By Luis
Manuel Aguana
This year's Christmas is particularly important for deep reflection on what the country is going through. At this time of year, when tradition dictates that we should be focusing on the best for everyone and expressing our greatest optimism and desire for the well-being of others, we still find ourselves in the harsh uncertainty of our own well-being.
How did we get here? With strong and solid leadership, María Corina Machado (MCM) led a crusade that ended in Oslo with the Nobel Peace Prize. The Nobel Committee recognized the struggle of the Venezuelan people, led by the now laureate. But even so, why do we feel, at Christmas 2025, that we are still on the shore, after having swum so far?
MCM reached the position she now holds, as a Nobel Peace Prize winner, because she embodied a unanimous aspiration of the majority: the return of her family home, especially during this heartfelt time of year for the Venezuelan people. I would especially like to recall the words of journalist Leoncio Martínez in his editorial of September 26, 1936, in his weekly newspaper Fantoches, entitled “The Meaning of the Popular Masses”:
“People do not follow agitators, but rather those who embody the unanimous aspirations of the majority. People do not know agitators, but rather interpreters, which is why they follow those who promise them food when they are hungry, those who speak to them of justice when they feel oppressed, and even those who promise them revenge when they feel victimized” (see in Spanish, Leoncio Martínez, El Significado de las Masas Populares”, in https://ticsddhh.blogspot.com/2011/06/el-significado-de-las-masas-populares.html).
And indeed, this was and continues to be a unanimous aspiration that unites all Venezuelans, regardless of political affiliation: the return of the family after the regime's departure. MCM correctly interpreted this sentiment and placed itself at the forefront of an entire people to find a solution to this problem. And although a candidate was imposed on her, forced by circumstances, after making that promise, the people overcame that barrier to make that heartfelt aspiration a reality, voting overwhelmingly on June 28, 2024, for whoever represented that desire that she embodied. But that hope did not materialize this Christmas.
And even though there are a number of serious factors that explain why the regime is still ruling in Venezuela, and there are the best and most well-founded reasons why that aspiration has not yet been realized, the simple reality that hits us in the face today, with the popular masses having indisputably placed political leadership in the hands of those who have it, is that the whole situation in Venezuela this Christmas feels like a failure in itself. And that is the profound reflection that those who, being at the forefront of the opposition leadership, still have the masses waiting tragically, must make today, on this special day for the Venezuelan family.
In this regard, I wanted to bring to the memory of Venezuelans and to their reflection on Christmas 2025 the image of how the government of General Eleazar López Contreras, considered at the time to be transitional, was perceived at Christmas 1936, especially with the cover of today's weekly magazine Fantoches, 89 years ago, which illustrates this article. Take a good look at the image accompanying this article, which I was able to give you for Christmas thanks to the miracles of AI graphic technology.
Leoncio Martínez, Leo, who ran the weekly magazine, was very sharp in the illustrations he placed on the cover of the weekly. The cover of Fantoches 89 years ago today was titled “This year's nativity scene.” As you may recall, General Eleazar López Contreras, successor to dictator Juan Vicente Gómez, who officially died on December 17, 1935, had been in power for one year by the date of issue 568 of the weekly magazine.
In the nativity scene, “the Baby Jesus” was represented by the child Eleazar in diapers, surrounded by Saint Joseph and the Virgin Mary, represented by the popular “Juan Bimba” and his wife, as the child's parents, symbolizing the people of Venezuela. As every Venezuelan should know, the People's Poet, Andrés Eloy Blanco, in his prison in the Castle of Puerto Cabello, described the profile of our people in a single figure known as “Juan Bimba,” from that moment on and forever.
The three “Three Wise Men” prostrated at the edge of the manger constitute a well-known trio in Venezuela: the famous corrupt political lizard, offering the bag of money; the old miserable opportunistic “chicken thief” businessman, always present, offering his business; and the armed “chácharo,” supposedly knowledgeable about military matters, with a machete in his hand, offering the weapon. The three are giving the only thing they have and what they are for the important occasion.
In the background, the complete choreography of the parties of that time, lining up to pay their respects, seeking, as always, whatever they can get. Above the manger, a long ribbon with the text “CALM AND SANITY... GLORY TO GOD IN THE HIGHEST AND DEMOCRACY ON EARTH FOR MEN OF GOOD WILL.” With General López Contreras' famous phrase - Calm and Sanity - that manger was and still is the living representation of Venezuela's “democracy for men of good will” that has prevailed until now.
