Speech at the Forum on "Natural Leaderships and the Original Constituent Assembly", sponsored by the association Fuerza Ciudadana en Acción, in Caracas, September 16, 2022.
Good morning. First of all, I thank Luis Márquez and Fuerza Ciudadana en Acción for this invitation to share with you on the occasion of an issue that concerns us all. But the topic should not be "the Constituent Assembly". And you will be surprised why I say that. After all these years, it still strikes me that this is the center of the debate. I have never heard anyone ask what is the reason, why and for what purpose we insist on the convocation of the Original Power. And it is clear to everyone that a Constituent Assembly has, among others, the objective of drafting a new Constitutional text. But beyond that, nobody asks why or for what purpose we want to do that.
And that is where I want to start this conversation. For the why and the wherefore. Then you will see if those motivations are delusional, far-fetched, or worse, unfounded.
In these days I published a note, which I recommend you to read. I titled it "The Fundamental Change" (see Fundamental Change, in https://ticsddhh.blogspot.com/p/the-fundamental-change.html) because I felt that in trying to explain all the complexity involved in our proposal for a structural change in the system of power relations in the State, I had to begin by explaining the main change to be made. And that is none other than in the conception we have had of how the relations that are structured in the Pact between those who govern us and us, the governed, should be set out in a Constitution. Because it is in the essence of that Pact where, in our opinion, the great problem of Venezuelans lies.
From the "Constitution of the State of Venezuela of September 24, 1830", which was the title of the fundamental text of our country approved after the separation of Venezuela from Gran Colombia, to the present day, the structure of power applied to the Constitution has been the same: there is a minimum definition of the Public Powers: Executive, Legislative and Judicial - in the latter of 1999 there are 5 - with delegation to the Executive Power of the Administration of the National Public Treasury and the Armed Forces, with the corresponding controls delegated to the Legislative Power.
And the Constitution is nothing more than the materialization, in writing and in black and white, of that Pact. It was through that Pact that Venezuelans decided and put in black and white in 1811 the rules according to which a new independent country would be governed, brought forth by representatives of the 7 Provinces that constituted the General Captaincy of Venezuela.
But I do not wish to go that far back because it would imply a longer explanation and the destroyed dream of Simón Bolívar with the Great Colombia. I want to start with the origin of Venezuela as a Republic, separated as Siamese twins, from Colombia and the rest of the territories liberated by the Liberator.
Since the first Venezuelan Constitution of 1830, after our separation from Gran Colombia, Venezuelans have defined in our Fundamental Pact that the President of the Republic, as head of the Executive Power, would be the one to centralize the power of arms and the money of all Venezuelans, under his dominion and administration. That is the system we have given ourselves since the beginning of the republican times. But that arrangement has a structural defect: our welfare is highly dependent on the efficiency and intentions - bad or good - of those who occupy the only position of power in the country. In other words, the rule established in all our fundamental pacts between the governed and the governors gives those who govern us in the Executive Power the license to do whatever they want with what belongs to all of us.
This arrangement makes the whole political world seek that position. The whole political structure that is organized in the country revolves around achieving that privileged position. The President of the Republic -in practice- becomes the owner of Venezuela. And you will tell me: but that is not so! There are institutional counterweights! There are the Legislative and Judicial Powers, the President cannot do whatever he wants! But in Venezuela he has done it and not just now, but since we became a Republic. The system of power relations has not worked efficiently and unfortunately throughout our history, these mechanisms defined as such in the Fundamental Pact, the Constitution, have not been efficient enough to prevent the excesses of those who have occupied power in Venezuela.
There has never been a balance between the Public Powers, causing that those who have exercised the Executive Power have permanently had a pernicious influence in the administration of what belongs to all, bringing as a consequence underdevelopment and poverty, and lately institutional destruction of the State and massive exodus of the population. We have not been able to avoid that those who control that Power defined in the fundamental Pact corrupt the rest of the Powers, even if they are defined as they are established in Venezuela in our current Constitution. And I refer to the evidence: a corrupt Electoral Power subrogated to the regime has not allowed us to get out of this serious situation peacefully.
In the 1925 Constitution, for the first time, the figure of something that we consider completely decimononic, unfair and detrimental to the citizens appears: the Situado Constitucional. The appearance of this figure coincides with the initial years of oil production in the Venezuela of Juan Vicente Gómez. And why? Because all that wealth had to be distributed in some way formally to the population. The latest revision of this arrangement that defines the income of the States of the country is established in Article 167.4 of the 1999 Constitution, which states and I quote: "... The Situado is an Item equivalent to a maximum of Twenty percent of the total Estimated Revenues annually by the National Treasury...". End of quotation.
