Yesterday a new article of mine came out in Foreign Policy on some of the possible contingencies for the upcoming Venezuelan Elections. An earlier version of the piece, which the FP editors felt may be a bit too legalistic and technical for their purposes, was just the sort of thing which I suspect might be of more interest to readers here on constitutionmaking.org since legalities and technicalities are much of what we're all about. I am posting it below.
The Foreign Policy version (which ended up being almost entirely different) can be found at the following link.
Fatherland,
Socialism or Death:
How
far might Hugo Chávez be willing to go to preserve his revolution?
In January 2007, after
being sworn in as president of Venezuela for the third consecutive time, a
beaming Hugo Chávez made
a promise to his supporters: “I vow by Jesus Christ,” he told them, “Fatherland, Socialism or Death. I swear
it.”
Now, nearly six years
later, with his own health dipping and a newly emboldened opposition set to
give him his greatest electoral challenge to date, the World can’t help but
wonder: in vowing to defend his revolution with his life was El Comandante merely slipping into his
trademark rhetorical bombast or was it something deeper? And, if the latter,
what might this mean for the Venezuelan people if they decide
that they have lost faith?
On
paper Chávez’s personal willingness to step down should be irrelevant as
Venezuela, at least in
theory, possess one of the most independent
electoral systems in the world. The 1999
Constitution is somewhat unusual in
that it delineates five separate (and nominally equal) authorities to the government.
Beyond the usual executive, legislative and judicial branches it establishes an
independent “electoral branch:” an apolitical authority empowered to
impartially police the electoral process, tabulate results and announce an
eventual winner.
Yet,
in practice, constitutional design and reality diverged long ago in Venezuela, and
the president’s personal influence is so pervasive as to essentially control every
national institution and tendril of governance. For example, Luisa Estela
Morales, the presiding magistrate of the Venezuelan Supreme Court, has publically
proclaimed her belief that separation
of powers “unacceptably weakened the state” despite the constitution’s clear
indications to the contrary.
Similarly,
four of the five magistrates of the Consejo Nacional Electoral (CNE), the
electoral authority, are avowed and loyal
supporters of the president and have
shown themselves to be far from impartial in practice. During this and other
electoral campaigns they have habitually turned a blind eye to countless
illegalities and abuses on the part of
the government; including the decorating of state buildings with campaign
material, the misappropriation
of state funds for campaign use, rampant
gerrymandering, misuse
of emergency powers to commandeer radio and television signals for campaign
messaging, and the de
facto disenfranchising of Venezuelan émigrés
(most of them opponents of the regime) through the closing of the Miami Consulate.
Yet while allowing the government veritable carte blanche, the CNE has oft been
ready to obstruct the opposition such as their recently censure of Henrique Capriles
Radonski, the opposition candidate, for wearing
a hat designed after the official flag of
the republic.
Thus
far the opposition has begrudgingly shrugged off this favoritism, downplaying
CNE obstruction where possible in the hopes of keeping Venezuelans excited
about the election, and galvanized to vote. There is some internal concern
among some opposition leaders however that by thus ignoring the elephant in the
room – that the government may simply misrepresent or disregard an unwelcome
electoral outcome – they may not be adequately preparing their supporters for
such an eventuality.
One
high-ranking opposition leader, who preferred he not be named, expressed to me privately
his concern that:
“By
pretending that this is a normal election and that every vote will be counted,
we are giving Chávez the ability to steal the election on a silver platter... If
we have been saying all along: ‘go ahead and vote, your vote will matter.’ And
then, following an announcement of our defeat, turn around and say ‘so it seems
your vote didn't matter and they stole it!’ What then? Will we be taken
seriously internationally? What about domestically?”