Doesn't that image seem familiar? It is the same court that appeared in Oslo, Norway, in recent days, updated in terms of time and characters, of course, on the occasion of the official birth of the country's new leadership, on the occasion of its Nobel Peace Prize, with the stellar participation of the specimens that appear immediately at the moment of a similar birth in our country. Politics in Venezuela has not changed at all in 89 years, only in form and protagonists, and especially in the representation of the people, “Juan Bimba” and his wife, as the undisputed parents and creators of the child in the manger.
But what follows after that cover is the most interesting part. The editorial of the weekly magazine Fantoches of December 24, 1936, No. 568, reviews the conclusions of an interview conducted by Colombian journalist Luis Enrique Osorio with General Eleazar López Contreras, already in his capacity as President of the Republic, for the magazine Acción Liberal of Bogotá, Colombia, which I transcribe below:
“His FUTURE
The most varied assumptions are woven around the personality of General Eleazar López Contreras.
For extremists of one stripe or another, he is a weak man. For the impatient, he is a continuator of Andean autocracy, who plays at freedom while consolidating his power. For some foreign conservatives, he seems to be a transitional figure, like Kerensky, who will facilitate uncontrollable popular reactions.
But aren't all these concepts based on European criteria, by those who believe that American politics should always echo the reactions of the old world?
We limit ourselves to stating that Eleazar López Contreras is the man with the most power in Latin America today. Material and moral power.
He is backed by a loyal army that trusts him and will follow him wherever he leads. He is backed by an intrinsic strength that no one disputes: honesty. He possesses the calmness of a pilot. He has a rich and healthy treasury, and half the national territory confiscated from Juan Vicente Gómez. He has the most dynamic, malleable, daring, emotional, and visionary people on the continent. He is so strong that he is not afraid to grant public freedoms in a country that has endured a hundred years of dictatorship.
He also has the opportunity to govern at a time conducive to great social change, when humanity is seeking new paths and Iberian America is tending toward maturity in the face of Europe's confusion.
If General Eleazar López Contreras uses his power to truly realize Bolívar's ideas, no force will be able to stop him.
What's more, he is perhaps the only leader in tropical America today who can afford to be Bolivarian." (Leoncio Martínez, excerpt from the editorial of Semanario Fantoches, No. 568, Caracas, December 24, 1938) (emphasis added).
We could accurately trace the past with the present. What does the future hold for this new opposition leadership? Today, as yesterday, we have a new leadership that is regarded by friends and foes alike as honest, with an extraordinary people behind it, at a pivotal moment in world history. As described 89 years ago today, if that power is harnessed, “no force will be able to stand in its way.” Is it possible that we will miss the bus of history because of a leadership that decides to accept the “gifts” of these three “Three Wise Men” who appeared at the ‘manger’ in Oslo? “Juan Bimba” is watching with legitimate concern the outcome of the current events of this whole story...
To conclude, I will echo the words of Leo in his immortal editorial of the popular masses: "On behalf of that people who know what they feel and know what they want, on behalf of that mass that is the same that fought and won alongside the Liberator until the doctrines of democracy and social equality were established, on behalf of that conscious conglomerate that has served as a pedestal for no one's glory but their own, since the Liberator was both man and masses, because within him slept the free people to which he aspired, we ask for Venezuela the legitimate appreciation of democracy, of that democracy always at odds with those who seek to impose without listening, to govern without obeying."
Read carefully: that leadership was not handed over by the masses to serve “as a pedestal for anyone's glory but their own” and we all owe ourselves to that. And in all fairness, we ask, or rather demand, that it be for “the legitimate appreciation of democracy, of that democracy always at odds with those who seek to impose without listening, to govern without obeying” as much for those who appeared at the manger yesterday in 1936 as for those we saw in Oslo a few days ago. May what we have been asking for since July 28, 2024, not only be a gift requested today from the Baby Jesus on the eve of his birth, but also the full fulfillment of a promise made and answered, with the generosity that only the people of Venezuela are capable of giving, in a fair interpretation of their most heartfelt needs and desires. It's not a gift, it's a mandate...
As every year, please accept my best wishes for the happiest Christmas possible in the world, in these times full of anxiety and uncertainty, and especially to those whom I have had the honor of counting as my readers during this difficult Year of Our Lord 2025. May God bless you always...
Caracas, December 24, 2025
Blog:
TIC’s & Derechos Humanos, https://ticsddhh.blogspot.com/
Email: luismanuel.aguana@gmail.com
Twitter:@laguana
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