Ricardo Álvarez, mayor of Tegucigalpa, president of the National Party and possible next president of Honduras is playing dirty games with trash. The "national emergency" declared by Lobo over the real (though in some cases overblown) dengue epidemic killing mostly poor Hondurans living in areas that have had basic services like water and trash collection interrupted by the coup, not to mention golpista attempts to fully privatize healthcare, is a state of exception allowing for all kinds of other attacks on the same people who are most vulnerable to the epidemic. These include numerous suspensions of civil liberties, as previously discussed here, including a reinforced militarization of Honduran streets, with the same army that carried out the coup and dozens (maybe hundreds) of assassinations of resistance members, given free reign to enter people homes with the excuse of public health, gathering all the intelligence they want along the way.

Álvarez is using the emergency not to reflect on the failures of his "Primero los Pobres" reign, but to blame those same victims of structural violence for the spread of the disease. Why? Because they're filthy, of course. He has made numerous statements to this effect in recent days, including noting that despite the many medical and cleanup brigades (which in a municipal government that collected trash and provided basic preventive healthcare wouldn't be necessary in the first place), they've found "tal cantidad de basura y desaseo que da pena"—"so much trash it's just embarrassing/shameful."

Now, there's no doubt that people need to take measures to ensure they aren't breeding mosquitoes in their homes. But in a town that doesn't consistently supply running water because many would rather its poor residents die off (don't scoff: I've heard this argument- overpopulation, you know), it is a necessity for most to store water. In a town without free municipal trash removal, many don't have a way to effectively dispose of things mosquitoes like. Is it a moral issue? I'd say yes. But the onus is on Álvarez, not the people he blames.

Now to boot, with heavy rains and subsequent flooding of the capital, he's found the perfect culprit: market vendors who don't properly dispose of their trash, blocking the drainage and causing the flood. See the neoliberal logic? Never mind that the municipality doesn't provide adequate trash removal and drainage systems, the problem is we still have individuals carrying out penny capitalist activities to make a living in public or semi-public spaces, spaces that haven't yet been corporatized and turned into malls. This must end!

Of course, equating poor people (or anyone you don't like, really) to trash is not new, as Lisa Marie Presley knows. And it's not new to Tegucigalpa. In my book, I analyze this full page ad taken out by the President's office (Carlos Flores Facussé, the golpista owner of the Liberal Party and nephew of tío Mike Facussé, the owner of Honduras) and the Ministry of Natural Resources and the Environment (click for greater detail):

I won't give you the full analysis here (buy the book for that, it's not that bad- I've read it), but suffice to say that Hurricane Mitch? Trashy poor people's fault.

Meanwhile, on the National Party's site, pre-pre-candidate Álvarez takes the ridiculously easy and hypocritical position of calling SB1070 apartheid (see below the jump for full text on this one, in case the link dies). Is SB1070 apartheid? Absolutely. But all Álvarez's policies ensure that more and more poor Hondurans will be forced into that apartheid system. And in Honduras, while the apartheid may not be one of (entirely) racial profiling, that apartheid also exists. It exists in my (and his) white privilege, it exists in the both invisible and very visible geographic and architectural class divides within Tegucigalpa. And if Ricardo Álvarez had been in DC, he would not have been with me and about a hundred friends yesterday outside the Nationals-Diamondbacks game, protesting SB1070, and demanding Bud Selig move next year's championship game. He would not have been with a dozen or so friends at the police station, waiting until the morning for the four people who had been brave enough to stop the game in protest of that apartheid law. Instead, he would likely have been meeting with his golpista allies in the State Department and Congress, some of whom enthusiastically support SB1070. Or he would have been meeting with golpista business allies or lobbyists with similar stances. It's easy in Latin America to call Arizonans neonazis, but Álvarez's primero joder los pobres policies belie his righteous indignation.

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Presidente del Partido Nacional: Leyes antiinmigrantes son un regreso al “Apartheid”
Agosto 12, 2010

Tegucigalpa – El presidente del Partido Nacional, en el poder, rechazó hoy la iniciativa del estado de Florida que anunció este miércoles que buscará endurecer sus leyes de control de la "inmigración ilegal" y dotar a la policía de mayores facultades para detener a personas sospechosas de ser indocumentadas, según un proyecto que impulsa la gobernación.

“Seguir con estas prácticas antiinmigrantes es retornar a la tristemente recordada época del apartheid” dijo el principal líder de los nacionalistas.

El proyecto de ley se presenta en La Florida luego de una fuerte controversia por una legislación similar aprobada en Arizona.

La propuesta de la Florida podría ir más allá ya debido a que contempla que los jueces tengan en cuenta la violación de la norma migratoria al fijar una fianza, o para elevar el grado de cargos criminales.

En Estados Unidos residen más de un millón de hondureños, una gran parte de ellos son indocumentados.

La Florida es uno de los estados que alberga a mayor cantidad de hondureños que trabajan en la industria de la construcción, en labores de limpieza, comercio y ocupaciones diversas en las que se ganan la vida con dignidad, indicó Ricardo Álvarez.

Los migrantes generan al país divisas superiores a los dos mil millones de lempiras que llegan especialmente a las familias más pobres de este país centroamericano.

El presidente del partido Nacional y alcalde de Tegucigalpa, ha protestado sistemáticamente por las leyes que afectan los derechos humanos de los migrantes.

En su oportunidad, Álvarez calificó la Ley SB- 1070 de Arizona como una legislación “neonazi” que hace retroceder la defensa de los derechos civiles en vez de fortalecerlos como corresponde, “es una atentado criminal contra la humanidad”, concluyó.