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Rodas Living Quietly in León, Nicaragua

Rodas Living Quietly in León, Nicaragua

Friday, 26 February 2010 16:14

Mrs. Rodas' low profile is notable because it is uncharacteristic of someone who has been Mr. Zelaya's most outspoken, even militant, ideological and political activist.

Fformer president Manuel Zelaya has consistently remained in the public eye since his ousting on June 28, 2009. For most of the eleven weeks that followed, he traveled up and down the Western Hemisphere seeking support for his reinstatement. On September 21, Mr. Zelaya secretly re-entered Honduras by land and sought refuge at the Brazilian embassy in Tegucigalpa, where he remained with his family and some of his supporters until January 27, 2010, when he voluntarily left for the Dominican Republic where he was received as a "Distinguished Guest" by the government of President Leonel Fernández. Mr. Zelaya has been living in the capital city of Santo Domingo in the upscale neighborhood known as "Las Sierritas".

While Mr. Zelaya and many of his closest advisers have remained in the public eye, either by staying with him at the Brazilian embassy, giving interviews to the media, or participating in street protests, Mr. Zelaya's closest confidant and former Foreign Minister, Patricia Rodas Baca, has been largely absent from the events of the past five months, leading many people in Honduras to wonder about her whereabouts. Mrs. Rodas' low profile is notable because it is uncharacteristic of someone who has been Mr. Zelaya's most outspoken, even militant, ideological and political activist.

According to the Nicaraguan newspaper La Prensa, Mrs. Rodas has been living in Nicaragua's second largest city, León. The newspaper has confirmed that she regularly travels to Managua, which is only 50 miles to the northwest. While her residency status in Nicaragua and future plans now that her ministerial term has expired are not publicly known, Mrs. Rodas, unlike Mr. Zelaya in the Dominican Republic, feels at home in Nicaragua and should have little difficulty adjusting to her new life.

Mrs. Rodas lived for many years in Nicaragua during her youth when her father, former Honduran presidential candidate Modesto Rodas, sought exile there in 1963 following a military coup in Honduras that overthrew President Ramón Villeda Morales. Mrs. Rodas' mother, Margarita Baca, was Nicaraguan. (2/26/10) (photo of Patricia Rodas courtesy AFP)

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Comments (3)

It seems that Rodas was the power behind the throne and the main idealogue of the attempted Zelaya Revolution in Honduras. During her tenure as Foreign Minister she was unyielding and unbending in her quest to slide Honduras into the ALBA initiative. Her rhetoric was of the strident, forceful and ¨take no prisoners ¨ variety. Her obvious infatuation with Cuba, Venezuela, Nicaragua, Ecuador, Bolivia and their model of government led her and her boss to miscalculate badly in terms of the reaction of the Honduran people to the their initiative. She did not count on the traditional conservative, non-political nature of the vast majority of the Honduran population, be they poor, middle class or rich. Oner must only look to the period of the 1980´s when as the rest of Central America was experiencing violent civil conflicts - Honduras for the most part was a bystander. Sure Honduras was termed Battleship USA back in the day, but the fighting was for the most part conducted by Nicaraguans vs Nicaraguans - the Hondurans merely supplied the logistics and territory. Hondurans historically have never shown much stomach for sustained, hard headed, in your face political and social conflict. Thus after a period of some 20 years highlighted by a distinct lack of political upheaval, the minute a serious political crisis presented itself in Honduras in the guise of the Zelaya affair, the country retreated to it´s 1980´s - ultraconservative, nationalistic mode which it knows all so well - which enabled the historically weak institutions such as the Supreme Court, Attorney Generals Office, etc to take a firm stand against the Mel - Rodas inspired revolution. The Mel - Rodas miscalulation that Hondurans of all stripes would whole heartedly jump on the ALBA bandwagon was a misguided pipedream - Hondurans are not Nicaraguans nor Venezualans nor Bolivians, countries where leftist regimes enjoy widespread popular support. Honduras for the most part just wanted to pull a Greta Garbo - and ¨wanted to be left alone ¨ ... hopefully future disciples of Rodas and Mel will take notice here next time before embarking on a road less traveled which very few Hondurans sought to travel on.

Remember that Hugo Chavez tried a coup in 1992 and got exiled, but came back to power in 1999, only seven years later.

He is poster boy for the new Latin style of coup d'etat that uses fraud instead of a direct military takeover.

The inside story is that while Elvin Santos was still vice president, Zelaya told him he would have Zelaya's support for the presidential candidacy, -IF- he took Patricia Rodas as his vice presidential candidate.

But Elvin Santos had already warned Zelaya against Patricia Rodas, maybe even before her appointment, saying she was trouble with a capital "T", that she was a pure Communist.

So shady back deals are in play, and she was there during that time. In my opinion she was the brains behind the ex-dictator's shenanigans.

--trutherator

www.trutherator.wordpress.com

Patty Rodas has done her share of diatribes and traveling. Search Chávez-funded Telesur and you'll find that she gets more coverage there now than Zelaya does -- which might be telling us something of things to come in the future. The latest articles were December and there were several. I would provide a direct link to the search but it doesn't seem possible on Telesurtv.net .

Next to Zelaya, I haven't seen anyone else who loves the public eye more than Patty Rodas. She may be distancing herself from Zelaya, but I don't expect her to be leading a quiet life for long. She may have just lost credibility with reputable news sources with her ridiculous stories of genocide and the country being a vast concentration camp. She does tend to get carried away with herself.

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