A
good question…
Of
course when it comes to the democratic process there may be no better predictor
than the past. For example, expect Cuban elections to be rigged,
primarily because they always have been so, while as regards Canadian elections
we have been primed
to expect the opposite. Yet in this regard, Venezuela is in something of a grey
area: while pre-electoral hijinks, abuses,
and improprieties are nothing new, dating back to long
before Chávez, there have been no
clear cases of voter fraud, deliberate
miscounting, or of a government refusing to acknowledge results at least since
the advent of Venezuelan popular democracy in the late 1950s. In fact, the country’s
last unelected dictator, Marcos Pérez Jiménez, was himself overthrown due in no
small part to a his disavowal of an unfavorable referendum result over a new
constitution, the sheer brazenness of which was instrumental in sparking
large-scale popular protests and eventually costing him the loyalty of the
armed forces.
Yet
despite the fate of Pérez Jiménez, there is considerable circumstantial
evidence that, under the current regime, electoral fraud would not be entirely
off the table should the presidency be at stake. When, during the 2007 vote to
abolish constitutional term limits, Chávez’s government came up short in the
vote, the electoral authorities inexplicably demurred for nearly eight hours
prior to announcing the results; despite near-instant tabulation systems and
some of the modern
voting equipment in the world.
According
to Yon
Goicoechea, a Venezuelan
pro-democracy activist and perhaps the most visible opposition leader during Chávez’s
2007 electoral defeat, the government made no secret to him during this time that
it was holding meetings behind closed doors while electoral authorities, military
leaders and presidential agents “figured things out.” He further claims to have
been personally approached by government officials on multiple occasions during
this period to “negotiate.” While eventually
ceding victory, the electoral authorities have to date refused
to release the actual tabulated voting
results raising the compelling possibility that the government’s decision may
have been influenced by more technical concerns in the case that a large margin
of loss would have rendered fraud more difficult in a practical sense.
More
recently, when the 2010 parliamentary elections delivered a majority of the
popular vote to non-Chávez backed candidates; another mysterious multi-hour lag
took place. In fact, if one compares the outcomes of elections to the time it
has taken the government to announce an “irreversible” result – at least during
the eight years that the CNE has existed in roughly its current form – an
interesting pattern begins to emerge:
|
Outcome
|
First Announcement
|
2005 Parliamentary
|
Chávez wins – running largely unopposed due
to opposition boycott
|
9:45 PM
|
2006 Presidential
|
Chávez wins - 63% of the popular vote
|
10:00 PM
|
2007 Constitutional Reform
|
Opposition wins - at least 51%, final
results never publicized officially
|
1:30 AM (following day)
|
2008 Regional
|
Chávez wins in 18/22 states. Opposition
wins control of most populous areas including Caracas, Maracaibo and Valencia
|
11:40 PM
|
2009 Constitutional Reform
|
Chávez 55%
|
9:30 PM
|
2010 Parliamentary
|
Opposition wins 51% of popular vote,
although gerrymandered districting prior to the lection results in only 66
seats out of 144, sufficient only to break supermajority
|
2 AM (following day)
|
Keeping
in mind this inverse correlation between CNE expediency and result favorability
(from a government perspective), in conjunction with Goicoechea’s account, it
seems likely that some kind of cost benefit analysis is indeed taking place.
That an “independent” authority should feel the need to do this at all likewise
highlights the degree to which the decision to accept or not accept, modify or
disavow the results of this election is dependent on the president himself and
his allies: if not, why not announce immediately?
Therein
lies the problem. In previous cases where the CNE eventually accepted unwelcome
electoral results, the outcome in question – ie., scrapping
term limits, or supermajority
requirements – could be (and eventually were) brought about later through
alternate means. Yet while in 2007 Chávez could accept a temporary setback, garnishing
his democratic credentials while preserving his political capital, his current
health problems and Capriles’ promises to dismantle
Chávez’s revolution should he be inaugurated, render this type of long-term
strategic planning unlikely to carry much weight at present.
With
a closely-controlled CNE and a green light from the president himself unlikely
to be forthcoming, the likeliest outcomes for October 7th would be
either a fairly-tabulated Chávez
victory or else a stolen
election. The challenge for the opposition then
will likely lie in telling these two outcomes apart, and deciding what to do
about it should they come to believe the latter. According to Goicoechea, had
the electoral authorities refused to acknowledge the government’s defeat in
2007: “we were prepared to call the Venezuelan people to the streets to defend
their votes.” In his view, Capriles, whom he describes as a strong but
responsible leader, would almost certainly be willing to do likewise “but first
he would have to know with certainty.”
