By Luis Manuel Aguana
The
regime's intention to bring forward the elections constitutionally established
for 2018, regardless of the outcome of the so-called dialogue in the Dominican
Republic, is already public, notorious and communicational. The desire to leave
this regime as soon as possible has been confused with the desire to change a
government constitutionally, and these are two completely different things.
The regime
is using that first desire of the Venezuelans to continue in power, using the
means we already know of kidnapping the electoral institution, the natural
propensity of the Venezuelan to vote as a means of legitimate peaceful
political change, and a committed opposition that uses the electoral argument
as blackmail to continue taking advantage of the opposition spaces, indicating
that this is the only way to peacefully solve the political problem of the
Venezuelans. This confluence of factors has resulted in Venezuelans not being
able to escape from this trap that has been going on for almost 20 years.
Venezuelans
have once again fallen into the wrong dilemma between voting or not voting, led
to that cunningly by this regime, when in reality the dilemma is between
accepting or not accepting a deceptive solution to the Venezuelan crisis. On
the one hand, the government wants the opponents not to vote because they have
a hostage population blackmailed by food that will vote for them. On the other
hand, the official opposition diminished by their condition as collaborators trying
to survive, trying to convince us that if we are going to play into this
regime, because "that is the only constitutional, peaceful and electoral
way to change it". The result: Back to the vicious circle of legitimising
criminals in the ballot box for another six years. I refuse to believe we're
doomed to do that with no way out.
And when I
say that it is two different things to leave this regime as soon as possible
and change constitutionally to a government, I base my assessment on the fact
that no election in Venezuela, whether it is advanced or not, is valid if it
takes place within the framework of a National Constituent Assembly erected in
an unconstitutional manner, and that it intends to constitute itself as a
superpower above the Venezuelan electoral power to call elections. Anything
that comes out of it, whether decisions, decrees, laws, calls for elections,
appointment of officials, etc., are irritants, null and void no matter how much
the pseudo-opposers of the MUD endorse them. Therefore, we cannot continue the
institutional life of Venezuela without first dismantling that mamotreto that
the regime imposed to perpetuate itself in power.
Any
discussion about choices that does not take into account this tiny detail is,
to say the least, collaborative. So it is not that we say "No and
Yes" to the presidential elections, as Father Luis Ugalde pointed out in
his last dissertation (see in Spanish “No y Si de las elecciones presidenciales”,
at http://www.el-nacional.com/noticias/columnista/las-elecciones-presidenciales_221353), is that elections cannot be held
in Venezuela unless that unconstitutional National Constituent Assembly
disappears, period.
I wonder
why important political analysts such as the aforementioned one leave aside
without discussing this "small" detail when that is precisely the
problem we have in Venezuela. Do you intend to tolerate it and live with it, in
the supposed case you will get to win? I think the reason for this is that many
Venezuelans believe - and some with good intentions - that they can succeed in
changing a regime of the characteristics of the current one only with elections,
when what is needed is an alternative proposal that applies a procedure of
constitutional restoration that fully develops Articles 333 and 350 of the
Constitution.
And that is precisely the approach of the
National Constituent Alliance. Who is the ONLY one who can politically
dismantle Maduro's constituent parapet? The Sovereign People of Venezuela, who
was violated that right on May 1,2017 with the unconstitutional Decrees 2,830
and 2,831. And only the Sovereign can dismantle it by means of a Popular Consultation,
to which he must be called by all the living forces of the Nation, especially
the Church and the Universities, the two most credible institutions of the
country and which can be conformed as the main drivers of the solution.
The Catholic Church has already pronounced
itself in this sense on January 12,2018 in its Pastoral Exhortation "God
Will Consolidate His People", stating that civil society "assumes its vocation of being a social
subject with its capacities to carry out initiatives such as, for example, that civil society carry out a
consultation to point out the direction it wants to take to the nation as
foreseen in our Magna Carta (Cf. Art. 71). (No. 6 of Pastoral
Exhortation http://www.cev.org.ve/index.php/noticias/273-exhortacion-de-la-cev-en-ocasion-de-celebrar-su-cix-asamblea-ordinaria-plenaria-dios-consolara-a-su-pueblo-isaias-49-13). The National Constituent Alliance
fully embraced that approach and took action for that call, with the intention
of making it a reality because we seriously believe that this is the right path
for Venezuela's recovery.
So this
Popular Consultation that we are proposing cannot be seen as a mere innocuous
consultation that resulted in the 16J consultation, nor can it and should it be
compared with it. It is part of a constitutional restoration procedure based on
Articles 5,70 333, 347 and 350, and that a) requests the dismantling of a
Constituent not summoned by its legitimate depositary, the people of Venezuela
and annulment of all its illegitimate acts; c) empower the Constituent Assembly
for an immediate renewal of public powers, starting with the executive branch
and establishing a Transitional Government of National Unity, ending with
general elections in the framework of a new constitution.
The
national and international pressure derived from such an approach would lead to
the convening of such a Popular Consultation rather than to give way to
elections with sung results in favour of the regime, if it is welcomed by all
those sectors that reject presidential elections that will not resolve the
serious crisis we Venezuelans are going through and nor will it restore the
rule of law in Venezuela.
We also
hope that the international community will accept and press for this solution
as the constitutional way out that they are asking for to force the regime to
be properly counted and that it will define the political future of the
country, and not an election that leaves out more than 4 million Venezuelans
who have practically fled from Venezuela and who will not be counted in that
cheating electoral process of the CNE, but in a Consultation that convenes
them. This solution dismantles the unconstitutional suprapoder invented by the
regime and puts the country back into a state of immediate governability, for
the beginning of a stage of reconciliation, reunification and reconstruction of
the country.
This
alternative agenda for Venezuela is a constitutional, peaceful, electoral and democratic
solution that we oppose to the dilemma of voting or not voting that is being
imposed on us by the regime and its committed opposition as the only solution
to the crisis. Venezuelans believe in the vote but we also believe, as Aquiles
Nazoa said, in the people's creative powers. Let us put that hope into effect
immediately.
Caracas,
February 3, 2018
Email: luismanuel.aguana@gmail.com
Twitter:@laguana
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