A motion has been proposed to my local Labour Party regarding Venezuela. As speakers will only have two minutes, I would not be able to reply to the motion in any great detail, so I’m going to address it here. I’m going to go through the motion line by line, and provide some general comments at the end. First, though, I want to address directly the question of whether Venezuela is currently a democracy.
Is Venezuela a democracy?
I’m going to start by looking at the famous voting system used in Venezuela, then look at other circumstances surrounding political competition there. I will then look at recent events in Venezuela, and then some of the popular indices of democracy used in political science.
The Venezuelan voting system
Claims have been made that the voting system in Venezuela is extremely robust, and therefore we can be sure that President Maduro was fairly elected. Statements from luminaries such as Jimmy Carter are brought out to support this. I addressed this at some length in a previous blog post, but the short version is that the turnout figures in 2017 were tampered with. Smartmatic, the company that provided the voting system, withdrew from the country because of interference in the voting system. If I may quote myself – and it’s my blog, so I may –
In short, despite the use of impressive election equipment, it was still possible for the elections to be rigged. The 2018 elections were not even conducted with Smartmatic there to audit the process; nor were the regional and municipal elections of the fourth quarter of 2017.
https://www.davidlandoncole.com/2019/01/regarding-skwawkbox-and-venezuelan-elections/
The various people brought out to support the integrity of the voting system made their statements before the system started being rigged.
The Canary has an article about alternative media countering a silent war on truth regarding Venezuela. I do not doubt for a moment that some people are trying to give a particular narrative about Venezuela to justify intervention, military or otherwise, and that some media are helping them, wittingly or otherwise, to do so, because they dislike the left and Chavez. However, I do not doubt for a moment that the reverse is true, with some alternative media running apologia for the regime because they like the left and Chavez. It doesn’t take much digging to show the problems with both sides.
Free and fair elections
I hope I have shown above that the elections were not fair: that is to say, the administration of the elections was not conducted in an even-handed way, to such an extent the technology provider stopped working in the country after fifteen years and fourteen elections. We refer to good elections, though, as being free as well as fair. That is to say, can anyone who so desires contest the elections, without being prevented from doing so or risking reprisal for doing so.
The Venezuelan government has arrested, detained, and otherwise stopped opposition leaders from contesting elections on trumped up charges and without due process.
Imagine if, after a protest turned nasty in London, Andrea Leadsom and Jeremy Hunt called for Jeremy Corbyn to be arrested, and, the day after he was arrested, Theresa May called for him to be imprisoned.
This happened in 2014 to Leopoldo Lopez, as Amnesty International reports
However, the organization believes that the fact that the warrant for the arrest of Leopoldo Lopez was issued one day after the President of the National Assembly, Diosdado Cabello, and the Foreign Minister, Elias Jaua Milano, accused him of bring responsible for the violence during anti-government protests violated his right to the presumption of innocence, and therefore to due process. Neither did the words of President Nicolas Maduro requesting the imprisonment of Leopoldo Lopez one day after his detention help to create a climate of confidence in the judicial system, which should act independently and impartially.
https://www.amnesty.org/download/Documents/4000/amr530092014en.pdf
Imagine if Diane Abbot and Jon Lansman were travelling in a car, and detained by MI5. Imagine if David Liddington announced that there had been guns and explosives in the car, and they were arrested and put in front of a military court, and the UN said that it was an arbitrary detention.
This happened to Gilber Caro, an MP from the Popular Will party, who was detained by the Bolivarian Intelligence Service. The Vice-President said that guns and explosives had been seized from the car in which he was travelling with another opposition activist, Steyci Escalona. MPs in Venezuela are supposed to have parliamentary immunity; instead,
he was “deprived of his freedom, imprisoned without a warrant, and brought before a military court despite being a civilian
https://www.amnesty.org/download/Documents/AMR5379922018ENGLISH.pdf
During his detention, Gilber Caro has repeatedly denounced violations to his right to food and being subjected to cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment.
On 23 October [2017], the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detentions determined Gilber Caro’s case constituted an arbitrary detention and demanded his immediate release.
