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HONDURAS' NEW PRESIDENT PROMISES SYSTEMIC CHANGE; OUTGOING PRESIDENT ALSO FACES SWEEPING CHANGE.

Article Excerpt
Manuel Zelaya Rosales was sworn in Jan. 27 as president of Honduras. He is known popularly as Mel, is 53 years old, and is the pick of the former opposition Partido Liberal (PL). He does not have a majority in the 128-seat Congress, but the PL's Roberto Micheletti was elected Jan. 25 as that body's president, so Zelaya will not be facing a hostile legislature. The PL won 62 seats in the election, the outgoing ruling party, the Partido Nacional, 52. Dealmaking with lesser parties left the two major parties evenly divided. The negotiations were tense, with potential success or failure of Zelaya's term riding on the outcome.

Zelaya was saved by a change of heart by a small leftwing party. The PN had struck a deal with the Unificacion Democratica (UD) and the Partido Democrata Cristiano de Honduras (PDCH) to back their candidate, Carlos Katan, giving them 64 votes. The PL teamed with the Partido Innovacion y Unidad-Social Democratica (PINU-SD), which had only two votes, to give 64 votes to Micheletti.

The deadlock could have spelled disaster, but the UD saved the day for Zelaya when its president, Cesar Ham, withdrew from its deal with the PN after loud complaints from within his ranks. The UD appears to have gotten nothing in return from Micheletti, who announced that the new leadership would include representatives of the PL, the PN, PINU-SD, and the PDCH,...

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