Congress Legislation

Five months after the Attorney General's office submitted a draft modernizing Honduras's public-contracting rules—with digital tools, certified suppliers, and tighter controls—Congress says it has not yet received the formal executive version needed to begin legislative review.

Environment Minister Juan Carlos Ramos is pushing Congress to approve a solid-waste law that has cleared first debate, saying it would unlock international funding for sanitary landfills and improve trash collection across Honduras's 298 municipalities.

A legislative committee is analyzing a fuel-price stabilization fund, to be financed by the government, importers, distributors, and possibly consumers, that would cushion price spikes for Hondurans when global oil costs rise.

Amnesty International's Americas director said recent Honduran laws—including an expanded terrorism definition and an agro-industrial sector measure—resemble patterns seen elsewhere in Latin America that have been used to criminalize protest, though she noted Amnesty has not yet formally analyzed them.

ENEE manager Guillermo Peña Panting said a bill to reform Honduras's electricity system is in advanced legislative stages and aims to attract private investment in generation, transmission, and distribution to address chronic blackouts and improve service reliability.

The Supreme Court of Justice submitted a draft law to Congress to reestablish the Judicial Council, a body dissolved a decade ago after constitutional challenges, as part of efforts to reorganize the judiciary's administration and discipline.

Two days after approving the Agroindustrial Protection Law, Congress modified it outside normal legislative procedure to extend tax and permitting benefits to energy and tourism sectors, a move critics say violates parliamentary rules and threatens indigenous and Garífuna lands.

Congress on June 4 passed a law declaring agribusiness lands exempt from expropriation and land-reform programs, and ordering police to act immediately against occupations or protests, while peasant groups say it criminalizes rural organizing in the conflict-torn Bajo Aguán region where 20 people were killed on May 21.

A Congressional committee held a second consultation with civil-rights organizations and government agencies on proposed reforms to strengthen prevention, early detection, and prosecution of sexual abuse against children and adolescents in Honduras.