Imagine if Jeremy Corbyn was banned from running for office for fifteen years due to administrative irregularities.
This happened to Henrique Capriles, after he led calls for a recall referendum on Nicolas Maduro.
Henrique Capriles is the latest in a series of prominent opposition politicians to be put out of action.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-39534732
Two years ago, Maria Corina Machado, a former congresswoman was banned from office as was a former mayor, Daniel Ceballos.
In 2015 another prominent opposition leader, Leopoldo Lopez was sentenced to nearly 14 years in prison on charges of inciting violence during anti-government protests in 2014.
Mr Lopez was himself barred from office in 2008 when he was the popular mayor of a Caracas district.
These are just three examples. There are many more. Nor is this targeted just at opposition leaders. The title of an Amnesty International post from last month on Venezuela suggests what is going on:
Hunger, punishment and fear, the formula for repression used by authorities under Nicolás Maduro
https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2019/02/venezuela-hunger-punishment-and-fear-the-formula-for-repression-used-by-authorities-under-nicolas-maduro/
In short, the government of Nicolas Maduro is using the power of the state to maintain its power and is abusing the human rights both of opposition leaders and ordinary citizens in the process.
Recent events
It’s important to highlight some of the extraordinary political events that have taken place in Venezuela of late. I draw extensively here from a House of Commons Briefing Paper by John Curtis and Daniel Harari called ‘The 2018 Venezuelan Presidential Election‘. However, these facts are not, I believe, contested.
Hugo Chavez died in office, on 5th March, 2013. The Vice-President, Nicolas Maduro, became Acting President. He would be confirmed as President in the elections of April 2013, when he beat Henrique Capriles (see above) by 1.49% of the vote. In December of 2013, the GPP (Gran Polo Patriotico Simon Bolivar, or Simon Bolivar Great Patriotic Pole; the electoral alliance of which Chavez and Maduro’s party, PSUV, formed part), came first in the municipal elections.
In the elections to the National Assembly of December 2015, the MUD (Mesa de la Unidad Democratica, or Democratic Unity Round Table) won a supermajority of two thirds. In theory, this would allow them to remove supreme court justices and make changes to the constitution. Much legislation and a proposed recall petition on Nicolas Maduro would be rejected by the Supreme Court.
Shortly after those elections, but before the new Assembly took office, new justices were appointed to the Supreme Court. Thirty-four justices of the High Court had stood down earlier that year; the opposition claimed that they were forced out.
In January of 2016, three MUD MPs stood down from the National Assembly. This meant that MUD no longer had a supermajority. The opposition alleged that they were pressured out by the regime.
In March of 2017, the Supreme Court declared the National Assembly to be in contempt, and gave itself the powers of the National Assembly, and said it would pass them out to such bodies as it considered appropriate. The international outcry is such that the ruling is reversed in April.
A special election was held in July 2017 for a Constituent National Assembly, ostensibly to draft a new constitution. The opposition boycotted the elections. The turnout figures were not reliable according to Smartmatic, the company behind the voting system, as I mention above. Smartmatic would leave Venezuela thereafter.
The opposition had organised an unofficial referendum on the Government’s plans for a Constituent National Assembly earlier that month. 98% reject the plans, although I don’t think we can place any trust in that figure actually representing Venezuelan opinion on the matter.
Sworn in during August of 2017, the Constituent National Assembly gave itself the power to pass legislation, effectively sidelining the National Assembly.
The October gubernatorial elections see GPP win 18 of the 23 races. Based on previous opinion polling, MUD claims electoral fraud, but cannot prove it. Four of the MUD governors elected eventually swear their oaths of office before the Constituent National Assembly. That decision apparently ‘fractures the coalition’.
In January of 2018, the Constituent National Assembly calls for the presidential elections scheduled for later that year to be brought forward to April; this receives much criticism, as it is felt there isn’t enough time to properly hold the elections in the reduced timeframe. MUD is barred from the elections. The election is later postponed to May 20. Around this time, the talks between MUD and the government being held in the Dominican Republic broke down.
