1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:17,320 Welcome to the Free Cities podcast. My name is Timothy Allen and this is the official podcast 2 00:00:17,320 --> 00:00:19,020 of the Free Cities Foundation. 3 00:00:30,000 --> 00:00:34,740 Hello and welcome to this special episode of the Free Cities podcast. 4 00:00:35,740 --> 00:00:38,820 This is not one of my normal dispatches. 5 00:00:38,820 --> 00:00:52,660 It will be a relatively brief summary of what we know so far as to what is going on in the current situation in the Honduras presidential election. 6 00:00:53,040 --> 00:00:57,720 The election happened last Sunday and there's still no official result. 7 00:00:57,720 --> 00:01:07,940 yesterday evening i sat in on a call with some of our close allies in honduras working within 8 00:01:07,940 --> 00:01:14,800 the free cities ecosystem and they gave us the lowdown on what they can see happening in the 9 00:01:14,800 --> 00:01:21,780 country at the moment i'm just looking at polymarket as we speak and according to the 10 00:01:21,780 --> 00:01:30,840 people betting over there as fura is has a 92 chance of winning but since we have no official 11 00:01:30,840 --> 00:01:41,260 result we can't declare that 100 anyway on the call yesterday was jorge colindres who is the 12 00:01:41,260 --> 00:01:50,620 technical secretary at prospera and alex ugorji who lives in ciudad morazan and is uh very closely 13 00:01:50,620 --> 00:01:56,440 connected with what is going on there. So I'm just going to give you a brief lowdown on what 14 00:01:56,440 --> 00:02:03,020 we discovered and what these people who really do know what they're talking about think the outcome 15 00:02:03,020 --> 00:02:10,300 of the election will be and what that will mean for the ZAs in Honduras. Briefly though to begin 16 00:02:10,300 --> 00:02:16,580 with I'm going to talk just about the three main candidates in the election. Salvador Nasralla 17 00:02:16,580 --> 00:02:26,060 from the Liberal Party and he was roughly tied with Rishi Moncada who is the incumbent from 18 00:02:26,060 --> 00:02:35,620 Libre which is the Socialist Party and then Nasri Tito Asfura from the National Party 19 00:02:35,620 --> 00:02:44,400 who currently is in the lead. Now according to what we can see now the good news is that Rishi 20 00:02:44,400 --> 00:02:50,120 Moncada is completely out of the picture. So the socialists are out. So what we're discussing now 21 00:02:50,120 --> 00:02:59,100 is a battle between Nasrallah and Asfura. And according to what we're hearing from the guys 22 00:02:59,100 --> 00:03:08,060 in Honduras, Tito Asfura might win with the previously leading party candidate falling behind. 23 00:03:08,620 --> 00:03:14,340 And it's worth noting here, Asfura was supported by President Trump just before the election. 24 00:03:14,400 --> 00:03:21,400 And a lot of what you can see in the news is people discussing whether that was some kind of interference in the election. 25 00:03:21,400 --> 00:03:27,540 Anyway, here's what Jorge had to say about the election shift. 26 00:03:27,680 --> 00:03:33,560 He claimed about Honduras that it's never really been a socialist electorate anyway. 27 00:03:34,280 --> 00:03:40,160 And as a majority, he described Hondurans as conservative and religious historically. 28 00:03:40,160 --> 00:03:46,140 he cited polling saying that about 74 percent believe the free market is the only path to 29 00:03:46,140 --> 00:03:53,340 prosperity and he framed it as anything where government is not messing with you is very well 30 00:03:53,340 --> 00:03:58,560 liked in the country you might wonder then why did they elect a socialist government last time 31 00:03:58,560 --> 00:04:05,020 and apparently according to him he said it was a coalition driven by the fear that the national 32 00:04:05,020 --> 00:04:11,220 party who were in at the time would remain in power indefinitely and he claimed that the general 33 00:04:11,220 --> 00:04:17,960 sentiment was that voters took a risk with the communists to ensure a difference in in the power 34 00:04:17,960 --> 