Congress Reform

Congress President Tomás Zambrano announced plans to push through legal reforms allowing gang tattoos—those linked to MS-13 and Pandilla 18—to serve as sufficient grounds for prosecution, arguing the measure targets only criminal members and would help overcome witness intimidation in high-crime areas.

A proposed legislative reform would permit authorities to use more than 353 million lempiras (about $14 million) seized in the Koriun Inversiones scheme to combat crime, leaving investors uncertain whether they could recover their money if the case results in acquittal.

Luis Zelaya, leader of the Liberal Party, has proposed 12 electoral reforms including runoff presidential elections, a reduction in the number of lawmakers, and depoliticization of electoral bodies, arguing that restoring democratic credibility requires structural changes to Honduras's political system.

Congress President Tomás Zambrano announced a proposed reform that would allow funds seized from organized crime to fund police, prosecutors, courts, and the military even before final conviction, rather than holding them during ongoing trials.

Congressman Sebastián Romero met with the National Volunteer Council to discuss proposed amendments to Honduras's volunteer law, which regulates organized citizen participation in nonprofit social work and seeks to protect volunteers' rights and benefits.

Honduras's Constitutional Court ruled the Mining Law partially unconstitutional after a twelve-year delay, but legal experts warn that Congress's promised reforms may not actually fix the constitutional defects the court identified.

The National Congress's Telecommunications Commission is advancing reforms to combat inmates' use of mobile phones and communications equipment to conduct extortion, including proposed penalties for satellite companies and prison officials who allow contraband devices into facilities.

Honduras's engineering college says a draft reform to the national electricity law could threaten sector stability by exempting state-owned subsidiaries from traditional asset controls and lacks binding mechanisms to address endemic technical and non-technical losses.

Congressman Frank Alley introduced a proposal to amend consumer-protection law requiring landlords, vehicle-rental companies, and private schools to charge in lempiras rather than dollars, arguing that these sectors do not require foreign-currency operations and that dollar pricing inflates costs for consumers.

Congress's Family and Children Commission is leading technical talks to revise the law on sexual abuse prevention and protection for children and adolescents, citing persistent legal gaps that hinder swift justice for victims.

A Data Veritas survey shows 69.3% of Hondurans back reducing the number of members of Congress, with an analyst attributing the support to public dissatisfaction with the previous legislative body's performance.