Country Profile: Honduras
Country Profile: Honduras
October 2016
A lethal combination of drug wars and gang violence has turned Honduras – the original banana republic – into the most violent country in the world outside a war zone, and the violence has escalated since the 2009 coup that deposed left-leaning president Manuel Zelaya.
Elections for Zelaya’s successor did not take place until the end of 2013, when the conservative Juan Orlando Hernández became President for a four-year term, following a campaign marred by allegations of fraud and intimidation. On 23 April 2015 the Honduran Supreme Court struck down a constitutional prohibition barring incumbent presidents from running for a second term, paving the way for Hernández to remain in power after 2017.
Only weeks later, however, the Attorney General revealed that a network led by Hernández had defrauded the government of $120 million from 2010 to 2014 – the period of the interregnum following the military coup. The investigation also showed that some of those funds were used to fund Hernández’s 2013 presidential campaign.
San Pedro Sula, Siguatepeque, Choluteca and other major cities erupted in calls for the President’s resignation and on 5 June 2015 20,000 Hondurans took to the streets, bearing torches and shouting ‘JOH out, JOH out!’.
More:
https://newint.org/columns/country/2016/10/01/country-profile-honduras/
