By Luis Manuel Aguana
From 15-O onwards, Venezuelans began to argue
that they could no longer accompany an absurd position such as that of
continuing to compete in elections with a partial arbitrator, even though the
leaders were muzzling them to an electoral slaughterhouse. So much so they
learned, that those whom we always tried to convince that the CNE was
fraudulent and could not attend without conditions to another election, are the
first ones who now reject the electoral organism even though they always
defended that they would win regardless of government traps. It seems that they
have already changed their position and that is an important step forward for
what happens in the future.
But the most important thing that is beginning
to change in my opinion is that now the issue of political change is not
focusing on candidates, or elected positions. We are beginning to discuss
routes, roads, formulas to get out of the regime. And why do I say this?
Because precisely the famous "electoral route" that the MUD had sold
us as a panacea to get out of these criminals who hold power in Venezuela is
being questioned. We are already putting aside the Manichean argument that only
with elections, let alone a few tricks, will we be able to overcome this terrible
crisis.
Then we are now slowly falling into the right
debate. Because if we talk about methods, procedures, and routes of action,
then those who are going to execute them take a back seat. Once you decide what
to do, you will then look for the one who does it best. It seems simple but
extremely complicated for those who have historically rested the entire
strategy of the opposition struggle to contain the regime only in changing
electoral faces. It was necessary to take the country to a fraud of unprecedented
proportions like 15-O so that the population would begin to understand the
situation and think differently. Although it is still too early, we can discuss
some of these routes. Let's see.
The first of these is what I would call the
"classic route" that has been proposed to us since we have been led
to vote with this corrupt system of the CNE. According to this route, the
official opposition sells us that independent of the traps of the CNE, if we
vote in a majority percentage and if we have all the witnesses at the tables,
then there is no way that we can be cheated.
The basis for this route is the victory of the
opposition in the parliamentary elections of 6D-2015. Although the
"classic route" seemed to be unbeatable, the 15-O watered down, and
now MUD spokespersons are now blaming abstention for defeat without any
statistical basis. In my opinion, the opposition won the 6D-2015 election not
precisely because the CNE was not prepared to steal the elections from us again
(see Emili Blasco of ABC International, “El
Alto Mando militar forces us to accept the great victory of the opposition in
Venezuela”, http://www.abc.es/internacional/abci-alto-mando-militar-fuerza-aceptar-gran-victoria-oposicion-venezuela-201512070619_noticia.html?ref_m2w). From 2004 to date, the CNE has committed technical fraud in
absolutely all elections, but the official opposition has systematically
ignored this reality… until now.
Venezuelans bitterly tasted 15-O that if they
insisted on this route without a profound change in the electoral system, the
results will invariably remain the same. In this way, I find it difficult to
get voters back into the polls unless a profound change is demonstrated to
guarantee the people's votes. If the MUD intends to insist on the "classic
route", they will have to change the authorities of the CNE from the
National Assembly, with an impartial composition and swallowed up by the regime,
something that I find difficult - if not impossible - to do in dictatorship.
Not to mention that the MUD is still living with the regime. They even made the
pretense of changing the CNE authorities but openly sabotaging the process of
non-attendance to the National Assembly of an opposition party clearly in tune
with the regime.
In contrast to the electoral “classic route” of
the MUD, María Corina Machado of the Vente Venezuela party has proposed an
alternative route that also involves the appointment of new authorities for the
CNE by the National Assembly, but which will have to meet from abroad because
they will be persecuted as the TSJ in exile, which was recently installed at
the OAS headquarters in Washington, DC (see MCM: There is no exit through the
electoral route with the CNE. https://www.contrapunto.com/noticia/maria-corina-machado-o-existe-una-salida-por-la-via-electoral-165561/).
