The Socialist 12 September 2012

Build a 24-hour general strike

Build a 24-hour general strike

TUC passes general strike motion

NSSN lobby demands a 24-hour general strike

Teachers must unite against Tories

Nationalise the banks

Cabinet reshuffle

Con-Dem housing measures - in 'the thick of it'?

After the Paralympics... Stop the Con-Dems' assault on disabled

Cable attacks health and safety

'Red tape' bonfire puts workers at more risk

More bad news from media mogul Murdoch

Quebec Solidaire's electoral gains show potential for left

Honduras: Privatised cities in the global economy

We need a political voice to fight austerity

Socialist students: Fighting for education

Bristol YFJ: "We're not lazy - we're fighting back"

Global youth unemployment rises

Youth Fight for Jobs in action! Coming events

Workers' unity against brutal bosses at Cranswick Foods

East Coast train cleaners on strike

RMT assistant secretary arrested on picket line

NHS under attack - Stop the closures, stop the cuts

Bromsgrove meeting opposes A&E closure

Demo against heart unit closure in Leicester

Sheffield Socialist Party pickets strike-breaking facility

Brent Labour: Making families homeless

Young tenants to lobby Leeds council over housing crisis

The Reunion rewrites history: the Poll Tax

The shame of sexism in sport

How we stopped the racist EDL

Previous issues, etc

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Honduras: Privatised cities in the global economy

John Sharpe

The Honduran government has agreed to hand over land to international finance to build three new privately run cities from scratch. These cities will have their own laws, courts, police, taxes and immigration rules. Work is planned to start building these states within a state early next year.

Edmundo Oreilana, a former attorney general and a member of the Honduran congress predicted these "charter cities" would allow multinational companies to set up protectorates. He told a Honduran newspaper: "We are going to see long eternal queues like we see in Palestine for people to go to work in Israel."

That the government has said these cities can issue identity cards reinforces that view. Workers will be reduced to migrant labour in their own country.

Predatory foreign capital will demand the crushing of workers' rights, the right to organise, the right to strike. While 65% of the eight million-strong population live below the poverty line, wages and conditions will be driven down still further.

Honduras is already one of the poorest and most unequal countries in the world; ten families control 90% of the economy.

Pepe Lobo, president of Honduras and wealthy landowner, came to power in November 2009 after stitched up elections, which followed a military coup in June of that year. He has already granted massive concessions to international big business.

Lobo has appointed "globally respected international figures" to a "transparency commision" that will appoint city governors.

They include extreme neoliberal 'Chicago Boy' economist Paul Romer (who dreamt up the whole scheme in the first place but is now getting cold feet), a retired Singapore former Brigadier General (Singapore is a city state), a banker and a consultant from Bain and Co (founded by US Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney).

These free-market, neocolonial enclaves will revive memories of the Standard Fruit Company and the United Fruit Company which dominated Honduras for much of the 20th century.

In this issue

Fight against austerity

Build a 24-hour general strike