00:04:24,140 structure so alternation he describes libre's behavior once they got into power libre is the 35 00:04:24,140 --> 00:04:28,240 left-wing party the socialists or communists i'll probably use those words interchangeably 36 00:04:28,240 --> 00:04:33,860 he alleged that they took over the institutions including congress executive supreme court 37 00:04:33,860 --> 00:04:40,080 using family members, the prosecutor general and the armed forces leadership. But despite that, 38 00:04:40,820 --> 00:04:47,440 he said the opposition maintained a majority control over electoral bodies, 39 00:04:47,440 --> 00:05:02,236 the National Electoral Council and Electoral Courts And when we asked him about interference in the elections and what would ensure the vote he said multiple groups have aligned against the government and 40 00:05:02,236 --> 00:05:08,856 electoral bodies with opposition majority, evangelical churches, etc., the business 41 00:05:08,856 --> 00:05:14,656 community, the media even. He said the media may take government money, but it stays aligned with 42 00:05:14,656 --> 00:05:21,276 private sector interests and the US, he said, participated with strong anti-communist foreign 43 00:05:21,276 --> 00:05:28,836 policy. Anyway, his bottom line at the moment is that the immediate question in Honduras is who 44 00:05:28,836 --> 00:05:36,356 actually won between Asfura and Nasralla. But according to him, either would be good for Honduras 45 00:05:36,356 --> 00:05:44,096 and especially for the ZAs. So we then asked him who out of the two remaining candidates would be 46 00:05:44,096 --> 00:05:51,416 the best for the zones. Who's most preferable? Jorge said politicians are hard to predict once 47 00:05:51,416 --> 00:05:59,476 they get into power but necessarily he believed both would be good for the ZAs. The national party 48 00:05:59,476 --> 00:06:06,536 Asfura has a stronger base support for the ZAs. Tito Asfura himself he's the former mayor of the 49 00:06:06,536 --> 00:06:13,236 capital city of Honduras. He has a construction company he's known for visible infrastructure work 50 00:06:13,236 --> 00:06:18,956 often via government contracts and said he's well regarded in the sort of upper levels of the 51 00:06:18,956 --> 00:06:25,936 private sector Nasrallah on the other hand he described Nasrallah's party the liberal party 52 00:06:25,936 --> 00:06:32,476 as historically quite messy and factional but Nasrallah himself who was originally opposed 53 00:06:32,476 --> 00:06:40,636 to the ZAs as part of attacking the former president Hernandez even though they engaged 54 00:06:40,636 --> 00:06:47,956 with him he's now much more positive towards them he's a private sector oriented person former tv 55 00:06:47,956 --> 00:06:55,196 presenter sports commentator actually and a civil engineer trained in chile jojai said personally he 56 00:06:55,196 --> 00:07:01,896 likes nasrallah but again like i said both candidates are absolutely fine he doesn't mind 57 00:07:01,896 --> 00:07:09,316 which one gets in really jojai actually predicted a settlement agreement between the zas and the 58 00:07:09,316 --> 00:07:18,616 government ideally in q1 of 2026 but more likely the first semester of 2026 regardless of who wins 59 00:07:18,616 --> 00:07:25,496 now then we asked him how when will the winner be declared given the incumbents are contesting 60 00:07:25,496 --> 00:07:33,356 the results etc and jorge went on to say he basically according to him everyone has dismissed 61 00:07:33,356 --> 00:07:39,296 the incumbents as politically irrelevant and said people are literally ignoring them he said the 62 00:07:39,296 --> 00:07:46,276 key issue has been the armed forces but that was now clearly in favor of institutions he then 63 00:07:46,276 --> 00:07:52,876 explained the process around 19 000 voting tables produced minutes electoral councils count the 64 00:07:52,876 --> 00:08:00,396 minutes 22 700 minutes had inconsistencies requiring special review with party reps and said 65 00:08:00,396 --> 00:08:07,816 the current vote was about 50 000 so theoretically it's possible the review could change the result 66 00:08:07,816 --> 00:08:18,176 He estimated, in his own words, the tally will be done by either today, that's literally today when I'm putting this out, or maybe tomorrow. 