The Diplomat
King Philip VI will attend today in Tegucigalpa the inauguration of the new president of Honduras, Xiomara Castro de Zelaya, who is already facing her first major political crisis before even taking office.
The Monarch arrived yesterday from Puerto Rico, where he was since last Monday on the occasion of the celebration of the fifth centenary of the founding of the city of San Juan. The King, accompanied by the Minister of Foreign Affairs, José Manuel Albares, will attend the investiture of Castro, the first woman in the political history of Honduras to become President, at the Tiburcio Carias Andino National Stadium in Tegucigalpa.
Besides, the Monarch will take advantage of his visit to Honduras (the first as King, since he was in 2014, as Prince of Asturias, to attend the inauguration of Juan Orlando Hernandez) to meet with the outgoing president and the new president and to hold his traditional meeting with the Spanish community residing in the country. Castro, from the Libertad y Refundación Party (LIBRE), was elected in the general elections of last November 28. She will succeed Juan Orlando Hernández, who will put an end to two four-year presidential terms and three consecutive periods of government of the National Party.
The King represents Spain in the inaugurations of Latin American presidents, a task that Philip VI has been assuming since 1996, when he was still Prince of Asturias. This is the seventh participation of Philip VI in the inauguration of an Ibero-American president since he has been King, since he was in 2018 in that of the Mexican Andrés Manuel López Obrador, in 2019 in that of the Panamanian Laurentino Cortizo, in 2020 in those of the Uruguayan Luis Lacalle Pou and the Bolivian Luis Arce and in 2021 in those of the Ecuadorian Guillermo Lasso Mendoza and the Peruvian Pedro Castillo.
In any case, the inauguration of Xiomara Castro comes at a very turbulent moment for the political life of Honduras, especially for the Libertad y Refundación Party. Last Tuesday, the Congress – elected in the same elections of November 28 – opened its new legislative period with two parallel boards of directors: the one supported by Xiomara Castro, which was elected in the Chamber itself, and the one backed by several dissident MP of her own party, which was ratified in a social club on the outskirts of Tegucigalpa to avoid clashes with the supporters of the new president.
The reason for these discrepancies is the opposition of twenty LIBRE deputies to the government agreement between Xiorama Castro and the Salvador Party of Honduras (PSH), which allowed the appointment of Luis Redondo as president of the board of directors of Congress. In response, the rebel parliamentarians and 44 other National Party MP voted in favor of Jorge Cálix, the candidate who was ratified outside Tegucigalpa (amid blows and insults) while the House elected Redondo. Castro has accused the dissidents of “treason” and expelled them from the party.
