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Xiomara Castro will mark the end of bipartisanship and will return to the original color of the flag in Honduras
Tegucigalpa, Jan 18 (EFE).- On January 27, Honduras will not only put an end to bipartisanship in power, but will also officially return to the original color of its national flag, with its two turquoise blue stripes and one white on the center, after many years with a dark blue emblem that will go down in history. The end of traditional bipartisanship will be marked by the new president that Honduras will have as of the 27th, Xiomara Castro, leader of the Libertad y Refundación Party (Libre, left), founded in 2011, after the coup against then-president Manuel Zelaya ( her husband) on June 28, 2009, when she promoted constitutional reforms that the law did not allow. For more than a century, power in Honduras has been alternated between the Liberal parties, founded in February 1891, and the National party, in February 1902, both conservative, although leaders of the former define it as center, thrown more to the left. Both parties have governed between internal struggles, a 1937-1949 dictatorship, headed by Tiburcio Carías Andino, leader of the National Party, and the interruption of the constitutional order of the military, mainly in the second half of the last century. In the last stage of military regimes, they were in power from December 4, 1972, when they overthrew President Ramón Ernesto Cruz, of the National Party, who had taken office in 1971, until January 27, 1982, handing over power to civilians, after the installation of a National Constituent Assembly in April 1980. Since the return to constitutional order in 1980, Hondurans have held eleven general elections, five of which were won by the Liberal Party (1981, 1985, 1993 , 1997 and 2005), five the National Party (1989, 2001, 2009, 2013 and 2017) and one Free (2021). THE NEW FLAG The Liberal Party, under whose banner Manuel Zelaya came to power on January 27, 2006, is identified with one of two red stripes and one white in the center, while the National Party’s is dark blue, with a white star in the center. According to historical notes, it was in February 1866, during the government presided over by José María Medina, when the creation of the national flag was decreed, with two blue stripes and one white in the center, with five stars, in blue, representing the five countries of the former Central American Federation: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua. So, the shade of blue of the Honduran flag was not established, but it is known that in the early years of the 20th century the emblem in navy blue and white was used in different events. The navy blue contradicted the lyrics of the national anthem, which dates back to November 13, 1915, which in one of its stanzas says: “Your flag is a lampo of sky crossed by a block of snow; and you can see in its sacred background five pale blue stars… There are those who affirm that the dark blue of the Honduran flag was used because that has been the color of the flag of the former Central American Federation, without missing those who associate it with the emblem of the National Party. On January 8, 1949, the year in which the dictatorship of Tiburcio Carías ended, there was a reform of the national flag and it was established that the upper and lower horizontal stripes would be turquoise blue, and the center one would continue to be white with five stars with five outgoing angles of the same blue color, forming with four of them a quadrilong parallel to the stripes. But politicians and the military gave little compliance to the decree with the new color of the flag, which was once again used in military events and other public acts with dark blue. A week after being elected, on December 4, 2021, President Xiomara Castro announced that as of January 27, the national flag that will be used is the one with the turquoise blue and white stripes. A sign of President Castro’s determination is that the National Stadium in Tegucigalpa, where she will be sworn in on the 27th, has been painted in turquoise blue and white. And in advance, the old sellers of national flags and of local and foreign soccer teams have already withdrawn the old dark blue emblem and now offer the turquoise blue one, at a cost of 200 lempiras (about eight dollars). (c) EFE Agency