Joel Mason reflects on the problems faced by Honduras, and his experience living there.
“When the great fall out, the weak must suffer for it” – so finishes the fable of ‘The fighting bulls and the frog’. Yet for the gently-spoken teacher sitting reading to the group of children assembled in front of him, wearing whatever collection of rags of uniform they could muster, this fable wasn’t just another story – it was their story. Sitting in the school on a picturesque hillside in rural Honduras, charged with teaching about 30 pupils of all ages and abilities in just one classroom, he recognised in Aesop’s tale the plight of his own country. Just as the frogs in the fable are trampled on when the bulls fight, so too do ordinary people across Central America feel powerless – victims of forces beyond their control.
At the time this occurred (the summer of 2009), the parallel had been thrown into particularly sharp relief for the students of that school, and the many like them across Honduras. The then-president Manuel Zelaya had just been ousted by the army in a coup, and much aid to the country had therefore been cut in response, including the daily ‘merienda’ funded by the World Food Program. The merienda provided all students in school with a simple meal during the morning, and for many poor pupils this was the only thing which stood between them and severe malnutrition. These people simply wished to get on with their lives – the political manoeuvrings of the country’s military elite were just news that filtered through to them on the radio and when traders passed through. Tegucigalpa, the capital, may as well have been a foreign country to them. Yet it was they, and not the powerful generals or corrupt politicos, who were punished when the bulls fought.
This feeling of being a dispensable pawn on some larger battlefield, echoes tragically once more in Honduras’ present situation. Since Nixon first declared the ‘war on drugs’ in 1971, it has consumed ever greater resources, with over $1 trillion spent on it to date by the US, but there is woefully little to show for this vast expenditure. This piece is not about the claimed rights to drugs of users in the US, nor about the Sisyphean futility of the task – cracking down on drugs, driving prices up, and thereby making drug trafficking an increasingly appealing option to poor, ill-educated people in countries with few opportunities. Instead, I wish to highlight the oft-forgotten impact this has on ordinary people in their everyday lives.
As the resources lavished on the traditional culprit, Mexico, gradually began to make drug trafficking there more difficult, the drug trade and its associated problems have gradually been pushed down Central America into countries which are even poorer and even less able to cope than Mexico. Now, it is estimated that 80 per cent of the cocaine which goes to America passes through Honduras, the majority of it overseen by powerful gangs.
Indeed, the emergence of gruesomely violent gangs across Central America, known as maras, has been exacerbated by the deportation of many who had been incarcerated in the US for drug offences. These people returned to Central America, replete with ruthless attitudes and experience of violent gangs, to countries already lacking the basic protection of law and order and awash with weapons.
Central America now finds itself inundated with violence; the murder rate in Honduras is the highest in the world outside a war zone, with an average of twenty people killed each day last year. San Pedro Sula, which should be a thriving industrial hub on the sweltering north coast of Honduras, is instead the most dangerous city in the world, in which street gangs murder with impunity. Of course, with the notoriously corrupt police barely able to keep track of all the violence, let alone prevent it, many young people are drawn to gangs by the safety and opportunities they appear to offer. With guns freely available, and the country growing ever more violent, the incentive is there for an ever-growing number of people to try to get their hands on weapons, which in turn leads to more violence, heightening the sense of fear, and so the vicious cycle continues.
Even in the small, rural village in which I lived for a year and a half between 2004-2005, it was commonplace even for respectable members of the community to walk around armed, pistols casually tucked into belts. I often used to go with friends to visit their little plots of land or tend to their cattle; though younger than almost everybody at this University, they would often carry pistols. In a society lacking the rule of law, and with a severe problem of alcoholism thrown into the mix, it is not hard to envisage the bloody end which is all too often the result of this toxic combination. In the year and a half I lived there, in my village and the surrounding area alone, with fewer than two thousand people, there were fourteen murders. This was, we were told, a good period. Having since been back, the problem has worsened significantly.
Looking at the problems faced by countries such as Honduras, and the effect these have on the lives of ordinary people, it is hard not to feel a sense of despair. Yet perhaps if more thought can be given to the lives of ordinary people as these great battles rage on around them, then there can be the prospect of a more optimistic future. Indeed, there is a growing cacophony of indignant voices which, appalled at the carnage they see, are calling for a change in the policies pursued by the US.
Ultimately, until people can harbour hopes of a better future from legitimate activity, they will continue to be drawn to drug trafficking. Until they can expect safety from the law and the state, they will continue to be drawn to violent gangs and the reassurance of weapons. The challenge faced by Honduras and other Central American countries is of how to achieve peace and prosperity when every day they face more bloodshed. For the sakes of the friends I have who live there, and the many people like them who simply wish to live their lives, I hope a solution can be found.
Joel Mason
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