67 00:08:18,676 --> 00:08:20,916 The review will begin this weekend. 68 00:08:21,436 --> 00:08:26,356 The declaration will likely occur within one to one and a half weeks. 69 00:08:26,636 --> 00:08:31,016 And certainly there'll be a declaration before the end of December. 70 00:08:31,016 --> 00:08:37,796 then we will pop over to alex alex ugorji who's who's closely aligned with what's going on 71 00:08:37,796 --> 00:08:46,296 ciudad morizan and alex said he characterized himself as as kind of being an emissary for 72 00:08:46,296 --> 00:08:53,276 massimo and saying that massimo was far more massimo mazzoni is the guy who basically founded 73 00:08:53,276 --> 00:08:59,796 and owns ciudad morizan and he's far more pessimistic slash conservative in his tone 74 00:08:59,796 --> 00:09:06,836 but he also appreciated that Jorge is far less conservative and I think it was a bit of a playful 75 00:09:06,836 --> 00:09:13,716 contradiction to be honest. Morizan's risk posture after the Supreme Court ruling according to them 76 00:09:13,716 --> 00:09:20,556 he said that at the Morizan government level they are uncertain of the ZA status after the Supreme 77 00:09:20,556 --> 00:09:26,616 Court ruling they're taking a conservative approach they don't open companies anymore due to uncertainty 78 00:09:26,616 --> 00:09:32,716 and liability concerns and said that the government has been giving conflicting signals. 79 00:09:32,716 --> 00:09:37,056 Even if a ruling is illegal, it still creates uncertainty. 80 00:09:37,916 --> 00:09:55,252 And the mood there after the election he said the mood is that a deal will happen within 12 months or less Slightly more conservative than Jorge timeline but still in 2026 He said Morazan is optimistic and is planning Massimo is thinking about what to build next 81 00:09:55,892 --> 00:10:01,432 He predicted that if a deal is made, tens of millions of dollars could flow into Morazan 82 00:10:01,432 --> 00:10:06,852 very, very quickly and said optimism is the highest since the Supreme Court ruling, 83 00:10:06,852 --> 00:10:14,312 the original one that is maybe even since 2021 here's a quick explanation of the supreme court 84 00:10:14,312 --> 00:10:19,792 ruling just for context this is what jorge said the supreme court declared the za regime 85 00:10:19,792 --> 00:10:26,812 unconstitutional and tried to apply it retroactively he argued that under honduran principles such 86 00:10:26,812 --> 00:10:34,292 rulings cannot affect acquired rights or settled legal situations and he acknowledged even if the 87 00:10:34,292 --> 00:10:40,432 ruling is null and void in practice it may be treated as real because it carries official seals 88 00:10:40,432 --> 00:10:47,272 and signatures the key legal pillars that jorge emphasized were non-retroactivity 89 00:10:47,272 --> 00:10:54,472 slash acquired rights the constitutional rulings should not disrupt settled legal situations 90 00:10:54,472 --> 00:11:01,372 and international treaty protection jorge highlighted uh the honduras kuwait treaty 91 00:11:01,372 --> 00:11:09,852 that he said explicitly guarantees legal status of ZAs for at least 50 years or 450 years and 92 00:11:09,852 --> 00:11:15,832 argued that that hasn't been changed that's not been struck down so the ruling didn't order him 93 00:11:15,832 --> 00:11:22,812 to stop operating put it that way somebody else very closely related to Morazan said that she 94 00:11:22,812 --> 00:11:28,492 spoke with Carlos Pineda recently who's described as one of the key people behind the original ZA 95 00:11:28,492 --> 00:11:35,712 law and carlos agrees with jorge's optimism regardless of whether nasrala or asfura wins 96 00:11:35,712 --> 00:11:44,292 though carlos personally prefers asfura and jorge prefers nasrala he emphasized the structural 97 00:11:44,292 --> 00:11:51,432 importance of international