I will not tire of insisting that in politics there is no such thing as naivety. Of course, it is impossible to deny that there is a great deal of ignorance about things and that is why decisions are made that end up affecting those who make them, precisely because they are ignorant. And this is not meant in a pejorative way. My father, a distinguished educator, used to say on this subject that ignorant is the one who ignores, and that is why it is necessary to educate them, although the task of educating the ignorant is very hard. Or as Benjamin Franklin said: "To be ignorant is not a great shame, but to be unwilling to learn is". And politicians have shown themselves to be shameless to the point of satiety…
This is the case of the first consequences that we Venezuelans are observing, as we are losing the diplomatic headquarters and representation of Venezuela in the U.S. with the decision to eliminate the interim and disappear the figure of the Presidency-in-Charge in the Law on the Reform of the Statute governing the Transition, which is the name of the legal absurdity approved by the National Assembly of 2015, last December 30, 2022. I doubt very much that the authors of such action did it out of ignorance of the Vienna Convention, or any other reaction of ignorance that the U.S. State Department is now wielding (see in Spanis, The State Department assumes the diplomatic offices of Venezuela in the U.S., in https://www.turimiquire.net/2023/02/10/el-departamento-de-estado-asume-las-sedes-diplomaticas-de-venezuela-en-los-estados-unidos/).
There were multiple notorious and communicative opportunities in which the opposition delegations convened with James Story, US Ambassador to Venezuela, based in Bogota, Colombia, before December 2022, to the point that many considered that the head of the political opposition in Venezuela was Ambassador Story. That is why I doubt very much that this intention has not been aired, with the consequent response about its consequences on the part of the US officials, so that the so-called G3 group would hardly be unaware of what would happen if the Presidency-in-Charge were to disappear.
But they still did so, deliberately placing relations with the US on hold until the 2024 elections take place or before when the regime so decides. The US closed the Venezuelan Embassy in Washington and kept the keys to hand them over to the new government they consider legitimate in our country. And that new government will have to come out of those elections.
Certainly, the Presidency-in-Charge was an obstacle for those who, within the erroneously called Venezuelan opposition, are doing the job of helping Nicolás Maduro Moros to remain in power. The unfortunate thing about this situation is that this step proved to pave the way for the regime in its pretension to be considered legitimate in the eyes of the International Community.
Seen in this way, an act that has now been taken by the community as impulsive, naïve or even ignorant because of the consequences it had, now has all the appearance of being deliberate and conscious.
That was the task imposed by the regime to the official opposition in that "dialogue" in Mexico: to put an end to the interim government and promote the electoral process through the opposition primaries, since that step would catalyze the existence of a "legitimate government" that the US could recognize as from those elections. Even better if they are held earlier, as already announced by prominent spokespersons of the regime such as Diosdado Cabello Rondón.
The next step is already being taken by the Primary Commission, by initiating formal approaches with the National Electoral Council (CNE). This would eliminate the participation of uncomfortable pre-candidates who are asking for something they will not be given: free, manual and transparent primary elections, with the full participation of Venezuelans in the Diaspora.
But the regime and its associates will keep those uncomfortable candidates close to them as far as possible, sending them the candy of polls where they come out winners. This will keep them entertained and confident, as well as the population, which will be pleased to see that they are ahead "neither one nor the other", in a strategy where an option where more than 80% of Venezuelans are registered would look like a winner. But this will last until the Primary Commission announces its majority decision to use the CNE to count the opposition votes, as indeed most of its main factors wish, and some of them have publicly manifested it.
What is this all about in the end? Who gets the keys to the US embassy and the recognition of the International Community. And the official opposition is deliberately putting it to the regime on a silver platter. Those who believe that they can win this primary election with a Primary Commission that nobody knows where it came from, under what criteria it was appointed and what interests it responds to, are living a sort of Midsummer Night's Dream. What is very clear to all is that whoever is designated as the "winning" candidate of those primaries to be measured against whoever the regime puts forward, will be the one who will meekly accept the results decided by the CNE controlled by Maduro. That is the situation in Venezuela.
And you will say to me, "but what you want is for the tiger to eat us" as the old guaracha used to say. It would seem that Venezuela's destiny is already determined, and that it is like a train that is going at full speed on a rail that points to a ravine. That the regime has all the numbers for the power raffle. Well, so far it is so.
And how do we derail that train? The International Community stubbornly insists that we measure ourselves electorally with whoever controls the vote-counting machine, and whoever has it is making sure that the result favors him, including who his opponent will be, because he has the money and the power to do so.
Meanwhile Maduro cancels the dialogue, where supposedly the official opposition would discuss "the conditions" for "free, fair and verifiable" elections, indicating that there are no guarantees to continue in the dialogue (see in Spanish, Nicolás Maduro announced that he is not returning to the dialogue table in Mexico, in, https://www.costadelsolfm.org/2023/02/16/nicolas-maduro-anuncio-que-no-vuelve-a-la-mesa-de-dialogo-en-mexico/).
The regime never had any intention of concluding this dialogue, but it will call for elections, but under its own terms and at the time it wants. That is what is on the political horizon. If Venezuelans are willing to hand over the keys to the US embassy to the regime in 2024, and with them the recognition it is desperately seeking, let us continue to think, as the official opposition does, that the way out is through the primaries. Otherwise, we have time to think from now on how to derail a train...
Caracas, February 18, 2023
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TIC’s & Derechos Humanos, https://ticsddhh.blogspot.com/
Email: luismanuel.aguana@gmail.com
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