Dear Friends,

We apologize for the gap in our communication.  We’ve been in Honduras, doing an AVP basic workshop and making contacts for future work this spring, summer and fall.

8-10 Feb,  Santa Rosa de Copan, Honduras

We were hosted by John Donaghy, a Caritas volunteer.  His home seemed luxurious – hot water, bookshelves full of tempting titles, and refreshingly cool weather (70’s for the high) – all welcome changes for us. Caritas has extensive popular education programs and Margaret helped John with a curriculum development project. We met with Caritas director Father Efrain Romero and explored ways to implement an AVP program in the region. Sisters Brenda and Nancy, visiting from Gracias 3 hours away, are also interested in creating an AVP center.   

Val and John in Santa Rosa

At First Friends Church (Evangelical) we were welcomed with amazement and joy. They may never have had North American Quakers show up at their door before. In the Second Friends Church we were also welcomed and the Pastor immediately spoke of making plans to have AVP workshops.

11-17 February; San Pedro Sula, Honduras

At the San Pedro bus station we connected with Lilian Haydee Vega Ortiz (the Guatemalan facilitator who worked with us on the upcoming Basic workshop) and Nelly Delcid (our hostess). Thursday through Sunday were spent with 18 women from Tejedoras de Sueños  (Women Weaving Dreams) at a weekend retreat. We had a delightful time together, integrating their traditions of tai chi, massage, and origami crane folding with our AVP Basic workshop.

On the 16th, Val taped an interview to be broadcast on Nelly’s radio program, Voces de Mujeres (Women’s Voices), along with live participation of three workshop alumni. Tune in Tuesday, February 23, 12:30 Central -- on the web at www.radioprogresohn.org.

“The Resistance” is a significant movement for many of our contacts in Honduras: Resistance to the mine in Santa Rosa (which has contaminated local water with heavy metals), resistance to the 2009 coup (which interrupted constitutional reform) and concerns about violence against resistance members. Padre Fausto told us of Mennonite volunteers who have returned to Canada after death threats and showed us where his car window had been shattered by a gunshot while it was being driven by a Honduran colleague of John’s who then fled into exile with his family. (See below for more on the coup and resistance.)

We heard repeated concerns that beneath a relatively calm façade there is heated resentment which could explode. Neighboring Guatemala, Nicaragua and El Salvador provide models of brutal repression and bloody resistance, and there is a danger that Honduras will follow that example. We heard praise of violence against soldiers, but we also saw how AVP can support a different model. During the last day of our workshop, a participant who had earlier questioned the usefulness of nonviolence recalled her experience in a large demonstration at the airport when people were hoping for the deposed President’s return following the coup. The Resistance was well organized and had water available for demonstrators. The army was not as well supplied. Melisa described an older demonstrator sharing her water with a soldier. She was now thinking about the strength of that gesture, and the potential to actively resist while recognizing the humanity of people on the other side.

Our hope is that Friends Peace Teams’ work in Honduras can empower the resistance to choose non-violent strategies.  If we are successful, there will be little headline news –and in a world were violence makes headlines we are looking for that quiet form of success. Ojalá (God willing).

From Val:   Background on the coup and the Resistance

The military coup early June 28, 2009 served to unite and animate a wide variety of groups struggling for social change, among them women’s groups, an indigenous rights movement, campesinos (small farmers) cooperatives, university students, left-wing politicians, and trade unions. Some members of the elite decried the coup and supported the Resistance’s objective of reinstating the democratically elected President Manuel Zelaya. However, they probably supported few of the more populist goals of changing the Constitution to empower the great majority of poor, indigenous and rural people, resisting rollbacks of the doubling of the minimum wage, and stopping plans to sell public utilities to private concerns.

Within Honduras and internationally the accusation against the President was that he was hoping to make constitutional changes that would allow him to run again (Chavez-like, say his enemies). Days after the coup, Zelaya countered that it would not have been possible for him to seek reelection, given that elections were scheduled for November and if the public opinion poll—due to have been voted on June 28—had been in favor of such changes, they still would have had to be voted upon during those same elections, and would not have applied to the current President.

The US decided to accept the elections despite earlier statements of nonsupport for elections held by the coup government, citing an agreement with the coup government to reinstate the President before the elections which the replacement President, Roberto Micheletti, never carried out. In the November 2009 election Porfirio “Pepe” Lobo, the candidate of the Conservative party, won a majority of the votes cast. The days before the elections were filled with attacks (including assassinations, torture and rape) on Resistance members and groups, suspension of freedom of assembly and closing down of opposition media. Resistance supporters boycotted the election. Estimates of the actual percentage of population voting vary widely. Our contacts in Santa Rosa and San Pedro Sula said the polls were virtually abandoned.

Members of the elite who supported the coup as well as those who opposed it, like the US government, have mostly reverted to supporting the newly installed government, which has continued repressive policies toward the opposition, including violations of human and constitutional rights. One of the new government’s earliest actions was to provide amnesty to military and civilians who participated in the coup and naming Micheletti “Senator for Life” a position which provides him protection from prosecution of any crimes. The left-leaning Resistance groups, some of whose coalitions preceded the coup by several years and those more recently activated, continue to be lined up in opposition. There’s a strong feminist contingent, and one (male) supporter told us, “One of the new things about the Resistance is a denunciation of patriarchy as well as the oligarchy.” Some of the strongest public leaders are women, with large feminist and union constituencies.

The strongest Resistance leader (according to a contact) in the second largest city, San Pedro Sula is the president of her union and a survivor of torture during the 80’s when the repression in Honduras was similar to that in El Salvador and Guatemala. In September she spoke with great passion about continuing the struggle, although her house was being watched by threatening men, she received numerous telephone threats, and her children were terrorized. Her courage and commitment inspire many and we hope that our work in Honduras is a part of a larger international presence and support for those advocating nonviolent change.