|
In Lawsuit
over Municipal Land
Oscar Siri Zúñiga, a lawyer and member of the Nationalist Party, is seeking payment of at least 100 million lempiras (about $5,880,000) for land he claims to own in the southeast section of Comayagüela in Tegucigalpa, the capital city of Honduras. But the land he claims is municipal land. He has made these claims before a city commission assigned to find a solution to the problem of land tenancy. This problem affects more than 50,000 poor residents who have lived on the land in question since the late 1970s. "He is soliciting, or submitting a demand soliciting, compensation in the range of 100 million lempiras from the city government . . .," confirmed Renán Inestroza, head registrar for the city. Those now living on the land are men and women who came to the "big city" from the countryside in search of a better life. They occupied property on the edge of the city that they believed to be municipal land, available for settling. Most of the families in question live in the neighborhood of Flor del Campo, which is home to more than 28,000 people. Flor del Campo has high rates of infant mortality, respiratory illness and diarrheas in the neighborhood, according to a report from the Secretary of Public Health. Most homes are plagued by faltering foundations, falling roofs, and inadequate spaces for sleeping and eating. However, according to residents, limited income is not an obstacle to resolving this problem. They express a desire to pay the true owners of their land, the city, the value as defined in negotiation. Land tenancy: a restriction on investment Studies issued by international financial organizations and Honduran business institutions agree that the lack of proper property titles is one of the principle economic problems in the country. It is estimated that only 14 percent of the neighborhoods in Tegucigalpa have a title to their land that would be recognized as a mortgage guarantee. Some 12.9 billion dollars are tied up in unregistered property in the country. Land tenancy disputes are the source of bitter struggles between individuals and city authorities who have been claiming ownership of land where thousands of low-income people are settled. One of the most noteworthy examples of this involves the claims of the lawyer and politician Oscar Siri Zúñiga, who bases his claims on an inheritance from his grandfather, the poet Luis Andrés Zúñiga. Siri waged a legal battle within his own family to ensure that his mother was included as an inheritor in his grandfather's will. He then took on the next battle with the City to claim ownership of the lands in the southwest section of Comayagüela in Tegucigalpa, the capital of Honduras. Legal Antics: Zúñiga's main tool Litigation-the demands and counter demands to city authorities-has become the principle tool in fighting over municipal land. A study of these cases in the courts of Tegucigalpa reveals that Siri Zúñiga's suits have been in court for more than 20 years. The lawyer has pursued a series of legal actions his own name and on behalf of other members of his family. His aunt Margarita Zúñiga has also made claims for herself. "He has been very skilled. From the start of his suit for the property he has tried to keep the case in court to keep pressure on the city authorities," said a member of the neighborhood council who asked not to be identified for fear for his safety. Legal professionals asked about the case have also remarked on "the skill" shown by Zúñiga in the process. "He has been able to generate an unnecessarily long and difficult case in the courts," they comment. Judges consulted on the case agree. They say that his consecutive legal actions generate confusion and that many times the judges do not have time to read all the cases he initiates. They also reveal that many of the suits are entered regarding the same case, which is considered an attempt to disrupt the legal process. He should be sanctioned for this by the Judicial Power and the Lawyer's College of Honduras, but they have failed to do so. "His strategy is to keep the judicial officials in a state of confusion," they conclude. An old lawyers' saying is: "If you can't win the case, confuse it." "As you can see, he is taking advantage of the negligence of the Judicial Power for his personal benefit. While he continues his endless suits, he can continue to sell land that is not his and to pressure us to pay him," said a member of the neighborhood council. "Even now he is selling land that has historically been the property of the Saúl Zelaya Jiménez Institute and no one says anything, not even the authorities of the Ministry of Education. It is because everyone is afraid," he complains. Many do fear Zúñiga, to the extent that they refuse to give talk about it. In the communities effected by his suits, there are few who will discuss the topic, and they do so only under conditions of anonymity. Their fears are based Siri Zúñiga's actions within the communities. He has people to defend his interests "at any cost. They are people who pressure you, threaten you, insult you, collect money from you . . . ." One of the former presidents of the neighborhood council was one of his principle allies. "She wanted to force us to pay Siri Zúñiga for the land." But the land belongs to the city Zúñiga, like many others who claim municipal land, has taken advantage of the weakness of the judicial system and the indifference or incompetence of city authorities in claiming what is theirs