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dir="ltr"> <font size="-2"><a id="reader-domain" class="domain"
href="https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/07/19/venezuelan-opposition-consultation-playing-alone-and-losing/">https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/07/19/venezuelan-opposition-consultation-playing-alone-and-losing/</a></font>
<h1 id="reader-title">Venezuelan Opposition “Consultation”:
Playing Alone and Losing</h1>
<div id="reader-credits" class="credits">by <span
class="post_author" itemprop="author"><a
href="https://www.counterpunch.org/author/ricardo-vaz/"
rel="nofollow">Ricardo Vaz</a></span></div>
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<p><em>Sunday, July 16, was a significant day in
Venezuela’s political history. The right-wing
opposition MUD, backed by the United States, threw all
its weight behind a “consultation” that they hoped
would show that their coup attempts had a formidable
public backing and trigger the “zero hour” of a new
phase that would lead to the removal of the Bolivarian
government. In the end the stunt backfired, leaving
the opposition more or less stranded. The real
surprise was the show of force from chavismo, which
went out on the streets to rebuke the opposition’s
stunt and take part in a dry-run for the July 30
Constituent Assembly elections.</em></p>
<p>The opposition “plebiscite”, or “referendum”, which in
reality was nothing more than a non-binding
“consultation” without any legal status, was predicted
as a major political earthquake that would instantly
change the country’s landscape. Maria Corina Machado,
one of the most extreme opposition leaders, <a
href="https://twitter.com/MariaCorinaYA/status/886713522876547072">likened</a>
it to the destruction of the Berlin wall, Mandela being
elected or the toppling of Saddam Hussein (no subtlety
there!).</p>
<p>The process would have been laughed into oblivion had
it taken place anywhere else. No electoral records were
used, expired documents were accepted and there was
nothing stopping people from voting <a
href="https://twitter.com/marxistJorge/status/886755416495067136">more
than once</a>. There was no monitoring and in the end
all the evidence was burned, so no audit was possible.
As for the ballot, it had <a
href="https://www.laizquierdadiario.cl/El-plebiscito-de-la-MUD-una-maniobra-para-objetivos-reaccionarios">3
questions</a> to be answered yes/no: whether people
rejected the upcoming Constituent Assembly, whether they
called the armed forces to intervene (i.e. a coup) and
whether all public powers should be renewed, free and
fair elections held, and a national unity government
formed to restore order. <u>(1)</u></p>
<p>The final result of 7,186,170 votes falls short of the
opposition’s total in the 2015 legislative elections,
and unlike what Henrique Capriles says, it would not be
enough to <a
href="http://www.el-nacional.com/noticias/oposicion/capriles-hoy-fuera-revocatorio-nicolas-maduro-seria-revocado_193546">recall</a>
Maduro, who received 7,587,579 votes in the 2013
presidential election, even with all the manipulation of
figures <u>(2)</u>. It also fell way short of
not-so-wise predictions of 11M (<a
href="http://www.lavanguardia.com/politica/20170715/424120875521/capriles-espera-que-11-millones-de-venezolanos-participen-en-el-referendum.html">Capriles</a>)
or even 14M votes (AD leader <a
href="http://elsiglo.com.ve/2017/07/11/esperan-que-14-millones-de-venezolanos-participen-en-consulta-popular-del-16j/">Negal
Morales</a>)!</p>
<p>And it is worth mentioning that with 2000 voting
centres and 14000 booths, this vote total would imply
that every centre was full for 9 straight hours with a
new vote roughly every 65 seconds. Given that the
process implies walking up to the booth, showing ID,
writing the name down on the electoral register,
receiving the ballot, going to the booth and filling it,
folding it, putting it in the box and walking away, this
number raises a few eyebrows. And that is excluding
people like Lilian Tintori who had to make a little <a
href="https://twitter.com/i/web/status/886679632984068098">speech</a>
before voting!</p>
<p>It is hard to understand the over-the-top statements of
opposition officials and media. The turnout, while
significant, was smaller than in previous elections, way
smaller than the outlandish predictions, and that is
giving a pass to all the dubious number manipulations.
The demands have been heard for weeks and were echoed by
leading figures even before the “results” were tallied.
