By Luis Manuel Aguana
Once the
general proposal for a Plebiscite to Nicolás Maduro Moros to define his
permanence in power in Venezuela has been made (see in Spanish, Comunicado
ANCO: Que el Soberano decida el futuro de Venezuela, PLEBISCITO SI, DIALOGO NO,
in http://ancoficial.blogspot.com/2019/06/comunicado-anco-que-el-soberano-decida.html), we have faced a shower
of concerns, many of them disqualifying, about the relevance or not of an
instrument such as this versus the electoral approach currently being
negotiated with the regime by the official opposition of the National Assembly.
And it is reasonable for people to wonder why this proposal was born as opposed
to others we had already made, favoring humanitarian intervention in Venezuela
through the Responsibility to Protect (R2P), and even the approval of Article
187#11 of the Constitution. And in reality, the plebiscite proposal does not
exclude these scenarios. Let's see why.
In
Venezuela we have reached a point of no return of irreconcilable positions with
the regime and its official opposition. In fact, there are no points of
convergence that make Venezuelans convince us to swallow Maduro's regime in any
way possible. There has been too much death, persecution and destruction of our
country for the average Venezuelan to accept anything other than the expulsion
of those who have done us so much harm.
On the
other hand, those who had to follow a route that meant the expulsion of tyranny
first, to continue with a transitional government and free elections later,
decided without consulting us that they would negotiate with the regime to
"stop the usurpation". Who do they intend to make swallow such a
thing? That is why the communicational machinery of the official opposition is
getting ready with its known journalistic anchors to begin a campaign that will
try to convince us that if we go to elections with the regime we will
"raze" them. Does that speech seem familiar to you?
The
electoral discourse is strongly supported by important factors of all the
European socialist battery and those in Latin America who still believe that
what happens in Venezuela is only a problem of political and not criminal
order. If we add to this the fact that the failed attempts of the 23E and 30A
have taken away an important international credibility (read the United States)
from the interim government of Juan Guaidó, the latter would have no
alternative but to give in to a negotiation with a regime that wants elections
and an international community that sees no other way to make the waters in Venezuela
return to their course.
The only
problem here is how to convince an entire country that is still waiting for the
promised "cessation of usurpation" and that now brews are being
cooked to transform it into a "cessation of usurpation by elections.
If the
country's fundamental problem is a castro-communist regime, which in 20 years
has tried to subdue its population using the immense resources of the nation,
ruining and destroying everything in its path, and still has not managed to
subdue it completely despite the exodus and the humanitarian crisis, how could
we possibly think that we can convince it that we can get rid of it by
negotiating "spaces of coexistence" through electoral mechanisms that
only work when democracy exists? In other words, the electoral solution is a
complete contradiction when it is carried out with those who do not believe in
that way except when they are the ones who count the votes using a system built
to favor them. That is why some of us believe that the definitive solution is a
solution of force, but that we do not have the approval of the International
Community as a whole.
We are
then stuck in the belief that we only have the electoral path to solve the
problem. And that solution, far from solving it, aggravates it. It is like
putting a patch on a large tank of gasoline that drips because it is rotten
from rust and if the structural cause of the spill is not remedied, at some
point and for some reason the spark will jump that will make it explode sooner
rather than later. That is why we have to go and solve the structural cause of
the problem, since the regime has distorted and destroyed absolutely all the
institutionality of the country. That is, to resort to the source where the
institutions are born, which is nothing other than Popular Sovereignty.
The
International Community recognizes without any doubt that in Venezuela we have
to resort to Popular Sovereignty to resolve our differences. That is why its
instrument is the electoral one. However, a Plebiscite is also an electoral
mechanism but it puts in the hands of the people a transcendental decision. And
that is precisely our case in Venezuela, but with one difference: with
elections we tolerate the existence of the regime, not with a Plebiscite. And
why not? Because it is precisely a question of submitting to the consideration
of Popular Sovereignty the decision about the very existence of that regime,
with all that that implies. Do you realize the difference?
But how
do we bring the regime to that judgment of the sovereignty of the people? It
won't be easy at all. It is clear that the open mechanisms of the International
Community will not be desired, knowing that the people do not want it. It is
there that the pressure of all countries must begin to work. The countries that
support us must be the first to be convinced of this solution. They could, for
example, continue with the same, or new and worse sanctions until the regime
accepts a Plebiscite.
The
difference with the current state of things is that there would then be a place
where to get with these pressures and sanctions: for the regime to agree to be
counted in a Plebiscite. This would be done with the collaboration of civil
society and without the intervention of the CNE, as this instrument does not
fall within its constitutional competence (Art. 70), so that its implementation
would be more agile and immediate than an election, and always with the support
and supervision of international organizations (OAS and EU). Depending on the
pressure exerted from outside to inside, and from within the very heart of the
country, the regime will begin to ask to "negotiate" the terms of its
submission to the will of the people. That is the only possible negotiation
with them: that of the terms of their exit.
But how
would it be done for the regime to comply with the outcome of that Plebiscite?
That question goes hand in hand with the acceptance of the instrument: if the
popular mandate emanating from the ballot boxes in that Plebiscite is not
fulfilled, the doors remain open for a humanitarian intervention that enforces
the Sovereign's decision, the International Community not having any way to
avoid the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) to Venezuela according to the terms
conceived in the 2005 UN General Assembly. And to achieve this in the most
expeditious manner and with the collaboration of the only legitimate power in
Venezuela, the National Assembly would no longer have excuses to refuse to
approve the presence of foreign forces within the country to support what the people
decided at the polls, through its attribution established in the Constitution
in Article 187#11.
As you
can see, a Plebiscite is an expeditious solution versus the opposition's covert
negotiations with the regime to ensure its permanence in the power structures
in Venezuela through elections. It would give continuity to the promise made to
Venezuelans on the 23E to immediately end usurpation and continue on the path
of the definitive conformation of a transitional government that will lead us
to free elections, WITHOUT THE REGIME OR SOMEONE OF ITS STRUCTURES. And it
shows that it is possible to have a next government without cohabiting with
Maduro, as the official opposition has tried to sell us as obligatory. It is a
solution that we propose to Venezuela and the world to abandon the limbo in
which we find ourselves, which deepens and prolongs the death and despair of
the Venezuelan people.
Caracas,
June 19, 2019
Email:
luismanuel.aguana@gmail.com
Twitter:@laguana
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