Yet
such knowledge may indeed prove difficult to come by, for while the opposition
has done much to secure
its access to electoral information, only the CNE itself would be privy to the
exact vote counts. This would leave the opposition dependent on more subjective
metrics such as exit polling, observer testimonials and the vastly
disparate pre-election polls. Likewise, even if
the opposition were confident enough in the results so as to call its
supporters “to the streets” it is uncertain whether the great
crowds that have previously rallied in
support of Capriles would still do so should the government suspend
constitutional safety guarantees or implement martial law. Yet the throngs of enthusiastic
supporters that rallied around the
opposition candidate during the closing of his campaign in Caracas on Sunday
served, to some, as
evidence that among his followers, for now at
least, loyalty runs quite deep.
Either
way, the opposition leadership may feel they have little choice but to attempt
a destabilizing mass protest. With passions running high, it seems unlikely
that the opposition could simply wait out such a failure without risking
massive disillusion among their supporters. Likewise with the U.S. otherwise distracted
by Middle
East unrest, Spain bankrupt,
Colombia counting on Chávez in upcoming
negotiations with the FARC, and
Brazilian relations recently
strained by an alleged indigenous massacre, the
prospects for substantial support from the international community must seem pretty bleak.
Recently,
former US Ambassador to Venezuela Patrick Duddy released a policy
paper through the Council on Foreign
Relations outlining possible contingencies for the October 7th in
Venezuela. The report claimed that: “...if
the public suspects that Chávez has used extra-constitutional means to preclude
or invalidate an opposition victory in order to sustain his regime's hold on
power… protests over such actions, which could turn violent, may in turn lead
to the imposition of martial law and the further curtailment of democratic
rights in Venezuela. This would almost certainly trigger a major political
crisis in the Western Hemisphere…”
Unfortunately,
were such a confrontation to take place, martial law and reduced freedoms might
be the least of it. The worse danger might lie in possible conflict between
civilian supporters of either camp. Should victorious Chavistas gathering for
their traditional post-election celebration outside of the presidential palace,
only to find themselves face-to-face
with opposition protesters demanding a reversal and “defending” their vote, the
potential
for violence cannot, in my estimation, be overstated. Deep-seeded animosity already
exists between the civilian support networks of both camps as was recently illustrated
through the spat of campaigning
violence in the seaside town of Puerto
Cabello.
Should
this type of worse case scenario come to pass, the restoration of order would depend
on the Venezuelan Armed Forces, as in all likelihood would any final decision regarding
the contested election itself. Once involved however, it is difficult
to know ex ante what the military may do. Unlike
other national institutions like the CNE or the courts, whose support for the
government is reflexive and can be assumed the Armed Forces are a bit of a
black box. While two years ago, Henry Rangel
Silva, a high ranking General and defense minister, went on
record a few years ago as saying the army was
strongly supportive of President Chávez’s administration and would find it
“difficult to accept a change in government” more recent comments by Willmer
Barrientos, the current head of military operations made an announcement to the
effect that among the army, neutrality
would indeed be upheld regardless of the outcome.
Mixed
messages such as these from among the Armed forces leadership may represent
actual divisions within the ranks. While Chávez has been careful to cultivate
the support of the top brass, there is little certainty as to how much control
these would be able to exert over middle-ranking officers; traditionally the
key factor in Venezuelan military interventions as seen in Pérez Jiménez’s
initial seizure of power as well as the aborted coups led by (and against) Chávez
himself in 1992
and 2002
respectively.
In a moment of frustration, Simon Bolivar (Venezuela’s first
president and Chávez’s personal idol) is said to have lamented of his then
splintering empire that while Colombia was a
university and Ecuador a convent, Venezuela was more of a barracks. Nearly two
hundred years later, it seems a real possible that the choice of his next
successor may indeed be decided in one.
Perhaps
“Socialism, or democracy or death” would have been more appropriate…
Read More...
Summary only...