We then come to the elections of 2018. The opposition grouping has been barred from participating. The dates have been changed. The opposition-controlled National Assembly has been sidelined in favour of a new body, which owes its existence to presidential decree. Opposition leaders have been arrested, detained, and harassed. There are widespread abuses of human rights.
The elections of 2018 were neither free nor fair.
Indices of democracy
There are three main indices of democracy used in political science. These are Democracy-Dictatorship (DD), originated by Adam Przeworski and others; Polity IV by the Centre for Systemic Peace; and Freedom House’s Freedom in the World (FitW).
There are well-known criticisms of FitW, principally based on Freedom House’s conceptions of negative liberties. While I think these are overstated, my preference is actually for the DD index. Unfortunately, DD is only available to 2008, so I turn to Polity IV to give us an indication of Venezuela’s democratic nature.
Polity IV measures democracy from 0 to 10, and autocracy from 0 to 10. This is then combined into a combined polity score – the first number less the second number, to give a figure from +10, meaning very democratic, to -10, meaning very autocratic. The table below gives Venezuela’s Polity IV scores from 2000 to 2017 (the most recent year for which data are available).
| Year | Democracy | Autocracy | Polity |
| 2000 | 7 | 0 | 7 |
| 2001 | 6 | 0 | 6 |
| 2002 | 6 | 0 | 6 |
| 2003 | 6 | 0 | 6 |
| 2004 | 6 | 0 | 6 |
| 2005 | 6 | 0 | 6 |
| 2006 | 5 | 0 | 5 |
| 2007 | 5 | 0 | 5 |
| 2008 | 5 | 0 | 5 |
| 2009 | 1 | 4 | -3 |
| 2010 | 1 | 4 | -3 |
| 2011 | 1 | 4 | -3 |
| 2012 | 1 | 4 | -3 |
| 2013 | 4 | 0 | 4 |
| 2014 | 4 | 0 | 4 |
| 2015 | 4 | 0 | 4 |
| 2016 | 4 | 0 | 4 |
| 2017 | 1 | 4 | -3 |
By way of comparison, some countries that received the maximum 10 in 2017 include New Zealand, Cape Verde, and Uruguay. Four states received the minimum -10 in 2017: Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, and North Korea. The other states that received a -3 in 2017 are the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda, Ethiopia, Jordan, Tajikistan, and Thailand. The United States received an 8 in 2017, while the UK received a 10.
Of course, it is possible for states’ Polity IV score to change rapidly. I would suggest that recent events in Venezuela do not, however, suggest that is likely.
For what it’s worth, FitW gives Venezuela an aggregate score of 26/100, and status of ‘not free’.
Venezuela is not a democracy.
The motion
The above provides, I hope, some context for the motion. I hope it also explains why I care so much about the issue.
The first section of the motion is ‘this CLP notes’. I will mark the various parts of the motion with an asterisk.
* Juan Guaidó, the leader of Venezuela’s National Assembly, has declared himself to be Interim President of Venezuela.
With the support of the National Assembly. I’ll return to this below.
* Guaidó did not stand in the presidential elections of May 2018, which were won by Nicolás Maduro with 68% of the vote.
The elections were neither free nor fair; Guaido’s political grouping was banned from taking part.
* The Venezuelan constitution contains no provisions for people to declare themselves Interim President.
This is wrong. Article 233 of the Constitution reads (my translation):
The following shall absolute disqualifications for the President of the Republic: their death, their resignation, their removal from office by sentence of the Supreme Court of Justice, their permanent physical or mental incapacity as certified by a medical panel appointed by the Supreme Court of Justice and with the approval of the National Assembly; abandoning the post, or declaration of such by the National Assembly, as well as revocation of mandate by the people.
https://venezuela.justia.com/federales/constitucion-de-la-republica-bolivariana-de-venezuela/titulo-v/capitulo-ii/
The claim made by Guaido and his supporters is that a due constitutional process has been followed. I am in no position to say whether that is legally correct or not. However, it is surely to the credit of the National Assembly that they have at least tried to operate within the constitution, given how fast and loose the government have played with such niceties.