The entire show was irrelevant because “victory” had
been pre-announced, and the corresponding massive
chavista participation in an electoral dry-run (see
below) was surely not expected. Jorge Martín <a
href="https://www.marxist.com/venezuela-july-opposition.htm">summarised</a>
the current crossroads for the Venezuelan opposition:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>“We can therefore say that the opposition
“referendum” backfired. At the time of writing, the
opposition leaders have not yet come out to say what
are the next steps they intend to take. Their rhetoric
before July 16 was fiery. The consultation was to be
the “zero hour” for a national uprising and the
removal of the government before the July 30
Constituent Assembly elections. They might still try
that, but now it looks less likely that they will
achieve any such thing. Of course they will not stop
trying. Both Spain and the US are already mulling over
the idea of sanctions against Venezuela (perhaps
targeted at selected officials) “if the Constituent
Assembly goes ahead.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>At a press conference on Monday the opposition
announced a “civic strike” for Thursday, and that they
would be nominating new supreme court justices on
Friday, whatever that means. This is a far cry from the
premonitions that the end of the “dictatorship” was
near, and we will have to wait and see how the
opposition intends to escalate further.</p>
<p><strong>The Cubans are coming</strong></p>
<p>A common theme amongst the Venezuelan upper classes and
plain idiots (these two groups overlap very often) is
this idea that chavismo’s ultimate goal is to turn the
country into their hell-on-earth propaganda version of
Cuba, or even that it is the Cubans who are <a
href="http://peru21.pe/cultura/henrique-capriles-nicolas-maduro-fue-cuba-recibir-ordenes-su-jefe-2128380">running
the show</a>. Opposition leader <a
href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-40624313">Julio
Borges</a> said that “We don’t want to be Cuba”, while
“patriot” <u>(3)</u> <a
href="http://www.elpais.com.co/mundo/reaparecio-el-piloto-oscar-perez-y-advirtio-una-segunda-fase-para-rescatar-a-venezuela.html">Oscar
Perez</a> said that holding the Constituent Assembly
means handing the country over to the Cubans.</p>
<p>It must have taken all the opposition’s collective
common sense to omit “Cuba” from the ballot. The media
often tries to omit the more embarrassing aspects of the
Venezuelan opposition, but the waving of the Cuban
bogeyman is quite prevalent for the right-wing in
Venezuela, and Latin America in general.</p>
<p>Several right-wing former leaders came to Venezuela for
the occasion, as “observers”. People like Andres
Pastrana and Jorge Quiroga, with enviable resumes of
corruption and human rights abuses, flew down to lecture
others on democracy. The most memorable moment was
undoubtedly this tweet by former Mexican president
Vicente Fox:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Diosdao Cabello, Yow’r the one behind Dictator
Maduro, You’r the killer, you torture, your hands’r
full blood, You’ll meet Halle Court. Prepare</p>
</blockquote>
<p>One can only wonder why he is addressing Diosdado
Cabello, a leader of the PSUV, in English. And it is
anybody’s guess what a “Halle Court” is. If Fox wants to
showcase his multilingual usefulness to his imperial
masters he should install a spell-checker on his phone.</p>
<p><strong>Staggeringly dishonest media</strong></p>
<p>The coverage of Sunday’s events in the mainstream press
had all the usual <a
href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jul/17/venezuela-protests-death-thousands-vote-unofficial-referendum">bias</a>
and <a
href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-40624313">dishonesty</a>.
Rather than report the event for what it was: a
non-binding consultation with no records, no monitors
and no control on people voting more than once, the
media just ran with the line that this was a big show of
support that shook the government and refer to the event
like it was a legitimate electoral process.</p>
<p>More than that, they resorted to their usual tactic of
<em>“Maduro said”</em> to try and discredit the other
point of view. So instead of this being a popular
consultation with no verification or binding status, it
was a poll that <em>“Maduro said was meaningless”</em>.
This is akin to, for example, the US Food and Drug
Administration finding something wrong with Burger King
and the company making a “Trump does not like our
burgers” publicity stunt.</p>
<p>As always, nobody can quite compete with the <a
href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/16/world/americas/venezuelans-vote-on-measures-devised-to-weaken-maduro.html">New
York Times</a> when it comes to dishonest reporting.
The NYT starts by announcing that “Venezuelans Rebuke
Their President by a Staggering Margin”. Imagine that…
Anti-government supporters go to an anti-government
initiative and, believe it or not, they “vote” against
the government! Next they will be asking about the right
of return of Palestinian refugees at a Zionist
convention and be surprised at the <em>staggering</em>
results.</p>
<p>The NYT follows this with a litany of falsehoods and
distortions that would merit an entire article on their
own. It says that the 1999 constitution has a provision
authorising this kind of consultation (it does not),
that the Constituent Assembly will do away with
elections (it will not) and that Maduro will “appoint”
“handpicked” members to it (they will be elected). The
article also mentions that the government has postponed
<em>every</em> election since the December 2015
legislative elections, but in fact only <em>one</em>
poll was scheduled since then. That was the
regional/governor elections that were due to take place
last year and were postponed because they conflicted
with the opposition recall referendum process, being
finally set for December 2017. The NYT also misleads its
readers by saying that the third question on the
opposition consultation was about “free elections to
pick a new “national unity government””, when in fact
the <a
href="https://www.laizquierdadiario.cl/El-plebiscito-de-la-MUD-una-maniobra-para-objetivos-reaccionarios">question</a>
mentions a “national unity government” <em>now</em>, to
“restore constitutional order”, and free elections <em>later</em>.
