Caribbean & Central America - August 2008 (ISSN 1741-4458)

Traditionally one of the US' most steadfast allies in Central America, Honduras would appear to be shifting its allegiances after President Manuel Zelaya announced plans to join the Venezuelan-led trade and integration initiative, Alternativa Bolivariana de las Américas (Alba). Honduras signed up to Petrocaribe, Venezuela's oil-supply pact in February [RC-08-03]. Zelaya has also upped his anti-US rhetoric, in a manner reminiscent of US bête noire, President Hugo Chávez of Venezuela. The president's proposal to join Alba has yet to be ratified by congress and has proved divisive within the country.

On 30 July at a meeting in Tegucigalpa of Petrocaribe agricultural ministers (see sidebar), Zelaya announced that Honduras would be joining Alba. While most countries in Central America are members of Petrocaribe, with Costa Rica the latest to seek formal membership [RC-08-07], Honduras is only the second country in the region to seek membership of Alba, a more overtly political and anti-US initiative. The other full members are Bolivia, Cuba, Dominica, Nicaragua and Venezuela.

Arguing that Alba membership would help diversify Honduras' trade ties, just as belonging to Petrocaribe has helped to reduce the country's fuel import bill, Zelaya said that it was high time that Honduras addressed the US “on an equal footing […] because we seem like vassals".

Aside from generating fears in the US that other countries in the region will follow suit, Zelaya's announcement is a particular blow to the US administration of President George W. Bush. Honduras has traditionally been one of the most pro-US countries in Central America. The current deputy Secretary of State, John Negroponte, served as US ambassador to Tegucigalpa in the 1980s and controversially, organised support for the Nicaraguan Contras from Honduran bases.

Railing against the US
Aside from Zelaya's declaration of interest in joining Alba, signs of estrangement between the two countries have emerged in the diplomatic sphere. Days after accusing outgoing the US ambassador in Tegucigalpa, Charles Ford, of “barbarous" comments after he claimed to have learned “ways of intimidating people_to keep them quiet" during his three years in Honduras, Zeyala warned the US official at the end of July to “pay more respect" to Honduras. This followed Ford's claims to the local media that 30% of remittances sent back to Honduras by family members living in the US came from asset-laundering and drug-trafficking.

Ford had also commented on the high rate of poverty and corruption in Honduras, remarks which Zelaya dubbed “unfortunate", especially as he had just been awarded the Order of Morazán (the highest decoration of the Honduran government). The president added that Ford should confine himself to discussing the parlous state of the US economy rather than casting aspersions on Honduras. Significantly, Zelaya also echoed the Chávez line that the US is ultimately to blame for drug violence in the region because it is the main market for illicit drugs.

This diplomatic spat followed a clash between the two last March [RC-08-04], when the US blocked imports of Honduran cantaloupes, on the grounds that they were contaminated with salmonella. (Venezuela later offered to buy all of the melons intended for the US.)

A divisive issue
Zelaya has invited President Chávez , Cuba's President Raúl Castro, Nicaragua's President Daniel Ortega and Bolivia's President Evo Morales to Tegucigalpa on 25 August for an official Alba signing ceremony.

However, Alba membership must still be ratified by congress, which only narrowly approved membership of Petrocaribe, a far less controversial initiative which the government could legitimately argue made real economic sense. Alba however, is considered more fundamentally ideological, and business organisations and politicians alike have raised objections. Critics have questioned what additional benefits, if any, Honduras would enjoy from Alba membership, pointing out that it already gets discounted oil under Petrocaribe. There are also fears among the local business sector that Alba membership could jeopardize the country's relations with the US. The powerful Honduran council of private enterprise (Cohep) points out that trade with Alba members is negligible in comparison to total trade (including maquila exports) of around US$8.5bn with the US in 2007. Imports from Venezuela amounted to US$36.2m in 2007, according to the central bank.

The issue has caused divisions in the ruling Partido Liberal (PL), and has featured in the increasingly acrimonious internal struggle between Vice President, Elvin Santos, and the congress leader Roberto Micheletti, both frontrunners for the PL presidential nomination in the November 2009 presidential elections. On 8 August, Santos charged that Zelaya had bribed Micheletti loyalists in congress (US$52,500 each) in exchange for their supporting Alba, although he has failed to provide any evidence for this allegation.

The PL and the main opposition Partido Nacional (PN) are all but equally matched in the 128-seat congress, which means that Micheletti, who commands the support of some 20 PL deputies, will have the decisive say. He has made it clear that congress will not ratify Alba if it has a military dimension. Chávez proposed the creation of an Alba Defence Council back in March to form a collective defence strategy, but it has yet to take shape.

• Petroalimentos

The new council of Petrocaribe agriculture ministers recently set up a new fund to improve food security for the 18 members of the group. Venezuelan agriculture minister Elí­as Jaua said that Venezuela would contribute 50 cents for each barrel of crude it exports for more than US$100. Jaua said that at current prices, the fund would amass US$450m by the end of the year. President Zelaya said that the fund would be used exclusively for food development projects, providing “a new response to old problems".