VHeadline editor & publisher Roy S. Carson writes: As if Venezuela's Foreign Minister (MRE) Nicolas Maduro needs a hole in his head, the former Caracas 'por puesto' (mini-bus) driver has gone into xenophobic overdrive and in a further act of diplomatic lunacy had decided to expel Human Rights Watch (HRW) Americas director Jose Miguel Vivanco on claims that he had made "unacceptable remarks" against Venezuela's institutions!
In an evident fit of nationalistic pique, Maduro whined "we aren't going to tolerate any foreigner coming here to sully the dignity of Venezuela's institutions."
Oh, dearie me!
At essence is a 230-page HRW report entitled "A Decade Under Chavez: Political Intolerance and Lost Opportunities for Advancing Human Rights in Venezuela," Vivanco had made use of Venezuela's very liberal, Constitutional freedom of expression rights to collate an opinion of the Chavez regime with the conclusion that "in its efforts to counter political opposition and consolidate power, the government of President Hugo Chavez has weakened democratic institutions and human rights guarantees in Venezuela."
Next thing we know. is that Jose Miguel Vivanco is sent packing on a plane back to New York with his tail figuratively between his legs!
No greater gift could have been given to the dissemination of untruths and lies about Venezuela's system of participative democracy than to qualify the Bush dictatorship's unfounded prejudice against Venezuela as a "Banana Republic" home to a "tin pot Dictator" by the name of Hugo Rafael Chavez Frias!
What on earth was Maduro thinking? Didn't he even stop awhile to realize the gift horse he was giving to the domestic opposition as well? What further proof does the anti-Chavez media need to justify their perpetual bleating of how Chavez supposedly conducts his personal matters of national government with sledge hammer abuse of everything in the dictatorship handbook?
Regrettably, it is just a further failing of the blinkered, but fully functioning, democratic government of President Hugo Chavez to deal with important issues of international concern. It's easier for Maduro to throw the toys out of the pram and scream and throw tantrums than to take an in-depth review of the causes and effects of the Human Rights Watch plethora of deliberate accusations and libel.
HRW says its report "examines the impact of the Chavez presidency on institutions that are essential for ensuring respect for human rights and the rule of law: the courts, the media, organized labor, and civil society."
Vivanco -- no fawning groupie of Chavez under any circumstance -- comments that "ten years ago, Chavez promoted a new constitution that could have significantly improved human rights in Venezuela ... but, rather than advancing rights protections, his government has since moved in the opposite direction, sacrificing basic guarantees in pursuit of its own political agenda."
Fair enough ... and basically it is Vivanco's (or HRW's collective) comment that is correct or incorrect depending on one's particular bias when reviewing the subject material. The conclusions are opinions, pure and simple. But Maduro takes it a step further and seemingly claims that the right of free expression as guaranteed under Venezuela's 1999 Constitution apply selectively and exclusively to Venezuelan citizens?
What does that mean: are we despicable foreigners to remain stum?
- ...and if we are not allowed to comment on anything about Venezuela, how much more illegal would it be for any foreigner to freely express the opinion that Venezuelans are a loving and truly hospitable people; that Venezuela is such a truly wonderful and beautiful country; to opine that Venezuela is virtually Paradise on Earth!
Vivanco does acknowledge "the most dramatic blow to Venezuelan democracy in the last 10 years was the 2002 coup against Chavez ... fortunately it lasted only two days."
To Maduro's obvious chagrin he then goes on to comment "unfortunately the Chavez government has exploited it ever since to justify policies that have degraded the country's democracy."
Pure opinion, granted, but is it sufficient to warrant immediate expulsion from Venezuela on a north-bound jet plane?
Rightly or wrongly (we'll let the reader decide) Vivanco claims that "in the absence of credible judicial oversight, the Chavez government has systematically pursued often discriminatory policies that have undercut journalists' freedom of expression, workers' freedom of association, and civil society's ability to promote human rights in Venezuela ... discrimination on political grounds has been a defining feature of the Chavez presidency ... the Chavez government has engaged in wide-ranging acts of discrimination against political opponents and critics ... at times, the President himself has openly endorsed acts of discrimination ... more generally, he has encouraged the discriminatory actions of subordinates by routinely denouncing his critics as anti-democratic conspirators ... regardless of whether they had any connection to the 2002 coup!"
