TOPPLED Honduran president Manuel Zelaya has announced plans to run for office again next year — if the incumbent does the same.

Latin American media reported late on Wednesday that “Mel” Zelaya, the popular leader deposed in 2009’s US-backed coup d’etat, would be on the ballot paper in his Liberty and Refoundation (Libre) party’s presidential candidate elections.

The Libre party was founded in 2011 by the National Popular Resistance Front, a coalition of organisations that opposed the coup.

Mr Zelaya’s wife Xiomara Castro was the party’s candidate in the 2013 presidential election, coming second with 29 per cent of the vote to 34 per cent for coup candidate Juan Orlando Hernandez.

The ruling National Party hinted in March that Mr Hernandez may seek office for a second time after the Supreme Court overturned the constitutional one-term limit last year.

Mr Zelaya’s calling of an indicative, non-binding plebiscite on forming a constituent assembly to discuss term limits, on the day of the 2009 presidential election in which he was not standing, was used as to justify the coup.

Congressional speaker Roberto Micheletti, a turncoat member of the Liberal Party that Mr Zelaya led until his overthrow, was installed as interim president while the security forces brutally cracked down of opposition to the coup.

Violence against the opposition continues to this day, with indigenous people’s rights campaigner Berta Caceres assassinated in March.