Photo by James Rodríguez.

Call from the National Front against the Coup d'Etat in Honduras to the worldwide working class



August 3, 2009 -- Tegucigalpa -- June 28 of the this year when the Honduran population was preparing to participate in a popular opinion poll on ... whether or not to convoke a Constitutional Assembly, thousands of soldiers kidnapped the constitutional president of the republic, Manuel Zelaya Rosales, and they expelled him to the neighbouring country of Costa Rica; they occupied the Presidential House; they violently closed all of the independent radio and television stations; they persecuted all the functionaries of the government and they implanted a state of siege in the whole country.

In that way a coup d'etat took place, which hours later was "legalised" by the National Congress (legislative assembly), putting into the presidency Roberto Micheletti Bain, leader of President Zelaya's own political party, [using] ridiculous arguments that the deposed president has "resigned". That was denied by President Zelaya himself, in addition to the fact that the National Congress does not have the constitutional authority to separate him from his role. At the same time, it was argued that there was an order of arrest without the president having faced a judge where he could defend himself from the accusations made towards him.

Behind the coup is the business leadership, the four political parties of the bourgeoisie (the Liberal Party, the National Party, the Christian Democratic Party and the Party of Social Democratic Innovation and Unity), the leadership of the Catholic and evangelical churches, as well as the main owners of the mass media. All of them made a counter-revolutionary alliance for fear that the popular poll of the June 28 would give power to the people and especially to the working class and poor peasantry to start the construction of a new society, where the privileges of the bourgeois class and the landowners would be eliminated.

It is also necessary to say that behind this coup d'etat is the hand of North American imperialism and the Latin American ultra-right, who are seeing it as an opportunity to stop the advance of the left in the Central American region and the influence of the Venezuelan revolution, after the recent electoral triumphs of the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN) in El Salvador and the Sandinista Front in Nicaragua.

Nonetheless, the answer of the Honduran people did not wait even for the first hour of the coup. The popular masses flooded into the streets to take over the public plazas and to protest in the Presidential House (headquarters of the government) against thousands of military troops, armed with tanks, helicopters, planes and heavy artillery. Ever since, the popular masses have come out EVERY DAY to the streets for a month, to protest, to carry out pressure to defeat the usurper government, carrying out massive mobilisations, highway takeovers, takeovers of public buildings, etc. making use of Article 3 of our Political Constitution that gives the right to popular insurrection in the case of the imposition of a government by armed force. Although this struggle has cost the lives of various Hondurans, assassinated by the military, thanks to this resistance the usurper government has not been able to control the situation, nor to defeat the masses and hence

has not been able to consolidate itself as a government.

The maximum organised expression of the popular resistance is the National Front against the Coup d'Etat, which unites all of the social and political expressions of the popular movement and is driving the national movement towards the defeat of the dictatorship. This front is made up of workers', peasants' and other people's organisations, as well as by the left and centre parties and movements who have declared themselves against the coup d'etat.

The international reaction was forceful from a diplomatic point of view. Except for the Zionist regime of Israel, no other country in the world dared to recognise the military-business dictatorship imposed in Honduras. Both the Organization of American States, the United Nations General Assembly, the Río Group, the countries associated with the Bolivarian Alternative of the Americas, among others, condemned the coup d'etat, because they correctly recognise that it is about the first coup against the limited bourgeois democracies that exist in Latin America, and that, if it consolidates, would set a disastrous precedent to allow the un-doing of the social and democratic liberties that have been achieved by the peoples and workers and would probably be imitated by the most reactionary forces in other countries of the region and world.

Nonetheless, this reaction has not yet gone past the point of diplomatic declarations which, while useful, are not sufficient to hurt the dictatorship economically or militarily.

The only government that always had an ambiguous policy towards the usurping government was the United States government led by President Barack Obama. While it declared recognition of the government of President Manuel Zelaya as the only president, it gave visas to the emissaries of the coup makers so that they could come into North American territory to lobby in favour of the coup; it has not suspended the main programs of economic and military aid to Honduras, it has not applied a commercial boycott like it has done against Cuba, and it refuses to declare that this is a coup d'etat. Instead it has promoted negotiations between the legitimate president of Honduras, Manuel Zelaya, with the dictator Micheletti, through a mediator, Costa Rica's President Oscar Arias.

