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A few days before the new President Xiomara Castro takes office, the election of the new President of Parliament has been the occasion of heated disputes even within the left-wing majority. The president-elect expelled twenty refractory deputies from her own party on Friday, January 21.
At the opening of the new parliamentary session on Friday, several deputies from the Liberté et Refondation party (LIBRE, left), supported the candidacy of one of them for the presidency of the body, contravening an agreement reached for support another candidate.
This deputy supported by the refractory, Jorge Calix, was elected at the head of the Chamber, with the support of the voices of the right-wing opposition, in particular of the National Party. During his swearing-in, several deputies loyal to the official party line came up to the podium to attack him, forcing him to flee from the perch.
According to the Interior Minister, Leonel Ayala, of the National Party (right) whose candidate Nasry Asfura, mayor of the capital Tegucigalpa, was defeated in the presidential election by Xiomara Castro, the candidacy of Mr. Calix was supported by 83 deputies. However, the President of Parliament must collect the votes of 65 deputies out of 128.
With Jorge Calix on the perch, the National Party, defeated at the polls, ” managed to maneuver and gain control of Parliament “, Underlined to Agence France presse Eugenio Sosa, professor of sociology at the National University.
Xiomara Castro, the first woman elected to head Honduras, held a meeting Thursday evening with the deputies of her party to ask them to support the deputy Luis Redondo for the presidency of Parliament. But twenty deputies out of 50 had boycotted the meeting. On Friday evening, the future president announced “ the permanent exclusion of deputies dissidents, following an emergency meeting of party authorities.
Xiomara Castro, who will take office on January 27, won the elections thanks to the alliance between LIBRE, led by Manuel Zelaya – her husband and ousted former president by a military coup in 2009 – and the Savior Party of Honduras (PSH), led by Salvador Nasralla. The agreement with the PSH provided that if the coalition won, Mr. Nasralla would be elected vice-president of parliament and might propose the name of the president.
The election of the Speaker of Parliament has yet to be definitively confirmed on January 23, two days before the official opening of the parliamentary session.
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with AFP
