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Honduras The Press
Freedom of speech and the press are guaranteed by the
Honduran
constitution, and in practice these rights are generally
respected.
Nevertheless, as noted in the United States Department of
State's
1992 human rights report, the media are subject to both
corruption
and politicization, and there have been instances of selfcensorship , allegations of intimidation by military
authorities,
and payoffs to journalists. In a scandal that came to
light in
January 1993, a Honduran newspaper published an internal
document
from the National Elections Tribunal (Tribunal Nacional de
Elecciones--TNE) that listed authorized payments to
thirteen
journalists. Observers maintain that numerous governmental
institutions, including municipalities, the National
Congress, the
various ministries, and the military, have been involved
in paying
journalists for stories; some estimate that more than 50
percent of
journalists receive payoffs. Another significant problem
in the
media has been self-censorship in reporting on sensitive
issues,
especially the military. Intimidation in the form of
threats,
blacklisting, and violence also occurred at various times
in the
1980s and early 1990s.
According to some analysts, however, despite instances
of
military intimidation of the press in early 1993, the
media,
including the press, radio, and television, has played an
important
role in creating an environment conducive to the public's
open
questioning and criticism of authorities. Honduran
sociologist
Leticia Salomón has observed that in early 1993 the media,
including newspaper caricatures, played an instrumental
role in
mitigating the fear of criticizing the military, and he
asserts
that this diminishment of fear was an important step in
the
building of a democratic culture in Honduras.
Honduras has five daily national newspapers, three
based in
Tegucigalpa--El Periódico, La Tribuna and
El
Heraldo--and two based in San Pedro Sula--El
Tiempo and
La Prensa. Quite conservative in its outlook, El
Periódico has former president Callejas as its
principal
stockholder. Owned by PLH leader and businessperson Jaime
Rosenthal
(who placed second in the PLH presidential primary for the
1993
national election), the left-of-center El Tiempo
has been
the newspaper most prone to criticize the police and
military, for
which its editor, Manuel Gamero, has at times been jailed.
In
February 1993, a bomb exploded at the home of the
newspaper's
business manager after the paper gave refuge to a
reporter, Eduardo
Coto, who had witnessed the assassination of a San Pedro
Sula
businessperson, Eduardo Pina, in late January 1993. Coto
alleged
that Pina had been killed by two former members of the
notorious
Battalion 3-16, a military unit reportedly responsible for
numerous
disappearances in the early 1980s. After alleged death
threats from
military members, Coto fled to Spain, where he received
asylum.
La Tribuna and La Prensa are considered
centrist
papers by some observers, although some might put La
Prensa
into the more conservative center-right category. La
Tribuna, which is owned by Carlos Flores Facusse (the
unsuccessful 1989 presidential candidate), has close ties
to the
PLH and to the new industrial sector of Tegucigalpa. La
Prensa has close ties with the business section of San
Pedro
Sula. Its president and editor is Jorge Canahuati Larach,
whose
family also publishes El Heraldo, a conservative
paper that
has been more favorable to the military in its reporting
than other
dailies and often reflects the positions of the PNH.
In addition to the five dailies, Honduras also has
numerous
smaller publications. Most significantly, the Honduran
Documentation Center (Centro de Documentación de
Honduras--Cedoh),
run by the widely respected political analyst Victor Meza,
publishes a monthly Boletín Informativo; and Cedoh
and the
sociology department of UNAH publish Puntos de
Vista, a
magazine dedicated to social and political analysis. In
addition,
an English-language weekly paper, Honduras This
Week, covers
events in Honduras and in Central America.
Data as of December 1993
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