For the National Front Against the Coup d'Etat, the mediation of President Arias is a strategy of the US State Department to achieve some level of international recognition for the dictator Micheletti, delaying the time for the end of the conflict so that the resistance movement is worn out, and to submit President Zelaya to unacceptable conditions before his inevitable re-installation in power, with the goal of making him abandon the political demands that have motivated the popular mobilisations, such as the struggle for a Constitutional Assembly and for the punishment of those responsible for the coup.

Consequently, the National Front Against the Coup d'Etat only accepts the immediate, safe and unconditional reinstatement of President Zelaya to his post.

The Honduran working class, which since the beginning actively responded to the popular resistance, organised in the third week following the coup a unified mobilisation through its own methods of struggle: a general strike and the takeover of work centres, starting with a 48-hour stoppage by the three central unions of the country -- the Unitary Confederation of Honduran Workers (CUTH), General Workers Central (CGT) and Confederation of Honduran Workers (CTH) -- on July 23-24, which was repeated again on July 30-31. In solidarity, friends from the popular organisations of El Salvador and Nicaragua [blocked] the entrance and exit of merchandise from Honduras. Immediately the business associations of Honduras and Central America, who are in solidarity with the usurpers, screamed to the sky because that boycott implied losses of millions for their companies. This means that the strike and the commercial boycott are effective weapons to wear out the economic base of the coup makers, more than formal declarations.

Because of all of this, the National Front Against the Coup d'Etat makes a call to working-class organisations of the wide to organise and carry out militant solidarity with the working class and the people of Honduras, carrying out boycott actions of all products that enter or come out of Honduran ports, with the goal of economically asphyxiating the dictatorship; hold protests against the dictatorship in front of the US and Honduran embassies, organise political and cultural actions in solidarity with the struggle of the Honduran people, and carry out action that strengthen the struggle of the Honduran people and its working class to get us out of this oppressive regime and reach a new society.

ONLY WORLD WIDE UNITY OF THE WORKING CLASS WILL DEFEAT THE FASCIST EXPERIMENT IN HONDURAS!

Tegucigalpa, Honduras, July 31, 2009

Honduran workers fight for return of democracy

August 5, 2009 -- Honduras's three principal labour centrals, the Unitary Confederation of Honduran Workers (CUTH), General Workers Central (CGT) and Confederation of Honduran Workers (CTH) have called for a national strike tomorrow, August 6, 2009.

Here is their statement:

The three workers Confederations of Honduras, CUTH, CGT and CTH address the critical political situation that prevails in our country as product of the coup d'état that threw out of the presidency Mr. Manuel Zelaya Rosales, legitimately elected by the Honduran people in free elections that took place in November 2005.

This not a personal problem, it's about the business sector and the vested interests who have generated a struggle between classes because of the social measures sponsored by the deposed government.

Facing this situation, our organizations condemn these facts and we do not recognize the so-called authorities of a dictatorial and de facto government.

We demand of all the governments of the world, the World Bank, the Interamerican Development Bank, the Central American Bank for Economic Integration and of USAID to withdraw all the official support and to freeze loans and projects to this coup government, imposed by the arms, which has created an atmosphere of repression and violence. We make an exception with regard to that support which goes directly to the people and organisations.

We also demand of the OAS, the UN to maintain and strengthen the resolutions to repudiate this fascist government, product of the force of the arms, and to withdraw all support.

We ask that the government of the United States proceed in cancelling the bank accounts and visas to all those persons involved in the coup, to freeze planned support and to withdraw diplomatic representation, for as long as institutional order is not re-established with the return of Jose Manuel Zelaya to the presidency of the republic.

For all the above-mentioned, the CUTH, the CGT and the CTH call all their organisations to an open-ended national strike beginning on Thursday August 6, 2009, until the restitution of institutional order and the return of Jose Manuel Zelaya to the presidency of the republic.

Our organisations must remain on alert and support the patriotic march to the cities of San Pedro Sula and Tegucigalpa.

