Our Tribune--The opposing opposition
El Universal This is not a tongue twister, but a reality, as “the Venezuelan opposition groups take their role so seriously that they oppose to themselves.” This phrase by journalist Clodovaldo Hernández -El Universal- was written within the framework of an absolute freedom of speech ruling this newspaper, and shows the dilemma facing the opposition in Venezuela, unable to find an efficient cohesion.
In Our Tribune, El Universal claimed that time would actually judge the results of the pact signed last week by government and opposition delegates at the Negotiation and Agreement Table. In the short term, the opposition leadership will be tested; it will be under the examining eye of those who expect more than speeches from their leaders. If there is any doubt, one just have to remember that the people that have systematically violated the Constitution and installed a culture of impunity and violence are the same people that now shamelessly declare themselves lovers of peace and tolerance. In the meantime, the regime abusively and conveniently orders the transmission of mandatory nationwide radio and television broadcasts (known as “cadenas”) and confiscates radio and television transmissions, while pro-government parliamentarians forecast that the designation of the new National Electoral Council -a prerequisite for any recall referendum- will take six months.
Damages resulting from the economic havoc orchestrated by the so-called revolution, together with the consolidation of a constitutional dictatorship -as a consequence of the enactment of a totalitarian set of laws at the National Assembly- will be irreversible if there is no political leadership able to efficiently defend the rights of the people and to hold back so much outrage.
Amid this climax of defenselessness, leaders are immersed in absurdity and they have no criteria for a real unity. Some spokespersons have even claimed that the responsibility to convene a recall referendum lies exclusively on the opposition groups. This is a strange idea, suggested by the Vice-president’s Office as a justification for the impending terrible electoral ordeal. As Chávez has warned, they are going to suffer as much as Cain did.
An inefficient hemispheric system and the “cubanization” of formerly democratic Venezuela; a useless Inter American Chart setting the standards for democratic performance; the institutional anomie resulting from public powers spurious at their origin; the violence as state policy; impunity; the complicity of the National Armed Force; the existence of multiple agendas; the attempts to shut up the media and the overall decay, are elements that will force leaders to give more.
We tell the opposing opposition the same thing we have told them before: in 1958 -when the dictatorship of Gen. Marcos Pérez Jiménez was overthrown- there was neither a Group of Friends nor a hemispheric system, but the society knew what had to be done.