of the University to allow students to demand what they deserve from their institution, has been completely destroyed. From this point of view, the right of parity makes no sense and is no longer needed because the University that it was created to achieve has already been achieved. We are living in the best of worlds.

2. The gratitude and veneration paid to the great leader, rector and father of the UNAH for the favors enjoyed by the faculty is immense. Administrative actions are confused and shifted to a personal plane which requires that they be retributed with "eternal gratitude". Based on what I heard, I think they should have asked that the article that limits a rector's term to two periods be reformed. The servitude is becoming alarming.

3. The language used was very particular and the meanings of words were twisted. Democracy is tranquility; to be democratic is to be conformist and obedient; the fatherland is the leader; the enemy is he who points out problems and errors; non-privatization is to maintain the current tuition of Lps. 45 per semester without limiting the number of semesters a student can register without meeting certain requirements, which endangers the academic level of the University and occupies the space of others who might need it (60 percent of the UNAH student body come from private secondary schools and 20 percent come from night schools); the desire to attend the UNAH is to suffer the pains of registration. In this arbitrary wave of synonyms, I've been wondering exactly what they meant to say when they called me "an academic."

4. After 35 years on the faculty, I realize that I have taught very little in the way of mathematics and even less in terms of morals and ethics. It saddens me to see former students who are now faculty members, students who were trained to be professionals, are also conformists.

To keep myself from suffering, I will now try to see the crisis of the UNAH from the eyes of a conformist. From now on:

* When I see the lawn covered with trash, I'll think of a flowering garden.

* When I enter a classroom and find it littered with corn husks, orange peels and plastic bags, I'll pretend that it's carpeted.

* When I see the chalkboards without paint, the broken desks and the broken windows, I'll believe that it is austerity that makes a good home.

* When I hear popular music blasting out of loudspeakers, I'll decide that it's better than Mozart for studying and reflection.

* When the electric system breaks down and we're once again in the dark, I'll think we're being invited to meditate.

* When professors accept such low salaries, I'll believe they did so out of dedication to their profession and in the spirit of service to the young student community.

* When the University pays such low salaries to its workers, I'll believe it is in order to give jobs to a greater number of people.

* When the University fails to control and supervise the quality of the work of its faculty, I'll believe that it is the strict selection requirements that guarantee the quality of a UNAH education.

* When students don't even bother to demand that their professors show up for work, I'll decide that it is because they're working on research.

* When students don't even show up to vote, I'll think that they agree with the conformists who represent them.

* When I hear of professors who are earning salaries without working, I'll think how charitable and humane the institution is.

* When I hear of professors using University funds to pay for their travels, I'll believe that the UNAH is paying for them to attend workshops and seminars.

* When I see students fighting to register, I'll think they see this great sacrifice is the price of their great desire to improve themselves.

* When I am told of the great numbers of drop-outs, I will remember that students are free to register as they wish and that they may sign up for a class as many times as they need to.

* When I see students playing cards, I'll decide they need a break from their heavy academic pursuits.

* When I hear of students who are registered or graduate without requirements, I'll think of the democratic spirit of the institution and its dedication to training good Honduran professionals.

* When I hear of authorities buying student votes, I'll be thankful that the UNAH has a philanthropic administration dedicated to providing the students with financial assistance and guidance.

* When I see music festivals on campus, I'll think of the great work of the University Extension Department.

* When I hear of academic periods that last fewer than 15 weeks, I will believe that the today's teaching methods allow students to learn more quickly and effectively.

* When I hear of the behavior of certain graduates, I'll think the degree is a resource to emerge from poverty.

* When I hear of these and many other things, I'll simply believe that it's all for the best for the University and the country because that's the way God wanted it.

It is our responsibility to save the University from the conformity and the fantasy that has taken hold at its roots and threatens to envelop us. Either that, or it's time to look for another place to study before it's too late and once again we are forced to hear that "beautiful" little song they so like to play for us: "How great we all feel...at our Uni-Uni-University."