Few people walk around the fact that this part of the Pact is completely detrimental to us, the citizens, clearly favoring those who get to exercise power in Venezuela. In 2016 only 3.67% of the National budget went to the country's Municipalities, and 14.71% went to the administration of the States, with the National Executive reserving 81.61%. And similar figures have been repeated for more than 60 years, the 40 years of the Punto Fijo Pact and the more than 20 years of Castro-Chavismo-Madurism. Tell me if all the Mayors of Venezuela can do something with 3.67% of the country's income to improve the quality of daily life of their citizens, that is, water, electricity, security, public transportation, school maintenance, etc., etc., etc., etc..
But the worst thing is not that the municipalities, which is where the citizens make their living, do not have the means to meet the ever-increasing needs of the population. The worst thing is that more than 80% of the money is at the discretion of a handful of politicians who get rich and make rich whoever they want, deciding in which part of the territory to invest what belongs to everyone. This Pact is in no way balanced. It is for this reason that Chávez, Maduro and their entourage took away the wealth of the country, ruining us all. And the reason why the parties kill each other to be in the same situation.
From the above we can infer that a Pact of such nature must be changed as soon as possible. Power must be dismantled and handed over to the citizens, turning the pyramid of power in Venezuela upside down.
The political parties, which should be the main modifying agents of this situation, are not interested in changing in any way the system of power relations established in the Constitution. They are usufructuaries of that system. We citizens find ourselves then in what I call a state of Constitutional defenselessness.
But as if the existing
imbalance in the constitutional accounts were not enough, a study carried out
in 2006 by Primer Poder, Asociación Civil, (https://www.facebook.com/PrimerPoderAC/) entitled "The Plural State", found that, and I quote: "The President of the Republic between 1958 and 1998 had direct
responsibility for more than 80% of the State Policies and their respective
operational areas of control and service. They all added up to 230 of the 279
responsibilities that corresponded to the National State. Not to mention a
total of some 500 companies and autonomous institutes under presidential
tutelage. As of 1999, the Castro-Chavista regime gradually transferred the
absolute control of the President over 100% of the State's responsibilities,
adding another 22 to total 317. A single person has direct responsibility over
the design of 103 areas of state policies; plus 105 areas of state controls and
109 areas of state services. Not to mention a total of some 5,000 companies and
autonomous institutes under presidential tutelage (10 times the 1998
estimate)". End of quote.
This takeover of the Executive Power, of the life of the Nation and of all of us, the citizens, is what must be changed URGENTLY in Venezuela. And the ONLY way to do it is by summoning those who can constitutionally achieve it, which is none other than the People of Venezuela through a mechanism established in the 1999 Constitution, a National Constituent Assembly of an original nature.
So far we have defined why we want this National Constituent Assembly. Let us now see what for.
By establishing a new relationship of power in the Pact, where the Executive Power is placed in a true place of representation of the citizens, it implies that this 80% should go to the States and Municipalities, but mainly to the Municipalities, within a new proposal of political-territorial distribution. More to the Municipalities, then to the States and then to the Federal Power. In that order. The figure of the Situado Constitucional would disappear, because it would be the States, now on the contrary, who would decide the contribution for the support of a Federal Government, assuming in practice the control of its development, according to their own potentialities. This is what I have called the inversion of the pyramid of power in Venezuela.
The States would establish the development model that best suits them according to their economic, historical and cultural profile, and this must be embodied in the State Constitution itself, which must be approved by its population, after the transcendental change that we propose in a true Federal Constitution for Venezuela has been sanctioned. This is what ANCO essentially proposes in its proposal The Great Change. (see in Spanish The Great Change, A Proposal for the Refoundation of Venezuela, in https://tinyurl.com/5n6enjrr).
But the proposed changes go beyond: the updating and political-territorial reorganization of the Municipalities, the territorial recomposition of the capitals of the States, starting with the capital of Venezuela, Caracas, and proposed suggestions for the development model of the States. All this is contained in the work of the National Coordinator of ANCO, Eng. Enrique Colmenares Finol, entitled "Mi Delirio Manifiesto, Venezuela, Política, Región y Ciudadanía " (1). Up to now, there is no other structured proposal for political-territorial change in the country of this magnitude, which demonstrates the seriousness of the political proposal made by ANCO to Venezuelans.
No one in Venezuela is prepared for these changes, but that does not mean that they are not possible. We are not proposing a government program like any other political party. NO. We are proposing a new structure of power relations and development for Venezuelans, and to establish it in our fundamental Pact, put in black and white in the Constitution. And once the Constituent has approved it, then the work of building a new Venezuela will begin. We are going to make mistakes, as anyone who starts a new way of doing things. But the creativity and drive of the Venezuelan people will overcome the state of constitutional and citizen defenselessness to which we have been subjected for almost two centuries. That is our challenge...
Thank you very much.
Caracas, 16 de septiembre de 2022
Blog: https://ticsddhh.blogspot.com/
Email: luismanuel.aguana@gmail.com
Twitter:@laguana
(1)
Enrique
Colmenares Finol, Mi Delirio Manifiesto, Venezuela, Política, Región y Ciudadanía, Ed. Punto,
ISBN 9789807801096, 2018
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