DEMANDS

1. The reestablishment of the democratic institutional order

2. The return of Mr. Jose Manuel Zelaya Rosales to the presidency of the Republic.

3. The installation in Honduras of a Constituent National Assembly

4. That the repression against the Honduran people be ended.

ONLY UNITED WILL WE BE VICTORIOUS / HASTA LA VICTORIA SIEMPRE

Tegucigalpa, Morazán Central District, August 4 , 2009,

National Executive Councils CUTH, CGT and CTH.

COMUNICADO



Las Centrales y Confederaciones obreras CUTH-CGT-CTH ante la critica situación política que vive nuestro país, producto del golpe militar que saco de la presidencia a don Manuel Zelaya Rosales, electo legítimamente por el pueblo hondureño, en elecciones libres llevadas a cabo en noviembre del 2005.

Este no es un problema personal, se trata de que el sector empresarial y los grupos facticos han generado una lucha de clases derivada de las medidas de contenido social que propició el gobierno que ha sido depuesto.

Ante esa situación nuestras organizaciones condenamos esos hechos y desconocemos las supuestas autoridades de un gobierno dictatorial y defacto.

Demandamos a todos los gobiernos del mundo, al BM,BID,BCIE y AID, que retiren sus ayudas oficiales y congelen prestamos y proyectos a este gobierno golpista impuesto por las armas, que esta creando un ambiente de represión y violencia. Hacemos la excepción de aquellas ayudas que vengan directas al pueblo y a las organizaciones.

Demandamos también de la OEA, la ONU que se mantengan y se fortalezcan las resoluciones de desconocimiento a este gobierno fascista producto de las fuerza de las armas y que se retire todo tipo de ayuda.

Al gobierno de Estados Unidos que proceda a la cancelación de cuentas y visas de todos esos personajes golpistas, que congele las ayudas previstas y que retire su representación diplomática, mientras no se restablezca la institucionalidad con el regreso del presidente legitimo de los hondureños José Manuel Zelaya Rosales.

Por todo lo expuesto anteriormente, la CUTH, la CGT y la CTH convocan a todas sus organizaciones a un paro nacional, por tiempo indefinido, a partir del jueves 6 de agosto del 2009, hasta que se restituya la institucionalidad y el regreso de José Manuel Zelaya a la presidencia de la República.

Que nuestras organizaciones se mantengan alertas, y apoyen la marcha patriótica hacia las ciudades de Sn Pedro Sula y Tegucigalpa.



DEMANDAS:

1. Restablecimiento de la institucionalidad democrática

2. Regreso de Don José Manuel Zelaya Rosales a la presidencia de la República

3. Que se instale en Honduras una asamblea nacional constituyente

4. Que cese la represión en contra del pueblo hondureño.

SOLO UNIDOS VENCEREMOS, HASTA LA VICTORIA SIEMPRE

Tegucigalpa, M. D. C. Agosto 4,2009.

CEN-CUTH CEN-CGT CEN-CTH

Global action day for Honduras on August 11, 2009

By Henry Saragih, international coordinator of Via Campesina

To the sisters and brothers of all the regions of Via Campesina.

To the sisters and brothers of all social movements.

To all the people of the world.

Since the military coup -- after more than 38 days of untiring efforts by thousands of farmers, women, indigenous people, teachers, students, unionists, and ordinary citizens of the cities and the countryside to revert it and to recover democracy and dignity -- the repression by the coup participants has not notched the fighting spirit of the heroic Honduran people.

This struggle has now entered a crucial phase as the farmers' movement and the National Front of Resistance Against the Coup d'Etat have summoned the social, union and democratic movements to a national march that begins on August 5 and will culminate on August 11 in Tegucigalpa and San Pedro Sula.

In support of this national march and our sister and brother farmers and all the Honduran people, Via Campesina calls you to participate in a "Global Day of Action for Honduras", which will take place on August 11, 2009. We seek to support strong solidarity efforts in carrying out political and cultural mobilisation, concrete actions and political pressure and lobbying, as well as any and all possible activities that help advance the Honduran popular resistance in defeating this military coup.

We ask you to inform us about your plans of action and work for the "Day of Global Action for Honduras" as soon as possible.

GLOBALISE THE HOPE! GLOBALISE THE STRUGGLE!

Write to Via Campesina Honduras:

Wendy Cruz: wendycruzsanchez@yahoo.ca

Mabel Marquez: mabelmarquez07@gmail.com