* The Trump administration has formally recognized Guaidó as President of Venezuela, as has the Bolsonaro government in Brazil and other right-wing governments In Latin America.
This is a case of ‘the bad man said it’s bad, so it must be good’. Yes, some right-wing governments have recognised Guaido as president. Just being on the right of the centre does not everything you do is bad or wrong.
The countries that currently recognise Juan Guaido as acting president are as follows. I have underlined those states who have a party in government that is a member of the Socialist International.
Albania, Andorra, Argentina, Australia, Austria, the Bahamas, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Estonia, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Israel, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Montenegro, Netherlands, North Macedonia, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, the UK, and the US.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Responses_to_the_2019_Venezuelan_presidential_crisis#Guaid%C3%B3_acting_presidency
The countries that currently recognise Nicolas Maduro as president are as follows.
Belarus, Bolivia, Cambodia, China, Cuba, Dominica, El Salvador, Equatorial Guinea, Iran, Laos, Nicaragua, North Korea, Palestine, Russia, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Serbia, South Africa, Suriname, Syria, Turkey, and Uruguay.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Responses_to_the_2019_Venezuelan_presidential_crisis#Guaid%C3%B3_acting_presidency
If we have to choose sides based on which countries support who – we don’t, by the way – I’m going for the one with Norway and Iceland, rather than the one with Russia and China.
* The Trump administration has threatened military action against the Venezuelan government.
It has indeed, and has probably helped the Maduro regime in so doing. In case it isn’t clear, I don’t think the US should intervene in Venezuela, not least because the history of its actions in Central and South America mean it cannot possibly be an honest broker.
* UK Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt has described Guaidó as “the right person to take Venezuela forward”,and claims that “Nicolás Maduro is not the legitimate leader of Venezuela”.
I think Robin Cook would also have claimed that Maduro is not the legitimate leader of Venezuela. Maduro is a dictator, who rigs elections and oppresses any opposition to him.
* Economic sanctions from the past months have worsened any economic recovery and have prevented the government from doing anything that they could do to recover from both the hyperinflation and the depression.
The picture is a bit more complicated than that. However, there has been endemic corruption and mismanagement of the economy in Venezuela since before the recent tightening of sanctions. Coupled with the decline in the oil price, it seems unlikely that the current government would be able to extricate Venezuela from the dire economic situation in which it finds itself.
I will say, though, that general sanctions – as opposed to targeted sanctions on specific individuals – cause harm to ordinary people, rather than the leadership of states. I do not support them.
We move onto clauses under ‘This CLP believes’
* Over the last twenty years, the Venezuelan government has pursued policies aimed at alleviating poverty, reducing inequality, providing universal healthcare and education, building huge amounts of social housing, and building systems of participatory democracy.
For the most part, that is true. Systems of democracy, participatory or otherwise, have been avoided or destroyed by the Maduro government. Here, though, we have to acknowledge the improvements that happened under Chavez. He did use oil revenues to help the most disadvantaged in society. There’s an argument to be made that he should have used some of the money to build an economy that would be more resilient in the long term, but that’s a hard argument to make when your people are in penury. That notwithstanding, the administration of PDVSA was poor. Giving the military control of the state oil company, as Maduro did in 2018, is not going to improve production. Equally, he did not deal with the endemic corruption in Venezuela. Indeed, there’s an argument that he worsened both corruption and the democratic resilience of the state through the populism, often focused on himself, he promoted.
* This progressive focus has consistently been opposed by the US government.
I think it is certainly fair to say that the US, and others, have opposed the Venezuelan government for some time. Certainly, much of that is opposition to both Chavez’s social and economic policies. However, it would be quite wrong to say that it is exclusively because of this. I don’t want to further lengthen this already too-long post by going into Venezuela’s foreign policy, but it has, for instance, given material support to the FARC. There is plenty of opposition to Chavez and to Maduro that has nothing to do with those parts of their politics that are progressive.
* International sanctions against Venezuela (in which the UK participates) are a significant factor in the economic difficulties the country is facing.
