I must explain my insistence in notes and interviews about the possibility of the call for an Original National Constituent Assembly, in view of the concern of the people arguing that likewise the regime "would not allow it", just as they did not allow the registration of the person designated by María Corina Machado (MCM) to replace her in the elections of 28J. I have answered each of those concerns, but I consider it even more important to go deeper into this issue and explain it in greater detail for everyone and thus be able to send this text for better reference.
Before I begin, I must point out for those who may have the wrong idea, a National Constituent Assembly MUST NOT be called to remove a government, nor is that its main purpose. A National Constituent Assembly, contrary to what some Latin American leaders think, is the instrument par excellence to REFOUND A NATION and rebuild it on new foundations. In Venezuela, the Venezuelan people as the depositary of the Original Power CAN call for a Constituent Assembly "with the purpose of transforming the State, creating a new legal system and drafting a new Constitution" (Article 347 of the Constitution).
So, if this is so, why do we insist, particularly at this historical moment of the country, on the call for a Constituent Assembly? Because since March 25, in Venezuela, we have reached the end. And I am not referring to the end that MCM persistently talks about in his speech. It is the end of the peaceful, electoral and constitutional struggle by the means that Venezuelans consider traditional: elections. The actions of the Electoral Power of the regime of Nicolás Maduro Moros by denying without any reason the nomination of Dr. Corina Yoris Villasana to the CNE have ruined any possibility for Venezuelans to trust again in the capacity and suitability of that entity to elect and assign positions of popular representation.
After that, who can doubt that it is not necessary in today's Venezuela to "transform the State, create a new legal system and draft a new Constitution" after the systematic deviation of the State towards totalitarianism and the institutional destruction of the public powers, to the point that the decision of a people by vote, to nominate a candidate with the support of 2.4 million of wills, is olympically ignored by the Electoral Power? Who can doubt now that Venezuelans URGENTLY need to meet under our legitimate representation to debate the country we want for the new generations, redefining the Pact between the governed and the governors established in the Constitution?
Institutional destruction has reached such extremes that it is not possible to accept the rules of a democracy that has been deformed, so much so that it is impossible for us to call elections of any kind, because the Electoral Power has completely lost its credibility. On March 25, the destruction of the fundamental democratic rule was completed and from that moment on, there is nothing left for the true democrats to do but to prepare themselves to summon the Constituent and remake the Republic, leaving for the end only the last 4 articles of the Constitution: 347, 348, 349 and 350.
Having made this institutional and clarifying justification, in view of a reality from which we cannot escape, we shall now explain the meaning that the calling of the Original Power would have for Venezuelans and the new opposition leadership, headed by MCM.
In 2003, when for the first time the constitutional possibility of recalling Hugo Chávez Frías from his position as President of the Republic arose, we did not stop to think that we could not do it in the face of a regime with thousands of times more resources than the one inherited by Nicolás Maduro Moros. We went through all the tests we were put through and we ACHIEVED to call for the recall recall of the "arañero" of Sabaneta. If back then we were able to do it with a regime with a popularity and money that Nicolás Maduro Moros wishes he had, do you think we could not be able to do it now, in spite of that CNE? But the issue would not only be to convene it, but to have that Assembly elected with Constituents elected from each part of Venezuela in a transparent manner. This would have to be done with the help of the International Community, in the same way as with the Constituent consultation, as well as with the conditions, or Bases Comiciales, to call for this process.
A Constituent Assembly elected in a transparent manner with an opposition majority would proceed to the immediate change of the Public Powers, establishing a Transitional Government until the promulgation of the new Constitution. Such government may or may not be headed by MCM as decided by the Constituents.
I am aware that this criminal regime would do the impossible to prevent this call, which is Constitutional, but what we are talking about here is to keep in motion a process that starts objectively with the election of MCM on October 22, 2023 as candidate and main opposition leader, and that should not and cannot be stopped just because through a stratagem combined with treason, they closed the possibility of solving the political problem of Venezuela through a presidential election.
