Wednesday, July 01, 2009

Zelaya and exile

In my last post, I asked about the rushed decision to take Zelaya out of the country and whether it was legal--the constitution answers my question. Otto at Inca Kola News notes a legal action in favor of Zelaya based especially on Article 81:

Toda persona tiene derecho a circular libremente, salir, entrar y permanecer en el territorio nacional.

Every person has the right to circulate freely, leave, enter, and remain in the national territory.

Also Article 102:

Ningún hondureño podrá ser expatriado ni entregado por las autoridades a un Estado extranjero.

No Honduran can be expatriated or handed over by the authorities to a foreign state.

I don't see a lot of wiggle room there.

3 comments:

leftside 3:34 AM  

I think we are beyond whether the removal of Zelaya was legal or not. The question is now whether he can be impeached or jailed instead. This gets down to the nitty gritty legal details of both sides' arguments.

Zelaya's legal position rests on the fact that he satisfied the Court's main 2 objections. The poll was made non-binding and no public monies were spent. He claims the polling was therefore stripped of any legal characteristics that could be objectionable to anyone.

The legal justification for holding a non-binding public poll is Article 5 of the Law of Citizen Participation, passed in 2006, which explicitly says that "ANY power of the State can convene the general public... to issue opinions, formulate and propose solutions to collective problems affecting them. The results are not binding..."

Zelaya will further argue that the Court actions were extraordinary, over-reaching, capricious and part of a larger criminal conspiracy. Decisions were not made in good faith. They rested on fabrications about term-limits and clearly over-stepped their bounds. The court is meant to judicate history, not make it.

For their part, the Constitution says the military is explicitly supposed to be "apolitical, obedient and non-deliberating." Of course, they have been none of that. Amongst other telling things, the military has admitted that there was "clamor in the ranks" over the decision to act against the seat of Government they are supposed to protect. Central America will be set back 20 years if this is left to stand.

Vladimir,  1:11 PM  

The legality or not of the decision to fled Zelaya to Costa Rica is imaterial to the decision of deposing the president.

The oficials in charge should be brought to justice if the "exile" was ilegal. But that does not change the fact that the SCJ, based on article 239, had the power to depose the President.

And if the SCJ is out of step, the prerogative to impeach them belongs to Congress.

Vladimir,  1:17 PM  

For their part, the Constitution says the military is explicitly supposed to be "apolitical, obedient and non-deliberating."

You forgot to mention that they are suposed to protect the constitution. And who gets to decide what the Constitution says is the SCJ. And if the SCJ is out of its bounds, it is the Congress who has the right to impeach them.

In what kind or bizarre constitutinal order the executive branch has the right to decide what the constitution says or not???

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