The deceptive election of a leadership

Por Luis Manuel Aguana

The proposal outlined by the Universidad Católica Andrés Bello, in statements by the Director of the Center for Political Studies and Government of the UCAB, Benigno Alarcón, according to which it is necessary "to choose within the opposition a "conductor of orchestra" by the primary method but by multiple selection (the voter selects three candidates instead of one)" (see news in Spanish at http://www.noticierodigital.com/2018/09/proponen-primarias-opositoras-seleccion-multiple/) is circumscribed within the MUD/Frente Amplio strategy of seeking the oxygen necessary to survive because its leadership is already completely exhausted and without credibility in Venezuelan society, and it would be unthinkable to go to a new electoral process with the regime, as they have planned for December if their leaders are not able to sell a cold lemonade in a desert. This is the level of credibility of those people.

The political think tank of the MUD based in Montalban comes to their aid (and always presuming that they do it in good faith because of the fact that bad faith has to be proved) by making a proposal to the country, and taken to the public through one of its best-known television communication anchors, and which of course will be pleasantly received by the leaders of the official opposition, who already have several months and resources already spent, and moving forward to carry out opposition primaries.

In other words, it is not a proposal to the MUD -which has already made its decision- on the part of UCAB academics, it is a proposal from the MUD to the country but with the credibility and quality seal of the Andrés Bello Catholic University, so that Venezuelan society as a whole buys it and concurs to "validate" those who are elected in that process, as well as the solution that would concomitantly be proposing to the country to resolve the crisis that hangs us all Venezuelans. What a convoluted way to regain credibility.

If it were not for the fact that the official opposition is so twisted in its approach to the country, the idea would not be a bad one because it is based on a universal democratic principle on which we all agree: an election.  But that is a hook that unfortunately starts from a fundamental mistaken assumption: leaderships are not elected, they are forged in crises.  Professor Alarcón points out the need to "choose a unitary leadership with the same people. Talking about this leadership being decided in conciábulos between parties in which people feel distrust ... is not going to work. The best way... is to choose that leadership...".

In other words, of all those who were trusted by Venezuela on 6D-2015 to resolve the political crisis that was already very serious in January 2016, those same characters empty of credibility would be presented to us again to decide which of them the Venezuelan society would "choose" to lead the opposition ship.

If that proposal included a process of internal and audited elections of all the parties that make up that "unity" of the MUD/Frente Amplio, whose main leaders have refused to measure themselves for a very long time and have their own parties kidnapped, the proposal would be something interesting to consider. But the way it is presented, it looks the same as always: we are going to measure ourselves again looking for the legitimacy that only the popular vote gives to renew the pacts between the parties and continue in the same bolero collaborating with the regime.

The parties require a new pact because the level of opposition devaluation is as or more serious than that of the monetary sign, and it is of such magnitude that even the regime itself needs credibility in the opposition it uses to achieve its ends. We need to know who should lead and negotiate in the face of the setbacks they present to society as a whole, and once again we want to turn to the Venezuelan people to put a quality seal on the official opposition.

By pretending to "choose" from among an opposition class circumscribed in the same leadership as always, because they have never opened themselves to democracy in their own grassroots militancy, they legitimize those same buds that they argue are trying to avoid so that they continue doing the same thing that has sunk us as a country. It is necessary to multiply political leaderships as Dr. Manuel Rodríguez Mena, founder of the Pío Tamayo Chair of the UCV, explained to me: "...the concentration of political power in a few leaders is in inverse proportion to the interests of the citizen majority. The greater the concentration, the less likely it is that the country's problems will be resolved" (see in Spanish La Multiplicación de los liderazgos, at http://ticsddhh.blogspot.com/2013/05/la-multiplicacion-de-los-liderazgos.html).

There have been several times in these years that I have approached in this modest tribune of the network the subject of the opposition leadership treating it from the scientific perspective. I have presented the researches of Simon Sinek and Derek Sivers (see in Spanish Tres Dimensiones del 16D at http://ticsddhh.blogspot.com/2012/12/tres-dimensiones-del-16d.html y Lecciones de liderazgo de un loco que se march, en http://ticsddhh.blogspot.com/2014/02/lecciones-de-liderazgo-de-un-loco-que.html) in order to understand how a leader inspires action and how a leadership begins a movement; as well as Rosalinde Torres' corporate experience (see Leadership Questionnaire in the http://ticsddhh.blogspot.com/2015/10/cuestionario-de-liderazgo.html) to understand what requirements a person must have to wear the highest responsibility for leading groups.

In the same way I have touched on the subject from my own experience and perspective (see in Spanish La búsqueda del liderazgo perdido, en
http://ticsddhh.blogspot.com/2012/11/la-busqueda-del-liderazgo-perdido.html, Un liderazgo que valga la pena, en http://ticsddhh.blogspot.com/2016/04/un-liderazgo-que-valga-la-pena.html, Reflexiones del conuco, en  http://ticsddhh.blogspot.com/2013/06/reflexiones-del-conuco.html). In all of them I somehow come to the conclusion that in Venezuela we as a people have done the opposite of what everyone else is doing: the leaderships reach the highest responsibilities in our country without the proper ethics or experience, and from there the disaster in which we are now involved with the opposition leaderships.

How can this situation be resolved? All that remains is to participate in order to generate new leaderships. And in that sense, we will be able to make our way in that new jungle that for many of us means politics, understood in the current terms.  But not by participating in a deceitful and continuous election. I am referring to a participation in the spaces that the country's need creates and that highlights the values of this new leadership, consubstantiated with the real problems of the country. Leaders are neither decreed nor "elected"; the situation itself generates them. What must be guaranteed is the existence of mechanisms to identify them and give them the necessary protagonism to lead. This has to be transformed into something different, and this is what I try to communicate from this corner and it is our decentralizing proposal of the Proyecto Pais Venezuela, which exponentially multiplies regional leadership.

En la nota del 2012, La búsqueda del liderazgo perdido, I pointed out that we should choose to represent ourselves only those people with knowledge, tradition and aging time, not in politics but in what they do with their lives. That we verify their trajectory and contributions to their communities. Not to choose newcomers without a long tradition in their own fields of activity. Ask for references, investigate them well. Do not give a blank check to someone you do not know. Be deeper and more critical in your appraisals. Listen to their interventions and try to weigh the sincerity of their speech and their love for this country.

Today I add another one: not even consider anyone who hasn't worked, who hasn't had a boss, who hasn't lived or faced the world. Young people should not feel discriminated at all. I've never heard of anyone having a head tumor operated on by a newly graduated doctor. That doesn't mean that young recent graduates are bad doctors, it means that they must continue to learn until they reach excellence in their professional performance. And that's only given by time and experience. The unnatural practice has been deeply damaging in recent years for Venezuela.

Today we are in an age of definitions. It is time for a new breed of leaders to appear to usher in a new era of progress and well-being. I'm not worried that they haven't entered the scene yet because I know they'll show up at the right time. I am concerned that the previous ones, who have already had their chance and taken advantage of that situation, are trying to take their places when they were the main direct and indirect responsible for this whole tragedy, which means that the necessary change that must be brought about may turn out to be a complete failure. Let's prevent that from happening...

Caracas, October 3, 2018

Twitter:@laguana

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