This is a possible line of struggle, constitutional, peaceful and electoral, as they have always insisted in the International Community. If MCM was going to face Maduro with that CNE for a presidency under the conditions of the regime, why couldn't the opposition constituents also face him under negotiated conditions and with the help of the democratic world? And this time the negotiation of those conditions would not be by those who "represented" us in Barbados, but by a legitimate representation appointed by the one who has the legitimacy of origin since October 22.
I must responsibly recall that a Constituent Assembly is not a process that would be carried out outside the regime. It would be done IN DESPITE OF THE REGIME. In the year 2002, signatures were delivered to the CNE to ask the Venezuelan people if we wanted Hugo Chávez Frías to leave with a "voluntary resignation". A total of 1,574,233 signatures were collected and a serious CNE approved this referendum for February 2, 2003. The regime undoes this request by removing the Rectores and appointing a new CNE adjusted to its interests.
Then, the Venezuelan opposition faced that, that same day, a little over 20 years ago, on February 2, 2003, we started a constitutional recall process against Hugo Chávez Frías in an event called El Firmazo. We collected there 3,236,320 signatures, of which 2,789,385 were valid, many more than those required at that time according to the RE of that time. The CNE of the regime decided in response to declare the request extemporaneous. Then, we citizens made another Firmazo, El Reafirmazo, but the CNE reserved the production of the forms, with multiple roadblocks and traps to avoid our exercise of constitutional participation. In spite of that, we went through that dirt road.
Then they began to intimidate and persecute us. They fabricated a list of political discrimination with our names, the Tascón List. They persecuted the members of Súmate, the organization that carried out the process at the national level. They took us to a process of "reparos" of signatures and threats to public officials who had demonstrated so that their signatures would be withdrawn. With all this, the final number collected and hard to get rid of Chávez was 2,436,083 signatures, which exceeded the minimum required of 2,399,213. The NEC had no other option but to call for the recall and did so on August 15, 2004.
In other words, a process that began with a simple collection of signatures for a Consultative in 2002 ended with the tenacity and consistency of the citizens in a date for a Recall Referendum for August 2004. The rest is the story of a fraud with machines controlled by a CNE led by Jorge Rodriguez.
They had to sweat it out to neutralize the citizen voice and finally the political opposition buckled to the regime. I do not believe that this is now the disposition of the new leadership led by MCM. This historical summary, better detailed for history by Ana Julia Jatar in her book Apartheid of the XXI Century, shows that we can call for a Constituent Assembly, with a true political opposition at the forefront, this time with the experience of 20 years and the support of an International Community better aware of what is happening in Venezuela and its full and greater willingness to recover the democracy kidnapped by a criminal mafia (see in Spanish Ana Julia Jatar, Apartheid of the XXI Century, Chapter 2, Lists, fear and discrimination, in https://www.sumate.org/documentos/ApartheidSigloXXI/Apartheid%20del%20Siglo%20XXI%20Capitulo2.pdf).
They will have to allow the Constituent as they had to allow Chávez's recall. The difference will be that they will not face an opposition that "bends over backwards not to split" and the full disposition of the majority of Venezuelans -those inside and those outside- to meet again over any difficulty. The rest will be to defend the conditions for a fair convocation or Bases Comiciales, as well as the votes of all the constituents, nothing that we would not have had to do if MCM had been qualified to compete in the election of July 28.
Achieving the Constituent Convocation by popular initiative, with a firm leadership at the helm, can be done at any time, and in a short period of time, regardless of where the citizen is located. It would only require the will of 15% of the electoral roll to do so, as opposed to the 20% needed to recall a popularly elected official. Even in this we will have to review the fundamental text when debating the representation of the people in a National Constituent Assembly, the end of a path that started with a Constituent Assembly and must inexorably end in the same way...
Caracas, March 31, 2024
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TIC’s & Derechos Humanos, https://ticsddhh.blogspot.com/
Email: luismanuel.aguana@gmail.com
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