[News] Media Deliberately Omits Critical Info to Demonize Venezuela

[Anti-Imperialist News]

https://venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/12741


  Media Deliberately Omits Critical Info to Demonize Venezuela

By Lucho Granados Ceja - TeleSur English , October 25th 2016

The announcement from Venezuela's electoral authority that it would not 
proceed with a recall referendum has unleashed yet another wave of 
critical articles and opinion pieces throughout the English-speaking 
media, labelling the socialist government in Venezuela as 
“authoritarian” or even a “dictatorship.”

It is a tired tune that people who follow political developments in the 
South American country have heard consistently throughout the 18-year 
process known as the Bolivarian Revolution.

Despite the fact that the Venezuelan government's democratic credentials 
have been affirmed repeatedly—including by groups who cannot be 
considered to be partial to the government, such as the Carter 
Center—private media outlets insist on labeling the Maduro 
administration “undemocratic."

Media outlets are fully aware that if they were to be honest in their 
reporting about Venezuela, the narrative that the country is not a 
democracy would collapse under the weight of its own insincerity.

Thus private outlets have consistently and deliberately omitted critical 
information about recent developments in Venezuela.

Many outlets, such as ABC News, have completely failed to mention that 
the opposition-controlled National Assembly is currently in 
noncompliance with a ruling from the country's Supreme Court, therefore 
its actions have no legal standing.

The right-wing leadership insisted on swearing-in three lawmakers 
despite the fact that their elections are in dispute over several 
serious fraud allegations. In a de-facto acknowledgment of the court's 
authority and ruling, the leadership of the Venezuelan parliament first 
respected the order and withdrew the three lawmakers, only to turn 
around and re-seat them later.

Those that do mention the assembly's contempt of court, such as Al 
Jazeera, are quick to point out that the Supreme Court has overturned a 
few bills the parliament has passed.

What they fail to mention is that some of the bills passed by the right 
wing are so flagrantly in violation of the constitution that one would 
be hard-pressed to find a legal scholar who would argue in favor of 
their legality.

As an example, in its mission to oust President Nicolas Maduro, the 
right-wing leadership of the assembly tried to retroactively shorten 
Maduro's term. One need not be a constitutional expert to see how that 
would run contrary to the will of the Venezuelan people who elected him 
to serve a six-year term in 2013.

In March, the assembly approved a highly controversial bill aimed at 
granting amnesty to a wide range of crimes committed by supporters of 
the opposition, including violent protests in 2014, known as guarimbas, 
that left dozens dead. Relatives of victims of right-wing political 
violence denounced their efforts to pass such legislation that would 
essentially absolve the perpetrators of violence. The bill never became 
law due to its unconstitutionality.

Outlets also fail to mention that despite their name, Venezuela's 
opposition is deeply divided, with different factions pursuing radically 
different strategies. In reality, the only thing that unites the 
so-called Democratic Unity Roundtable is their opposition to the ruling 
United Socialist Party of Venezuela.

It is this disunity that led to their delay in initiating the recall 
referendum, making it all but impossible that a recall vote would occur 
this year.

The opposition is no position to plead ignorance, they attempted a 
recall once before in 2004 against former President Hugo Chavez. That is 
to say, they were fully aware that the process takes approximately eight 
months.

Yet the opposition insisted the recall happen in a rushed manner, and as 
a result, they submitted a high number of fraudulent signatures—the very 
same that have now led to the suspension of the entire process. Had the 
opposition faithfully followed the requirements of the recall process, 
the government would have been powerless to stop the recall vote from 
taking place.

This a fact that always goes unmentioned by the private media when they 
report on the recall referendum.

Disinformation and manipulation are the modus operandi of the Venezuelan 
opposition and their media lackeys, both domestic and international.

Recent events in the country mirror the lead-up to the 2002 military 
coup against Chavez. Before staging the short-lived coup attempt, media 
outlets demonized the Venezuelan government, utilizing the very same 
language now being used against Maduro.

In 2002, the right-wing opposition tried to delegitimize the Chavez 
government, staging protests calling for his ouster, and asking for 
international bodies to intervene.

The role of the media in setting the conditions for the coup attempt to 
take place was instrumental, so much so that one of the coup supporters 
even went on television to thank the private media for their role in the 
coup. In fact, it was that very same manipulation by the media that led 
Chavez to create more publicly owned media outlets, such as teleSUR.

The resolution issued by the opposition-controlled National Assembly has 
parallels to another dark episode in the political history of Latin 
America, the 1973 coup in Chile against democratically-elected President 
Salvador Allende.

Only months before the violent military coup on September 11, 1973, the 
Chilean parliament approved a resolution accusing the Allende government 
of acting unlawfully and calling for the armed forces to act to restore 
the constitution.

Like Venezuela today, international outlets jumped on this resolution, 
offering it up as proof that Allende was the head of a totalitarian 
regime. That media manipulation helped lay the groundwork for the coup.

The opposition coalition appears to be following that script, calling 
for a major protest Wednesday, dubbed "The Takeover of 
Venezuela"—something that government supporters view as an effort at 
destabilization and a precursor to the kind of violent protests seen in 
2014 or even another coup attempt.

-- 
Freedom Archives 522 Valencia Street San Francisco, CA 94110 415 
863.9977 www.freedomarchives.org
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