treaties because they limit what honduras can do unilaterally and said 98 00:11:51,432 --> 00:11:58,212 experts in in international arbitration would likely not favor honduras because evidence of 99 00:11:58,212 --> 00:12:06,412 acquired rights violations is strong. Then we had a question about public opinion on the situation 100 00:12:06,412 --> 00:12:12,532 with the ZAs. What's the public opinion? Jorge said they do regular polling. He didn't have exact 101 00:12:12,532 --> 00:12:18,832 numbers, but cited something like 40% positive, 30% negative, remained a neutral unknown. He said 102 00:12:18,832 --> 00:12:27,112 Prospera's brand is positive, but not widely known. ZAs as a concept is more widely recognized. 103 00:12:27,112 --> 00:12:34,232 and he claimed there's a belief that ZAs helped motivate US support for Honduran democracy, 104 00:12:34,232 --> 00:12:42,632 which is good for PR. Okay, then we had a question about connecting additional land plots, 105 00:12:43,532 --> 00:12:47,512 referenced an old provision allowing additional land plots to be connected 106 00:12:47,512 --> 00:12:55,292 to an existing ZA and what are the chances of restoring and using that? Jorge said their legal 107 00:12:55,292 --> 00:13:01,312 position is that incorporating additional land is safeguarded by the international treaty because 108 00:13:01,312 --> 00:13:08,792 the za organic law is integrated into it and he claimed that a regulatory body share that view 109 00:13:08,792 --> 00:13:14,852 and that they have supporting legal opinions so they might incorporate additional property soon 110 00:13:14,852 --> 00:13:19,772 and they said they want a formal agreement with the next government to increase certainty 111 00:13:19,772 --> 00:13:23,312 and enable more ZA-like zones in Honduras. 112 00:13:23,992 --> 00:13:28,432 He also claimed Honduras is still the easiest place to start similar zones 113 00:13:28,432 --> 00:13:31,332 because people are already familiar with them. 114 00:13:31,452 --> 00:13:36,952 Alex Ugorgi added that the ZAs have a separate land registry, 115 00:13:37,432 --> 00:13:41,592 which is interesting, from the national regime's land registry. 116 00:13:41,592 --> 00:13:46,372 And that offers robust protection and complicates expropriation tax, 117 00:13:46,572 --> 00:13:48,492 building permit interference, etc. 118 00:13:48,492 --> 00:13:54,772 that was just a side note okay then we had a question about immigration and residency 119 00:13:54,772 --> 00:14:02,252 logistics whether resources exist for attendees to for example the free cities conference to fly in 120 00:14:02,252 --> 00:14:08,832 and while they're there simultaneously pursue honduran residency maybe via investment or real 121 00:14:08,832 --> 00:14:14,372 estate jorge's answer was that prosper has an agreement with the national migration institute 122 00:14:14,372 --> 00:14:22,792 to facilitate residency for prosperer investors or business people or residents and he claimed that 123 00:14:22,792 --> 00:14:28,152 the current government didn't revoke that so it's still in place and ideally the new administration 124 00:14:28,152 --> 00:14:35,472 will respect and reactivate it by september he offered a plan b standard petition process 125 00:14:35,472 --> 00:14:50,908 file request and stay while processing paying small periodic fees so basically that possible you can according to what i understood anyway you can stay there indefinitely just by updating your file every 126 00:14:50,908 --> 00:15:00,048 every few months then someone mentioned why did prosper reduce its uh claim recently that's the 127 00:15:00,048 --> 00:15:06,808 claim against the government it was many many billions and they were claiming and jorge clarified 128 00:15:06,808 --> 00:15:12,048 this is something masmo talked to me about when i was in prague last and i think he got it a little 129 00:15:12,048 --> 00:15:20,468 bit wrong he said it looked like the prosperer just recently reduced their claim uh of of the 130 00:15:20,468 --> 00:15:27,788 government but actually it wasn't reduced it's