"Ladies, with strength and hell-bent on victory: go PANTHERS!" 30
girls chant in unison.
What sounds like a sports game is actually Honduras' answer to
keeping thousands of troubled teenagers out of the dangerous
clutches of the country's powerful and increasingly brutal
gangs.
It's a boot camp where children as young as 10 are hauled
into military barracks for values training in a desperate bid
to break the poor Central American nation's downward spiral of
violence.
Honduras has the world's highest homicide rate -- 79 per 100,000
inhabitants, according to the Violence Observatory at the National
Autonomous University of Honduras based in the capital
Tegucigalpa.
And the murder rate is continuing to creep up, leaving the
government of President Juan Orlando Hernandez grappling for
answers.
Even more disturbing, experts say, is the role children are playing
in the violence -- and the fact youngsters have been killed for
refusing to join gangs.
But Hernandez believes he may have found an answer with his
"Guardians of the Homeland" nationwide initiative aiming to provide
tough values education to 100,000 youths each year.
On one recent day at a logistical command center outside the
capital, 152 boys and girls -- some as young as 10 but most aged 14
to 18 -- wore white T-shirts, sweatpants and sneakers.
Ready and primed for instruction, they were grouped in units
bearing the names of Honduran or other Central American army elite
squads -- Warriors, Cobras, Lions, Hawks and Tigers. They chanted
the names one at a time.
Bitia Medina, a single mother aged 21, was the oldest of the
group.
"I am not planning on joining the military, but I do like to come
for the values training," she said, over a bite of lunch.
- 'Close to God's heart' -
The president -- plus his supporters, political allies and some
church groups backing the voluntary program -- stress they are not
looking for young military recruits.
Rather, they say they are hopeful that the values, structure and
discipline might help kids stay on the right path.
Olive-green military trucks pick up the youths at the crack of dawn
from their homes in dirt poor, gang-controlled neighborhoods,
dropping them off again in the evening. The eight-hour day includes
lunch.
The curriculum ranges from spiritual health or sex education,
to so-called personal values training -- the rights and
wrongs -- explained trainer Colonel Elvin Corea.
"This program, I think, is close to God's heart; it is a great
effort," declared Alejandro Rivera, member of the evangelical group
Christian Businessmen as he led some young boys in prayer.
His involvement underlines the role religion plays in the
scheme.
Yet there are voices at home -- and at the United Nations -- that
have expressed wide-eyed alarm at the Honduran government giving
parenting duties to a national military, especially one that took
power in a 2009 coup and was accused of rights abuses in the
turbulent aftermath.
Hernandez is facing broader pressure over the effectiveness of his
military-led crackdown on gangs, with critics pointing at the
average of 86 children and youths killed every month since he took
power in January.
Najat Maalla M'jid, the United Nations special rapporteur on the
sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography, weighed
in recently.
"The best way to combat violence and insecurity is by offering
vulnerable children and families sustainable alternatives," she
said.
Local charity Casa Alianza, which works with street kids, said it
was "outraged" by the program.
"We are convinced that militarizing kids' childhood and teenage
years is not the best way to develop and promote values," it
said.
But Corea countered: "They are just getting training to help them
in their lives. None of them are going to be soldiers."
Sixteen-year-old Genesis Sanchez, however, has other ideas.
"I'd like to stay," she told reporter News.