25/10/2016
Venezuela is subjugated to a continued coup d’état by the chavist regime. Anyone who considers that said statement is excessive should propose other description for the sequence of attacks against elementary rights that the democratic opposition suffers, for the hardships that have Venezuelans struggling on a daily basis for a minimal sustenance, for the degradation that the social life experiments as a result of the violence, attributable to crime as well as the one directed by the regime.
In just three days the regime presided by Nicolás Maduro has perpetrated the destruction of the last remains of democratic institutionalism, which remained thanks to the engagement of the opposition. On one hand, the electoral chamber of the Supreme Court has arbitrarily altered the rules of the presidential recall referendum, demanding the signature of 20% of the electorate in each state and in the capital district, instead of requesting it on a national level. On the other hand, several state criminal courts have simply cancelled the signature collection for the recall referendum, dooming the possibility that Venezuelan people will decide on the continuity of chavism, according to what the Bolivarian Constitution stipulates. If the former was not enough –and there aren’t any signs of limit in the degradation of the regime–, the National Assembly has been assaulted by a gang of chavist elements which, since they could not break the ballot boxes, seek the disposal of those who emerged from them.
When the procedure aimed at the recall referendum broke and the Venezuelan people was subdued to the coercion and the violence organized by the government, the regime in Venezuela settles itself inexcusably in the territory of the dictatorships. It’s not just –in spite of its severity– that the leading personalities of the opposition have become victims of arbitrariness. Now it’s the institutions, those in which the opposition speaks out in its condition of majority and legitimate representation of the people, what the chavist regime seeks to neutralize. Now there’s a constitutional process, the recall plebiscite, the object of the scams of judges who are undignified of performing the jurisdictional function. It’s not about harassment of the opposition, this is the “final solution” that chavism wants to impose: the pure and simple eradication of any democratic trace. The socialism of the 21st century transits quickly from chavism to castrism before the resounding silence of the democracies from Europe and America. Seeing how Venezuelan authorities gracefully granted the freedom of two political prisioners to the former president Rodríguez Zapatero reminds too much of the use by the castrist regime, and for its convenience, of the dissidents who are in prison.
It might be worth recalling the reproach of Hannah Arendt to those who asked the Nazis to make exceptions with “special cases” of Jews. Arendt wrote in Eichmann in Jerusalem that Nazis, when they were asked to make exceptions, when they granted them in some cases and earned the appreciation of the interested people, ended up believing that they had convinced their adversaries –Jews or not– of the legality of what they were doing. And Arendt added that what was “morally disastrous” is that the person who asked for an exception to be made, knew the rule implicitly, even if they were not conscious about it.
The dialogue between the Government and the opposition, endorsed by the Vatican, is a commendable effort of mediation but, with this background, its sense is not obvious by itself, beyond seeking that Nicolás Maduro prevents the worst repressive excess in the coming days, not least. The inequality of the parts in said possible dialogue is overwhelming. A government which does not meet not one of the minimum conditions of the democratic institutional structure and the Rule of law; which controls the judges as it pleases against the opposition; which keeps more than one hundred political prisoners and submits the opposition in a permanent state of coercion and menace, will sit on one side of the table. On the other side, a convergence of parties which strive to play within the Bolivarian legality and not even like this prevents the aggression of the regime.
The two most outstanding leaders of the opposition have already distanced themselves from the false expectations that, once more, the Chavist regime wants to raise. Henrique Capriles has declared he learned of the agreement to initiate the dialogue in Margarita Island next Sunday from the press. Lilian Tintori, wife of Leopoldo López, has emphasized that the conditions for said dialogue are not adequate. The risk of the meeting on Margarite Island being used by Maduro as a trick to distract the international community and to divide and disable the opposition is a real risk. Therefore it is good news that the Democratic Unity Roundtable (Mesa de Unidad Nacional in Spanish) has specified the nature of said dialogue, the key conditions that it must meet, and the full maintenance of the partisan political platform, including the procedure of the requisite for political responsibility to Nicolás Maduro that the Venezuelan National Assembly starts to discuss today.
The next Iberoamerican summit should offer the appropriate setting for a sincere and effective expression with regard to what is happening in Venezuela, without raising false expectations around a dialogue that instead of pushing the democratic and defenceless opposition, must require the fulfillment of essential conditions from the Chavist regime: Freedom for the political prisoners, recall referendum and a shock plan to relieve the excruciating nutritional and sanitary deficiencies that Venezuelan people are suffering.
Apart from the Popular Party, the invitation that the Venezuelan Assembly extended to the president of Citizens (in Spanish Ciudadanos) and the activity that Felipe González has developed in the country should be remembered. Who has separately showed themselves to be committed to the democratic future of Venezuela should reflect together that commitment in a majority that supports it.
Translated by Clara Ayuso