Yes, but the principal cause is the mismanagement of the economy over a long period by Chavez and, more so, by Maduro.
* U.S. is using International Finance System to Strangle Venezuelan Economy.
It is broadly true that the US is using its financial clout to try to effect political change in Venezuela.
* Venezuela’s political problems must be resolved by Venezuelans, peacefully and within the framework of their constitution, without the interference of foreign states with a vested interest in removing a progressive government.
The government of Venezuela today is not progressive. No matter its economic policies, a government that imprisons opposition leaders and abuses human rights is not progressive. The problems within Venezuela will, ultimately, have to be solved by the Venezuelan people; one of those problems – the principal bar to progress – is Maduro.
I think it is entirely legitimate for other states – I note here the caveat I made above regarding the United States’ historical role in the region – to try to help processes of peace and reconciliation. Whether that counts as ‘interference’, I don’t know. I will note here as well that the Maduro regime has played fast and loose with the constitution: the establishment by decree of the Constituent National Assembly, the bringing forward of the dates of elections, and so on.
The final section comes under the head of “This CLP calls on the Labour parliamentary front bench to”
* Oppose any move by the UK government or the European Union to recognize Juan Guaidó as President or otherwise subvert the democratic process in Venezuela.
As I have said above, the democratic process in Venezuela has been subverted by the Maduro government, which has interfered with voting processes to the extent that the company providing the technology has left the country, imprisoned opposition leaders, and abused human rights. It is simply wrong to say that Nicolas Maduro was democratically elected. Even if he were democratically elected, his actions since the most recent presidential elections mark him as a dictator.
I do not know whether the best way to achieve a just, lasting peace in Venezuela is to recognise Guaido as president. It strikes me, though, that Juan Guaido (a member of Voluntad Popular, which is a member of the same Socialist International to which the UK Labour Party is an observer) is going to have to be involved in the peace process. There has been a lot of demonising of Guaido in the new media. To be clear, I don’t know a great deal about Guaido, but it does look like he is receiving a great deal of criticism simply because he has the temerity to oppose Maduro.
However, I can see why Guaido would reach out to anyone – almost anyone – who could support him in achieving democratic change in Venezuela.
*Facilitate a peaceful, negotiated solution to the political crisis, including calling for an end to sanctions.
I’m not entirely sure what the opposition front bench can do to facilitate such a solution but, such as it can, it should. I do not support removing all sanctions from Venezuela – for instance, the sanctions targeting specific individuals involved in human rights abuses and drug trafficking – but I suspect that I would want all or most of the broad economic sanctions to end.
* Call to stop the Trump’s administration economic warfare and sanctions depriving the country of foreign exchange needed to import necessities. These sanctions are designed to prevent any economic recovery and are now destroying the economy as well as creating shortages of food and medicine.
The flowery language aside, this is similar to the previous clause. I simply re-iterate that principal causes of Venezuela’s current situation are the actions of its government.
Some final thoughts
If you have reached this far, thankyou.
My suspicion is that the promoters of this motion are doing so with the best interests of the people of Venezuela at heart, and that they desire, as I do, justice and peace in that country. I suspect I also share with them great concern about what the US is doing in Venezuela at the moment, and has done in the past.
My concern is that they are at risk of going from opposing American intervention, and certainly military intervention, to supporting the government of Nicolas Maduro. I do not doubt that Maduro has some support, and that Chavez had considerable support. However, we must not allow opposition to military adventurism in Venezuela to become support for the current regime.
If there is to be that just, lasting peace in Venezuela, the regime will have to substantially change, and Guaido or someone like him will be part of the process. What part we can play will be strengthened by making sure we stay close to that which is real.
Unfortunately, I cannot attend my CLP meeting. I’d considered what I would do – propose amendments, speak against, ask questions – but I hope that this will suffice and that, in the unlikely event that anyone who attends the CLP meeting reads this, they will bear what I say in mind.
PS – I’ve written this pretty much from the top of my head; I trust that you will forgive any typos or other slips.