and making available resources that by all rights belong to the city. Legal documents, like the Municipal Certification of Comayagüela, the Municipal Accord #166 and a Memorandum from the Municipal Legal Department in 1980, demonstrate that the disputed lands are municipal, along with many other properties that were acquired illegally by persons claiming municipal land as their own. What is evident is the apathy of municipal authorities in attending to this problem and claiming the resources that belong to the city. That is changing somewhat with Mayor Miguel Pastor's order to respond to these demands. Never before has there been as much accomplished as what we have done in a very short time, says Pastor, who recognizes that this is one of the most serious conflicts facing his administration, primarily for its legal implications. He denies that his administration is compensating the alleged owners of the municipal land, and he is inclined to seek a legal end to the problem, although there are no details available about the central points of his proposal. He says that all the plans are in place to respond to the problem. Fear and disillusion This whole process has generated fear and doubts among the residents of the effected communities, many of whom no longer want to fight for their interests. The president of the neighborhood council in Flor del Campo recognizes that there exists a high level of disillusion after 20 years of fighting and not receiving title to the land. He recognizes that there are many who have become accustomed to the situation and who want to maintain things as they are because now they do not have to pay city taxes for the land they live on. A history of municipal negligence In his game, Zúñiga has counted the Municipal Office of the Central District (AMDC) as an ally, because of its past ineffectiveness in resolving land problems. The level of negligence in the municipal offices is extreme, to the point that they are barely interested in the avalanche of court cases that have been brought against the city, and often have not even attended the trials. The only exception to the inattention to this problem comes during election season. Neighborhood residents remember that Rodimiro Zelaya came to them asking for votes with the promise of solving their problem with land tenancy. But his campaign offer resulted in only nine families gaining legal right to use, but not to own, their plots. Before him, the mayor Oscar Roberto Acosta arranged user-rights for 12 plots, and before him the mayor Nora de Melgar did the same for 14 plots. "And it is precisely due the lack of interest shown by judicial and municipal authorities that this problem has never been resolved. Justice gives way to the most powerful, and the city has not lifted a finger in all this time," said Concepción de Jesús Zelaya, the president of the neighborhood council in Altos de la San Francisco. José Tomás Reyes, president of the Flor del Campo neighborhood council, shares this critique: "What happened is that the issue became political. Whenever someone ran for office or tried to further their political career, they offered to help the community if the community supported them. But after the community voted for them, they forgot all about the issue. And then three years later it would start all over because it was only political," he commented with evident frustration. Nonetheless, community leaders do recognize that the current administration of Miguel Pastor is showing more interest in the issue, though this could just be another repetition of the same old cycle. They do not cease to fear that something "strange" is happening under the table, and for this reason they demand a real solution to the problem. "We have been surprised by the information that the city is negotiating with the supposed owners of our land," said Juan Hernández, vice-president of the Flor del Campo neighborhood council. Hernández is opposed to this possible negotiation because he and his neighbors are convinced they can prove that the land they have lived on for more than two decades is municipal land. He warns that paying someone who is not the owner of the land "would be an act of corruption." The residents remember that Zúñiga has proposed extrajudicial solutions to the problem. On one occasion he asked for 7 million lempiras in exchange for the land comprising Flor del Campo, La Pradera and Las Torres. He has also proposed the sale of the land for 320 lempiras per square meter of rough land and 600 lempiras per square meter of flat land. "Obviously, we did not even discuss these proposals because we know this is municipal land and that we have to pay the city," says Hernández. More than anything, the community is worried by the fact that Siri Zúñiga campaigned in support of the current mayor. Any arrangement to benefit the self-appointed owner would be suspect. The residents may show fear in front of the large landowners and political powers, but they clearly understand their need to put an end to this conflict for the good of their families and for the good of the State. |
Mayor Miguel Pastor |
|
—Index— Title Search Reveals that the Zúñigas do not own the Land in Dispute Unregistered property in Honduras totals $12.900 billion The boundaries of city land in Comayagüela have been clear since 1900 Siri Zúñiga could get 100 million lempiras due to the negligence of the City A solution is proposed to the legal problems of tenancy in urban areas |
|
|
Oscar Siri Zuniga |
