Daily Archives: 11. January 2011

Bureaucratic Quagmire

It appears that the monolithic bureaucratic entity is endemic to civilization, no matter the country’s development status.  A word about the Personeria Juridica: a Honduran legality conferring a status to an organization similar to incorporation in the States.  Sister Edith has been engaged in a bureaucratic battle for six years.  Her first two attorneys meant well but accomplished squat and ended up at odds with each other, the process at a dead stop when I became involved in March 2009.  A new attorney expressed interest and then a friend of hers joined the campaign.  Over the past year we have jumped hoops and organized folk to get to the point of completing and getting the required paperwork to the capital city for approval.  We have been in an approval situation since the first of December that is so stereotypically bureaucratic.  The Tegucigalpa governmental bureaucracy is asking for corrections to the tramite (legal paperwork) that have already been submitted.  Our lawyer told me she has completed all the requested modifications but she does not have the influence to move the tramite through the bureaucratic maze.  I have contacted folks to enlist the assistance of a diputado (similar to a congressman) from Comayagua; a lawyer assigned to Governacion y Justicia which is a governmental office, a staff person recommended by the President’s daughter; and the governor of the departamento of La Paz.  There is nothing more I can do.  It would seem that every country has its bureaucratic labyrinth that is impervious to common sense and whose squeaky, ponderous wheels are greased by who you know, power, and pure luck.  The tragedy, of course, is that the construction of a new building for the Hogar San Jose is contingent upon the approval of the Personeria Juridica.