Caribbean & Central America - 16 November 2004
HONDURAS: Corruption spreads
Honduras has not been passed by in the latest bout of corruption allegations afflicting the political and judicial milieu across Central America. On 21 October, the chief prosecutor, Ovidio Navarro, dismissed ten public prosecutors and transferred six others who had criticized his controversial decision to shelve a number of corruption cases involving, among others, former President Rafael Callejas (1990-94). His action triggered a strike in the prosecution service and brought hundreds of demonstrators on to the streets.
Navarro has been accused of abusing his position to protect Callejas. A number of NGOs claim that his actions demonstrate how entrenched corruption is within the Honduran establishment. Along with demonstrators, they demanded Navarro's resignation and petitioned the supreme court to overturn the dismissals. The national press singled out the opposition Partido Liberal for criticism: the weekly current affairs magazine Hablemos Claro said that the PL had neglected its duty to take the government to task for the corruption within the politicised judiciary.
Navarro has staunchly defended his decision on both fronts. He says that the ten dismissed prosecutors masqueraded as crusaders against corruption while doing very little: 'What did they do against corruption over the past 10 years?' he asked. He also claims that the dismissals follow internal investigations which revealed myriad 'irregularities' ranging from breaches of the law to contempt, defamation and insults directed against the prosecution service and himself. Each case - including seven against Callejas - was shelved because it failed to stand up to close scrutiny, he said.
Honduras fared particularly badly in the latest Corruption Perceptions Index released by Transparency International (see sidebar). In its 2004 report, TI placed Honduras at 114th out of 145 countries, above only Guatemala and Haiti in the region. TI said that there is a direct relationship between high levels of corruption and low levels of economic productivity. The lack of transparency that tends to go hand in hand with government corruption leads to a level of uncertainty that effectively discourages foreign investors, the report said.
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ECONOMIC OVERVIEW: HONDURAS
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An IMF mission visited the country in mid November to review the fiscal
targets agreed with the government in September. The targets call for
a fiscal deficit of between 2.5% and 3% of GDP this year and growth of
between 3.5% and 4%. The central bank is confident that the government
will hit these targets. A favourable progress report by the IMF will mean
that more of the country's debt will be written off by government creditors:
at the beginning of 2005 around US$1bn of the US$5bn the country owes
will be written off under the IMF's Highly Indebted Poor Countries' Initiative.
On 12 November the US wrote off US$98m of Honduran debt under a Paris
Club agreement. The Paris Club sorts out debts to export credit agencies:
an agreement in September wrote off US$140m in debt-service payments Honduras
was due to make this year. This is equivalent to 90% of the country's
Paris Club debt service payments. The country owes US$1.2bn to Paris Club
members. |