US embassy cable - 05TEGUCIGALPA1643

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 TEGUCIGALPA 001643 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SENSITIVE 
 
STATE FOR WHA/PPC, WHA/CEN, WHA/USOAS, AND DRL/PHD 
STATE PASS AID FOR LAC/CAM AND DCHA/DG 
 
E.O. 12958:  N/A 
TAGS: PGOV, EAID, PREL, KDEM, HO 
SUBJECT: REQUEST FOR USD 1.6 MILLION IN FY05 ESF FOR 
ELECTION ASSISTANCE/DOMESTIC MONITORING IN HONDURAS 
 
REF: A. 04 TEGUCIGALPA 1541 
 
     B. FY06 MPP 
 
1. (U) This is an action request for WHA/PPC.  Please 
see para. 9. 
 
2. (U) Summary:  On November 27, 2005, Honduras will 
elect a new president, national congress, and mayors in 
the first national general election under the new 
electoral reforms.  The new 2004 Electoral Law 
substantially reduces political party control of the 
election. Successful implementation of the electoral 
reforms is essential to tackling the long-standing 
patronage culture that has undermined transparency and 
a democratic culture in Honduras.  These changes 
significantly impact the entire electoral process, 
affect Post's election-related MPP goals, and 
dramatically increase the GOH's need for technical 
assistance.  Although the general election will take 
place in FY06, technical assistance will be needed in 
FY05, during the run-up to the election.  Post 
therefore requests $1.6 million of FY05 ESF funds to 
support these key reforms.  Of those funds: $500,000 is 
needed by Honduran NGOs to develop and deliver training 
and educational materials for voter education, $650,000 
is for poll worker training of 260,000 poll workers who 
will work in 18,368 polling stations across the 
country, and $450,000 will field ten thousand volunteer 
domestic observers to cover all the polling stations 
nationwide.  End Summary. 
 
3. (U) Passage of the new Electoral Law in March 2004 
allows direct identification of the candidate, 
significantly reducing the control that political 
parties held over the final selection of 
representatives off party lists (see ref A).  The 
former system reinforced the customs, practices, and 
attitudes that sustained an extended spoils system. 
Cronyism and corruption have proliferated given the 
lack of accountability of representatives to their 
electorate.  The new electoral system allows the voters 
to choose the candidates to Congress in a direct and 
transparent way, marking under the name and photograph 
of each candidate.  The reforms provide the opportunity 
for transforming the electorate's political party 
patronage perspective to focusing instead on individual 
candidates. 
 
4. (SBU) In Post's FY06 MPP, under Foreign Operations 
Budget Projections, we stated "There will be a Honduran 
national election during FY 2006.  The successful 
execution of the November 2005 elections will create 
the necessary political environment for the country to 
continue its pursuit of needed political, economic, and 
legal reforms" (see ref B).  Post requested funds in 
the MPP for supporting the primary elections and 
received $150,000 in ESF funds that were applied to the 
successful voter education activities.  The 
implementation of the February 2005 primary elections 
successfully initiated the reform of the electoral 
process and tested the first phase of the electoral 
reforms, following a majority voting system for the 
Nationalist and Liberal Parties; the three smaller 
political parties did not participate in the primary 
elections.  Successful implementation of the electoral 
reforms during the February primaries can be attributed 
to the broad voter education campaign that was possible 
using ESF funds.  However, lessons learned from the 
primaries revealed weaknesses in poll worker training, 
resulting in incomplete or inadequate documentation 
from the polling stations.  This required retabulation 
of vote counts and subsequent delays.  The successful 
implementation of the electoral reforms is critical to 
sustain the progress and not let the critics succeed in 
pushing the country back to old, non-transparent ways. 
 
5. (U) The radical change in electoral processes 
presents an enormous challenge for the November 27, 
2005 general elections.  The Supreme Electoral Tribunal 
(TSE) has already identified sources of funding for the 
November elections.  Japan is providing $3 million to 
the TSE, but several areas remain without funds, 
including poll worker training, voter education, 
electoral systems administration, training, and 
monitoring.  Adequate implementation of these critical 
areas would help ensure a successful electoral process 
if ESF funds herein requested were made available per 
paragraphs 6, 7, and 8 below. 
 
6. (U) Voter education will be critical for the general 
election since it will follow a different format 
(proportional) from that of the primaries (majority). 
In preparation for the primaries in February 2005, 
FOPRIDEH (a USAID-funded umbrella NGO) had tremendous 
impact through an effective civic education campaign 
through the media.  Voter education will be critical to 
educate the Honduran public on the new electoral law, 
the right to vote, electoral institutions, the new 
election system for members of Congress, party lists 
and open lists, the new ballot, stages of the polling 
process, causes for annulment of a vote, etc.  Since 
the proportional system is poorly understood, voter 
education will impact the survival of the smaller 
parties by improving the electorate's understanding and 
thus, encourage more people to vote.  $500,000 will be 
needed to develop and deliver training and educational 
materials developed by Honduran NGOs who have already 
demonstrated their capacity during the primaries in 
February 2005, reaching provincial and municipal 
capitals and further extending to some populations that 
are distant from the municipal capitals. 
 
7. (U) An expanded domestic monitoring program will be 
essential to strengthen compliance with the new 
Electoral Law as well as to improve transparency and 
accountability.  FOPRIDEH conducted a successful 
domestic monitoring program for the primary elections 
in February 2005 and states the need for more extensive 
domestic monitoring given the increased likelihood of 
fraud, given the high stakes, in the vote count process 
at 18,368 polling stations.  Domestic observation must 
be expanded significantly since the monitors will play 
a key role in making this process more transparent. 
The estimated cost is $450,000 to field ten thousand 
volunteer domestic observers in order to cover the 
polling stations nationwide.  Post also sees the need 
for international monitoring conducted by the OAS in 
conjunction with the Embassy, and possibly 
international NGOs, and has separately urged WHA/USOAS 
to supporting funding for an OAS election observation 
mission for the November elections. 
 
8. (U) Poll worker training will be critical for 
ensuring credibility and transparency of the process. 
The effort will require selection and training of 
approximately 260,000 poll workers who will comprise 
the 18 departmental (provincial) electoral tribunals, 
298 municipal tribunals and hundreds of members for the 
18,368 polling stations throughout the country to 
ensure adequate administration of the elections. 
Training is essential to the success of the process 
given the complexities contained in the new legislation 
and the lack of local experience with the new 
procedures.  The TSE will take the lead in training 
activities to ensure consistency and avoid the 
practices of the past whereby each of the political 
parties trained their members separately and 
interpreted procedures differently.  Approximately 
$650,000 will be needed to cover this activity. 
 
9. (U) Action request for WHA/PPC: Post requests $1.6 
million of FY05 ESF funds to finance election 
assistance activities to prepare the electorate, local 
electoral bodies, and a national network of monitors 
that are critically needed to ensure successful 
implementation of the electoral reforms. 
 
10. (U) Post appreciates WHA/PPC's consideration of 
this proposal. 
 
Tuebner