Caravan Activists Are Weaponizing Poor Central Americans
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by Ana Quintana,
Just like the migrant caravan earlier this March, organizers of this march are weaponizing poor Central Americans. This caravan was organized by Bartolo Fuentes, a former Honduran legislator and member of the radical leftist Libre party. He was detained by Guatemalan authorities on Tuesday for illegally entering the country.
Libre is not a political party but a destabilizing movement.
Following Libre’s losses in the 2013 and 2017 presidential elections, Libre’s turned to a public campaign of generating turmoil and instability.
I travel to Honduras frequently and experienced the chaos firsthand. In 2013, I was an international observer for the presidential elections. I was at the electoral tribunal headquarters as the votes were being counted when Zelaya stormed in and held a press conference disputing the election result.
His claim was ridiculous, as polls had only closed hours before. But he had a personal interest in the election: His wife was the party’s candidate. She ended up losing, earning less than 30 percent of the overall vote.
Even though various international groups gave the election a clean bill of health, party activists and agitators protested the results for days afterwards, shutting down major streets and highways.
Later in 2015, I returned to Honduras for a business trip. I was preparing to leave my hotel when the military showed up and told us that thousands of demonstrators carrying burning torches were headed to the presidential palace, which was right next to the hotel. For hours, we were confined in the hotel while thousands of protesters shut down traffic at the height of rush hour.
This caravan antic is right out of the left’s disorder and chaos playbook. The timing before the U.S.’s midterm elections and the change of presidency in Mexico is not coincidental. It is also clear the caravan organizers are more interested in creating turmoil than the well-being of the migrants.
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