The key is in the name. “National unity” governments are
usually not elected…</p>
<p><strong>Chavista response</strong></p>
<p>Simultaneous to the opposition consultation, the
Venezuelan electoral authorities ran a dry-run for the
July 30th Constituent Assembly elections, to test the
process and help voters familiarise themselves with the
voting machines. This turned out to be a chavista show
of force, with queues forming from early morning and the
voting deadline extended in a few places. Photo
galleries attest to this large mobilisation (see <a
href="http://albaciudad.org/2017/07/en-fotos-miles-de-personas-participan-en-el-simulacro-para-la-constituyente/">here</a>,
<a href="http://www.avn.info.ve/node/403576">here</a> or
<a
href="https://www.facebook.com/lucia.zerpa/posts/10154940806149426">here</a>).</p>
<p>The mainstream mostly ignored or downplayed the
pro-government mobilisation, but some outlets stumbled
on the pitfalls of their one-sided coverage. Spain’s <a
href="https://www.facebook.com/ManosFueradeVenezuela/posts/1795991100430047">El
País</a> published photos of people who were clearly
chavistas, with the caption <em>“chavistas were queuing
to vote in the opposition consultation”</em>. This was
beyond ridiculous because people had banners supporting
the Constituent Assembly, so the inconvenient photos
were deleted and the blame assigned to EFE Agency.</p>
<p>Even with all the hardships and months of opposition
political violence, the chavista bases have made it
clear time and again that they are not going to
sleepwalk into an opposition coup and have seized the
Constituent Assembly as an opportunity to strengthen the
gains of the Bolivarian Revolution and radicalise even
further. Whether these impulses will be able to overcome
the more conciliatory sectors of chavismo and the
concessions to “patriotic businessmen” remains to be
seen.</p>
<p>What is clear is that the opposition is not where it
hoped it would be by now. With the exception of a rogue
state’s attorney and a handful of opportunist former
chavista officials, trying to position themselves as a
“third way”, the opposition’s campaign has failed to
cause breaks inside chavismo. Despite the constant
appeals for a military coup, they have also not caused
any movement inside the armed forces. And most
importantly, they have not made significant inroads in
getting the popular classes on their side, not even in
getting them to demobilise <u>(4)</u>. The upcoming
Constituent Assembly is therefore a golden opportunity
to strike a serious blow to the coup-plotters and their
imperial backers.</p>
<p><strong>Notes</strong></p>
<p>(1) In retrospect, the opposition might also have tried
to frame this consultation as a vote for their “national
unity” government, assuming they could ever agree on
one. The US, its allies and the media might have started
referring to it as the “legitimate representative of the
Venezuelan people”, like they did with Syria. A few
dozen puppets, nominated by the backers of the Syrian
war (Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey, etc), living in
Turkey, chose a “government” which was referred to as
the “legitimate representative…” for a while, before it
became clear that nobody cared about it.</p>
<p>(2) Perhaps aware of Maduro’s total, the opposition
claimed the 7.1M corresponded to 95% of total ballots,
and later came out with the total convenient figure of
7.6M. One wonders how a total can be updated after the
ballots are <a
href="http://www.lechuguinos.com/mud-incendio-actas-plebiscito/">burned</a>.
However, given that they claimed that 98.4% voted “Yes”,
because 100% would not be as respectable, this brings
the total of “Yes” votes to 7.48M, again below Maduro’s
2013 total!</p>
<p>(2b) On Monday night, PSUV leader and mayor of
Libertador Jorge Rodríguez <a
href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HKPJJe3dSIE">revealed</a>
a phone conversation between two opposition leaders in
Aragua who openly talked about cooking the numbers and
adding 50.000 to the total for the state. He also
claimed, but did not provide evidence, that the 7M+
VOTES did not correspond to the same number of VOTERS,
but that the opposition was counting every voter 3
times, since the ballot had 3 questions. So the event
would have had only around 2.5M voters and the
opposition revealed the total number of “Yes” votes.</p>
<p>(3) On June 27 Oscar Perez stole a police helicopter,
fired weapons and threw grenades at government
buildings, and yet the <a
href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jun/28/venezuela-helicopter-attack-oscar-perez-rumors">Guardian</a>
referred to him as a “patriot” or a “government plant”!</p>
<p>(4) It is hard to convince the poor and working-class
that you have their best interests at heart when your
foot-soldiers are <a
href="https://www.google.de/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjluYqZoZHVAhWL8RQKHXfmDD4QFggtMAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.telesurtv.net%2Fenglish%2Fnews%2FVenezuelan-Youth-Burned-for-Being-Chavista-Dies-from-Injuries-20170604-0011.html">setting
people on fire</a> because they <em>look</em>
chavista.</p>
<p><em>This article originally appeared in <a
href="http://www.investigaction.net/">Investig’action</a>. </em></p>
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