Caribbean & Central America - November 2009 (ISSN 1741-4458)

When US President Barack Obama addressed the Fifth Summit of the Americas in Trinidad on 17 April he pledged an era of equal partnership and a new chapter of engagement with the region that reflected his stated preference for multilateralism in regional affairs. Seven months later, the administration's patience with multilateralism appeared to have already worn thin, amid the failure of the efforts led by the main hemispheric Organization of American States (OAS) to bring about a resolution to the Honduras coup crisis. Obama has moved to re-assert the US as the ultimate arbiter in Latin America, probably out of sheer frustration, but also at the cost of principle and in doing so has provoked a fresh rift with the region. Unless the US and OAS can row back in step with each other in coming weeks, this will have strong regional implications and may undermine his administration's standing and influence in Latin America.

US pragmatism vs. OAS principles?
Caving into growing regional calls for more concerted intervention, the US state department, which had desperately sought to remain on the multilateral/OAS track over Honduras, finally took matters into its own hands in late October, in what was a clear effort to deal in a politically pragmatic manner with the complex 'sui generis' nature of the Honduran crisis, which is probably best described as a constitutional coup by the supreme court and congress against the president.

The Tegucigalpa-San José Accord signed by the ousted president Manuel Zelaya and his de facto successor Roberto Micheletti on 30 October came about only after the direct unilateral intervention of the US, in the form of the (now former) US assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Tom Shannon. The agreement contemplates the establishment of a national unity government, a congressional vote on Zelaya's restitution (taking into account the 'opinion' of the supreme court), along with full recognition of the scheduled 29 November general elections. Zelaya took this to mean that he would be reinstated to head a national unity government before the elections, as did the OAS.

The US made it patently clear that it was firmly focused on the scheduled elections as the definitive way out of this nearly five-month old crisis, with Zelaya's position now secondary. Shannon said in a widely distributed TV interview on 3 November that the US had explicitly agreed upon the signature of the accord that it would 'accompany' the election process. When pressed, he explained that the US would recognise the outcome of the elections with or without Zelaya's restitution, stressing that the agreement made the restitution question an internal matter, and effectively cast it as separate from the elections, which was the argument put forward by the de facto authorities.

That, however, removed all incentives for the de facto administration and the other Honduran institutions to act in good faith, with the result that Zelaya on 5 November declared the agreement “dead letter" after Micheletti attempted to form a unity government without him and congress (in recess ahead of elections) dallied over the timetabling of a restitution vote.

It is hard to know whether Shannon was simply naí¯ve in thinking that Micheletti, congress and the supreme court would stick to the spirit of the agreement, or whether he just felt that his solution was the most politically pragmatic. Certainly, the US shift was partially dictated by domestic political concerns, including opposition Republican party pressure. Either way, Micheletti, perhaps the most underestimated player throughout this crisis, was subsequently able to provoke a damaging public split between the OAS and the US.

On 10 November a state department spokesman, PJ Crowley, stressed, “_what's first and foremost important is that you get to a new election on November 29 that is free and fair, that's effectively monitored by the international community. As part of the [Tegucigalpa-San José] agreement, the existing institutions within Honduras will determine how to implement that accord. We continue to encourage." With regard to Zelaya, Crowley added, “It's not about any one person. It's about a return of democratic processes and democratic government in Honduras."

In contrast, the OAS position remains that Zelaya's restitution at the head of a unity government prior to the elections is a sine qua non of the agreement. On 6 November, the OAS secretary general, José Miguel Insulza, called for implementation of the accord “without further subterfuges" adding that Zelaya, should “naturally" preside over the national unity cabinet. On 10 November, amid continued dallying on the part of the de facto authorities and congress, Insulza warned that the OAS could “not even consider" sending election observers as things stood. The OAS and the other main regional body, the Brazil-led Rio Group, also stressed that their recognition of the election might still depend on Zelaya's reinstatement.

Amid such a public rift between the two main international mediators, Micheletti and the other state actors continued to pay lip service to the agreement. Tactically, Micheletti and the state institutions will do just enough to keep the US onside. From day one, Micheletti's main focus has always been on legitimising the elections (and preventing Zelaya's return).

As we went to press Zelaya's best bet, aside from the OAS, looked to be the efforts by the rump of his domestic supporters to boycott and otherwise disrupt the electoral process.

Ironically, the OAS will draw most support for its 'principled' position vis a vis the US by pointing out that a failure to secure a 'correct' outcome in Honduras will only inflame the anti-US regional sentiment led by Venezuela's radical leftist President Hugo Chávez .   But neither does the OAS emerge from this crisis unblemished; its behaviour before and after 28 June underscores the need for urgent reform of its own institutional mechanisms for dealing with the oft cited 'excess of presidentialism' in Latin America. Some analysts argue, and not without reason, that the OAS response to the Honduras crisis amounted to external interference in a constitutional dispute on one side of the argument (i.e. the presidential side) without giving any weight to the constitutional credentials of the other disputants (congress and the judiciary).

• Valenzuela takes office

On 10 November the new US assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Arturo Valenzuela, was sworn in. Valenzuela's senate ratification had been blocked by a conservative Republican senator, Jim DeMint, over the Honduras crisis. DeMint lifted his block on 5 November, telling reporters that he had received personal assurances from both Valenzuela's predecessor Tom Shannon and Hillary Clinton, the US Secretary of State, that US recognition of the elections was now “guaranteed".