just that the initial filing didn't take a final 131 00:15:27,788 --> 00:15:34,328 damages number so there was no number it was an up to figure figures estimated the total project 132 00:15:34,328 --> 00:15:42,348 loss that could be claimed was up to 11 billion or something now since operations continued and 133 00:15:42,348 --> 00:15:49,508 the worst case loss didn't materialize the recent filing presented actual calculated damages for what 134 00:15:49,508 --> 00:15:56,168 happened over the past four years so that that was just a misunderstanding as far as settling goes 135 00:15:56,168 --> 00:16:01,428 with the government here are some predicted timelines jorge said it should be a priority 136 00:16:01,428 --> 00:16:07,008 for the government due to finances and hoped it could be done in the first semester of 2026 137 00:16:07,008 --> 00:16:15,448 okay closing remarks jorge was very very positive and and this is my takeaway he predicted 2026 will 138 00:16:15,448 --> 00:16:21,808 be the year of the za saying growth could be extremely rapid if they go fully online again 139 00:16:21,808 --> 00:16:28,468 which is phenomenal news of course here were the key takeaways this is what was collectively 140 00:16:28,468 --> 00:16:35,268 communicated as far as i'm concerned number one the election outlook shift away from the libre 141 00:16:35,268 --> 00:16:42,868 party the socialists slash communists this is seen as a major opening a final winner will be 142 00:16:42,868 --> 00:16:52,468 expected late december after review of disputed minutes the two acceptable winners according to 143 00:16:52,468 --> 00:16:56,668 the free cities foundation and jorge and everyone connected with the zedays 144 00:16:56,668 --> 00:17:06,148 is that both asfura and nasrallah would likely be favorable to the zedays with national party support 145 00:17:06,148 --> 00:17:14,488 more established let's say the legal posture Jorge's side emphasizes that acquired rights 146 00:17:14,488 --> 00:17:22,308 and treaty protections are in place Alex emphasized practical enforcement risk when 147 00:17:22,308 --> 00:17:28,808 the government ignores the law operational reality of what's going on Morazan is still building 148 00:17:28,808 --> 00:17:36,548 but not incorporating companies currently customs uh interference remains a concrete example of 149 00:17:36,548 --> 00:17:44,368 what's been going on uh the customs offices were taken away previously now the settlement goal 150 00:17:44,368 --> 00:17:53,788 both jorge and alex expect a deal in 2026 jorge said ideally first semester alex within 12 months 151 00:17:53,788 --> 00:18:01,088 so it's all looking pretty good we did also mention of course that the free cities conference 152 00:18:01,088 --> 00:18:08,908 is scheduled in september in prospera and alex actually mentioned that he's going to do some 153 00:18:08,908 --> 00:18:15,108 side trips to morizan if you want to look around anyway joe expects a settlement after political 154 00:18:15,108 --> 00:18:22,548 agreement and the timeline depends heavily on the government's legal strategy so there you have it 155 00:18:22,548 --> 00:18:30,448 very very very positive news from Honduras currently this is what we've discovered on the 156 00:18:30,448 --> 00:18:39,188 ground and as we sort of move into 2026 I think 2026 is going to be a monster year for the free 157 00:18:39,188 --> 00:18:45,108 cities ecosystem and not just Honduras I was talking about this in Prague I've never seen so 158 00:18:45,108 --> 00:18:52,188 many projects coming online as we see today and currently and now we've got great news 159 00:18:52,188 --> 00:18:59,588 from Honduras where two of the most famous and most advanced Free Cities projects are occurring 160 00:18:59,588 --> 00:19:08,408 so it's all good right that is the end of my brief summary of what we know from Honduras 161 00:19:08,408 --> 00:19:17,388 let's keep our fingers crossed and I can't wait for 2026 and I will see you all in the next dispatch 162 00:19:17,388 --> 00:19:18,148 many thanks 163 00:19:22,188 --> 00:19:52,168 Thank you.