Maduro or Death

Maduro or Death
DIMAS CASTELLANOS | La Habana | 19 de Mayo de 2017 - 10:08 CEST.

The electoral victory, from which el chavismo emerged victorious in
1999, represented an invaluable opportunity to diversify the economy and
democratize Venezuela. With enormous wealth, popular support, and almost
absolute power, Hugo Chávez chose to copy the Cuban model, which has led
to a frustrating alternative: Maduro or Death.

What ensued was a massive exodus of capital, inability to pay its
external debts, a decline in production and productivity, along with a
growth in bureaucracy and public spending. The currency's loss of value
led to massive inflation, and an indiscriminate increase in the
circulation of money, without productive support, meant that the minimum
wage was insufficient to cover the cost of even basic needs. This
decline in the economy and finances - beginning during the Chávez
administration – worsened under that of Nicolás Maduro, who in 2014 had
to dictate a "fair prices" law and implement a rationing "system."

Among the causes of this collapse are administrative ineptitude, the
nationalization of sectors of the economy, violence, repression,
widespread corruption, the squandering of national resources, the
scarcity of food and medicines and, in parallel, the dismantling of
democracy.

An insistence on blaming external and internal agents for the crisis and
inventing false solutions only aggravated the crisis, the most serious
in Venezuela's history, and the main cause for the defeat of el chavismo
in the parliamentary elections of December 2015.

Dialogue and negotiating under the threat of violence

"Dialogue" and the recent National Constituent Assembly scheme (results
of the path paved by Chavez, defined by using the vote to secure power,
and then veering towards totalitarianism) are responses calculated to
retain power.

Maduro is incapable of dialogue as a way of actually ascertaining the
other party's opinion, presenting one's own, and exploring possible
solutions to a conflict. He is averse to negotiations as a process
entailing opportunities to exchange promises, make commitments and reach
agreements – which he will not recognize as incompatible with violence.
Hence, he has come up with an innovation: dialogue and negotiations
under the threat of violence, to achieve "peace." "Venezuela needs peace
and dialogue to move forward," Maduro wrote in The New York Times.

The results were inevitable. His call for "dialogue" never could have
succeeded based on these premises, as the other side is calling for
general elections, the release of political prisoners, a humanitarian
channel to send medicines and foods, the renewal of public authorities,
and the disarming of groups armed by the Government.

In 2014 Panamanian President Ricardo Martinelli asked Maduro to release
opposition leader Leopoldo López if he wanted to engage in a national
dialogue. And, once the dialogue commenced, the Executive Secretary of
the Democratic Unity Forum, Ramón Guillermo Aveledo, threatened not to
continue because the same entity was in crisis. "And the Government is
responsible for the crisis suffered. We talk about the issues, we get
commitments, but there is no progress," he said. Meanwhile, Maduro's
response was: "Let us oblige the opposition to talk, sooner rather than
later. We're going to have to oblige them in the best sense of the word."

After that and other failures, on April 10, 2017 Maduro stated in
Havana: "I have called for dialogue ... and I continue to call for
dialogue, there is no other way to achieve peace. The only way to
achieve peace is through words, dialogue, sincere debate, reasoning, and
the search for common ground."

This very novel concept of dialogue, accompanied by violence, and his
refusal to budge in any way, explains why, since February 12, the
country has been consumed by a wave of protests producing dozens of
deaths, hundreds of injuries, and thousands of arrests.

Convinced of his "reasoning," Maduro refuses to accept that his
rejection of plurality is driving the country towards a civil war. As
Hannah Arendt once explained, totalitarian ideology entails the firm
conviction that it has determined the end towards which Nature or
History is to evolve, an outcome associated with the establishment of
social justice and harmony, such that the fulfillment of the movement's
aim can justify any action– precisely the principle articulated by
Nicholas Machiavelli.

The Constituent Assembly

Politics, as a forum for the administration of economic interests, is
closely related to power. Although an effect of the economy, it has
generated conflicts throughout history.

The extensive process of elections and plebiscites, in which Venezuelans
learned to use democratic mechanisms, yielded an electoral division of
approximately 40%-60%, for over 17 years, which legitimized both Chávez
and the opposition. But electoral systems have rules, and they do not
permit what Maduro expressed on the eve of the parliamentary elections
of 2015, when he said that if he lost: "I will rule with the people via
a civic military union." That is, a minority will rule anyway, just as
is currently the case.

Maduro, proud of the Bolivarian Constitution of 1999, never spoke of
renewing it, because the people, in his own words, were in power. Until
April 2017 he fought the opposition "with the Constitution in hand." But
now, in the midst of a deep crisis and with protests demanding his
departure, he has decided that the people must "seize primordial power"
because "they have left us no other alternative."

Thus we have learned that the people were never really in power. On May
1, under this pretext, he called for a National Constituent Assembly to
"reform the State and draft a new Constitution."

Hoping for a rise in oil prices, to be better positioned for the
upcoming elections (right now would be defeated), Maduro aims to
distract the population and buy time, so he made no reference to the
regional elections, which were not held at the end of 2016, nor the
municipal elections of 2017.

His proposal is based on Article 347 of the current Constitution, but to
be legitimate it needs to be endorsed in a referendum under the current
Constitution, which states that the president, the National Assembly
(with a two-thirds majority), the municipal cabildos (with a two-thirds
majority) and 15% of the electors can propose the convocation of a
National Constituent Assembly, but to confirm this convocation a
referendum is necessary.

Maduro himself, erecting himself as a source of law, has announced that
the assembly will be made up of 500 members, elected by the "vote of the
people," and that approximately half will be elected by the "working
class" base, and the other half according to "a territorial system, of a
municipal nature, in the communities." In this way he places the
creation of the Constitution in the hands of the communal councils and
the great missions that el chavismo has promoted, where he enjoys a
certain popularity.

As the country's bureaucracy has gone from 1.2 million to 4 million
officials, and there are another five million beneficiaries of el
chavismo's missions, Maduro is banking on those nine million supporting
his Constituent Assembly. If he pulls it off, he could:

1. Dissolve the current National Assembly, currently in the hands of the
opposition
2. Terminate the Attorney General
3. Remain in power —without the need for elections— at least for as long
as the process lasts.

In this way he would avoid facing elections with 68% of the electorate
against him, as is currently the case. The vaunted 1999 Constitution and
Chavez's Fifth Republic would be torpedoed, and Venezuelans would then
have to choose between two evils: Maduro or death.

Source: Maduro or Death | Diario de Cuba -
http://www.diariodecuba.com/internacional/1495181306_31227.html