This alternative route, which we will call the
"exile route", requires that this new CNE appointed by the National
Assembly convene general elections in line with the fulfillment of the mandate
of the 16J Popular Consultation. This “exile route” leaves as a response to the
crisis presented by the MUD disaster evidenced on 15-O, establishing a sequence
of international events that will eventually lead us to a transition through a
different path than to continue waiting for the change by the electoral “classic
route” of coexistence with the regime proposed by the MUD.
In other words, once a Government of National
Unity is elected by a legitimate CNE in exile, what is lacking would be to
force compliance with this scenario through international pressure. Such
international pressure could range from deepening sanctions that have been
imposed on the regime for a few weeks now to a multinational humanitarian
intervention force.
The scenario is similar, with its obvious
differences, to the one presented in Panama when Guillermo Endara won the
elections against the candidate of the Panamanian regime in May 1989. Endara
was immediately persecuted by Manuel Noriega, then dictator of the country.
That and the death of a U. S. soldier by Panamanian forces was the reason for
invasion by U. S. troops. “On December
20,1989, while the Americans were bombing different points of the Panamanian
capital, Endara was sworn in as Constitutional President of Panama, at a
ceremony held inside a U. S. military base located in the Canal Zone” (see
Guillermo Endara, at https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guillermo_Endara).
Regardless of whether that was good or bad for
Panama, that country was not in the situation of today's Venezuela, a country
completely divided and destroyed by ideologized fanatics, which, although
urgently in need of a change of government, also needs those authorities to be
born from a process of reconciliation among its people, and not out of
negotiations behind closed doors, but out of the decision of its own citizens.
And that goes far beyond electing or appointing a new President of the
Transition, since his stability would be null in the face of a dismantled
country and with the seriousness of the problems that afflict us.
The effort to call elections via a new CNE in
exile to provoke a Transitional Government is exactly the same as calling the
people to solve their crisis through a Constituent Consultative Referendum that
asks the Depositary of Sovereignty : a) whether or not it wishes a Constituent
Originate process in peace - with proposed Commissions Bases - for the
reorganization of the State and the re-institutionalization of the destroyed
country; b) whether or not it wishes to revoke the Constituent Assembly of
Maduro and its unconstitutional decisions; and c) whether or not it wishes the
renewal of all Public Powers and the designation of a Government of National
Union until the promulgation of a new Constitution with general elections. This
route would guarantee the political stability of the country.
The last question would be in line with
question No. 3 of the 16J Popular Consultation, only that in this case it would
be a mandate, not only to the National Assembly, but to the elected
Constituents, with which the National Constituent Assembly would not be
disposing of the Public Powers on its own, but by express mandate in a
Referendum of the Depositary People of Sovereignty.
This third route, which we have called the
"constituent route", would also start from new CNE authorities as a
fundamental premise, from exile or not, but also that the National Assembly
should call this Constitutional Consultative Referendum through Article 71 of
the Constitution, which could be called by a simple majority of its members for
matters of special national importance.
As you can see, there is more than one proposal
of "routes". And the last one is not new. It is nothing more than a
variation of what we have proposed for years from the National Constituent
Alliance because it is nothing more than the summoning of the Original
Constituent Power to resolve the crisis of the country, emphasizing that it is
from its very core that any Transitional Government should be born, not from a
simple decision born of a political conciliabulo. And now, after the fraudulent
Constituent of the regime, this “constituent route” becomes even more necessary
after the illegal decisions that are already being taken by the National
Constituent Assembly of Maduro.
It will not be a matter of personal
protagonism, but of the political solution that best suits the country. It will
remain for the Venezuelans to decide which route to continue independently of
the driver. I will always be inclined to a solution that has no more of a
leading role than we do, including those who don't think like me. But these
processes must be driven by new leaderships that will emerge from the ashes of
the 15-O disaster. Not only new routes are needed, but also those who plan and
implement them. We're starting to be on the right track...
Caracas, October 20, 2017
Email: luismanuel.aguana@gmail.com
Twitter:@laguana
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