Roberto Micheletti Bain, Honduras
Who is he? Micheletti is president of the ruling Partido Liberal (PL) and, until 28 June, was president of congress.
Why watch him? On 28 June congress named Micheletti acting President of Honduras, after Manuel Zelaya was ousted in a military coup and forced into exile. Micheletti's appointment owed to his erstwhile position as president of congress after Vice President Elvin Santos resigned in December 2008 to run as PL presidential candidate. Despite hailing from the same party as Zelaya, Micheletti, a member of the conservative elite, is a political rival. Differences between the two emerged over Zelaya's unexpected swing to the Left last year and his alignment with the regional radical movement led by Venezuela's Hugo Chávez .
Micheletti was one of the main actors in the coup, which stemmed from the resistance of the Right to Zelaya's ambitions for constitutional reform. It feared that Zelaya sought to end the current ban on presidential re-election (continuismo) and thereby perpetuate himself in power beyond January 2010, when he is due to step down.
Micheletti - who led calls for congress to remove Zelaya on the grounds that he was “unfit" to govern and had violated the constitution - insists that his appointment is legal and that the general elections planned for 29 November will go ahead, after which he will step down. It remains to be seen whether the international community, which has widely and unequivocally condemned the military coup, the first in Central America in more than 15 years, are won over by this argument.
Born: 13 August 1948, El Progreso, Yoro.
Education: Micheletti has a degree in law from Mexico's Universidad Autónoma de Monterrey and the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Honduras.
Public life: Born to Italian immigrants, Micheletti trained as a young cadet in the Academia Militar de Tegucigalpa and served as a member of the presidential guard under the liberal administration of Ramón Villeda Morales (1957-1963), the first civilian government after a period of military rule. However, following a coup d'etat led by Col. Osvaldo López Arellano in 1963, he was forced to leave the country. He travelled to Mexico, where he continued his education, and then to the US. With the reinstatement of civilian law in 1980, Micheletti returned to Honduras and was a member of the constituent assembly responsible for drawing up the 1982 constitution.
A businessman, with interests in the transport sector and a former managing director of the state telecommunications company, Hondutel, Micheletti is a stalwart of the PL, one of the two traditional parties of the Honduras oligarchy (along with the opposition Partido Nacional) which have long dominated the country's political system. He has been active in the party for nearly thirty years; he served as PL national deputy for the Yoro region in 1980-2006 and has held various prominent posts, including secretary general and party president. He ran unsuccessfully as pre-presidential candidate in the 28 November 2008 PL primaries, incurring an unexpected (and strong) defeat against Mauricio Villeda Bermúdez, a political surrogate for Micheletti's main rival, Vice President Elvin Santos, after Santos was deemed “ineligible" to run in a controversial ruling by the supreme electoral court (TSE).
Micheletti's defeat was interpreted as a vote against Zelaya by the party's Right, after Zelaya opted to join the Venezuelan-led trade initiative, Alba, in August last year; Zelaya had agreed to back Micheletti's candidacy in return for Micheletti guaranteeing his faction's support for Alba in congress.
The truce between the two politicians did not last; Micheletti led the opposition to Zelaya's proposal to call a constituent assembly, fanning fears of continuismo and then called for congress to censure Zelaya in light of his insistence in pressing ahead with what the state institutions ruled was an illegal (non-binding) referendum on Sunday (28 June) on whether to hold elections for a constituent assembly to reform the 1982 Constitution alongside general elections on 29 November.
Timeline:
1963: Leaves Honduras for Mexico after the coup d'etat ousting Ramón Villeda Morales.
1980: Returns to Honduras where he serves as a member of the constituent assembly responsible for drawing up the 1982 constitution.
1980-2006: PL congressman for the Yoro department.
1980-2005: President of the board of directors of the Tranportes Union Progreseña SA (Tupsa).
1991-1994: PL general secretary.
1994-1998: First secretary of congress.
1998-2002: Managing director of state telecommunications company, Hondutel.
1999-2005: President of the board of directors of Transportes Sula de Lujo (Transul)
2002-2006: Leader of the PL bench in congress.
2006-2010: President of congress.
November 2008: Loses PL primaries to Mauricio Villeda Bermúdez by 32%-52%.
March 2009: Named president of the PL leadership committee.
May 2009: Claims there is a plot to assassinate him because of his opposition to Zelaya's plans for a referendum on constitutional reform.
28 June 2009: Appointed acting President of Honduras by congress after Zelaya is ousted in a military coup.
Strengths: Having served nearly 30 years in the PL, Micheletti is considered one of the most powerful figures in the ruling party (along with Elvin Santos and the former president Carlos Flores Facussé [1998-2002]). This power translates beyond the realm of party politics given the weak and politicised nature of Honduras's institutions - one example is the supreme electoral court (TSE) ruling against Elvin Santos in the November party primaries, which many attributed to an under-the-table deal between Micheletti and Zelaya.
As regards his current power struggle with Zelaya, Micheletti has the backing of congress, the judiciary, and even the Church - including influential archbishop of Tegucigalpa, Óscar Andrés Rodríguez, traditionally a mediatory influence in Honduras. There is some substance to Micheletti's claims that Zelaya was acting unconstitutionally, given his intent on pushing ahead with a reform deemed illegal by congress and judiciary.
Weaknesses: The November PL primaries revealed that Micheletti lacked widespread support from the PL, and it remains to be seen whether his leadership in the current crisis will unite the divided party.
The fact that he (along with the other coupsters) evidently felt so threatened by the prospect of the non-binding vote suggests that it had popular backing, which also raises questions over his claims to be acting democratically.
Crucially, in terms of his current situation, while he has the support of the country's institutions, Micheletti is completely isolated internationally; his mandate has not been recognised by a single country and a host of international organisations such as the US-dominated Organisation of American States (OAS); the Rio Group, and the European Union to name but a few, have lined up to unequivocally condemn the coup and call for Zelaya's reinstatement.
Prospects: Micheletti's prospects hinge on whether he is able to secure international backing for his administration, which is highly unlikely.
It is also unclear what impact this international response will have domestically. While it remains tense in the capital, calls by the leaders of the Alba countries such as Venezuela's Chávez and Bolivia's Evo Morales for the “people to rise up and demand the return of their president" have yet to result in action. To date, it has been a bloodless coup.
Ultimately the political fate of Micheletti - who has so far shown himself determined to go it alone, convinced of the legitimacy of his mandate - will be determined by his ability to negotiate a resolution with the main intermediary, the OAS.