We at VHeadline don't necessarily agree with HRW or Vivanco's analysis although previous editorials on the subject will have indicated our very own concern over the current state of affairs with rampant sectarianism, exclusion on top of the malfeasance and corruption we have highlighted as detrimental to President Hugo Chavez Frias' central theme of returning participative democratic power to the Venezuelan grassroots who, by virtue of their citizenship, have the electoral mechanism at their disposal to decide the country's fate.
Admittedly, as foreigners, even as foreigners who have plighted our troth to Venezuela, and the Venezuelan people's ultimate destiny, we do NOT have the right to vote and have no electoral mandate to decide anything ... however, our right to freely express opinions across national and international borders is enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (adopted and proclaimed by General Assembly resolution 217 A (III) of December 10, 1948), http://www.un.org/Overview/rights.html and subsequently ratified by the Venezuelan government to wit: "Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers."
The rest of the 230-page HRW report is a concoction of greater or lesser-known (usually USA biased) opinions about Venezuela, given some semblance of international respectability by being issued by a supposedly serious guardian of international human rights. Sadly, this is not always so, given the omni-present bias for Washington DC's think-tanks and, more obviously, the care given NOT to otherwise economically to offend the hyper-sensibilities of the organization's central funders...
We can agree or disagree on defining Chavez' presidency as being in open disregard for the principle of separation of powers. and we can agree or disagree on whether or not there has been a political takeover of the Supreme Court by Chavez and his supporters in 2004, which (according to HRW) effectively neutralized the judiciary as an independent branch of government. It's rather like discussing the implications of a Bush nomination of a Supreme Court Judge and what may or may not be seen as Bush's dictatorial control of the US judiciary -- opinion, pure and simple!
We can, however disagree with certain aspects of HRW's claim that the Chavez government "has undermined freedom of expression through a variety of measures aimed at reshaping media control and content." HRW stretches itself to admitting that "Venezuela still enjoys a vibrant public debate in which anti-government and pro-government media are equally vocal in their criticism and defense of Chavez!"
Vivanco, however, shows little understanding for the absence of certain failures or outright absence of Venezuelan laws on libel and slander when he claims that the President has "expanded and toughened penalties for speech and broadcasting offenses" which he claims "have strengthened the state's capacity to limit free speech, and created powerful incentives for critics to engage in self-censorship."
Vivanco harps on the hoary rhetoric of Radio Caracas Television (RCTV) when he claims that the Venezuelan State "abuses its control of broadcasting frequencies to intimidate and discriminate against stations with overtly critical programming."
Let's just ignore the fact, for a moment, that RCTV would have been hauled off the air more readily in the United States than it was tolerated in Venezuela for ignoring the Law on Media Social Responsibility by broadcasting filth -- pornography and violence -- at all hours of the night and day regardless of even any thought of moral restraint, never mind legal broadcast responsibilities.
The Venezuelan government (via Conatel and NOT Chavez personally!) refused to renew a free-to-air broadcast license to RCTV when it came up for renewal! Whether or not you agree or disagree with the inevitable decision by Conatel, it had every democratic right to do so!
One can readily discuss the unmitigated crap produced by TVes, which has since replaced RCTV, but the Conatel was within its legal jurisdiction!
That Chavez, personally, has "undercut established unions and favored new, parallel unions" neglect to address the fact that the "established unions" were nothing more or less than jobbing gang masters ruled by a political Mafia that, as well as enriching its top brass with impunity, had already shown its destain for the democratic process by adamantly refusing to submit to democratic secret leadership ballots, preferring to impose gang bosses rather than true representation of the membership.
They say that the Chavez government "has pursued an aggressively adversarial approach to local rights advocates and civil society organizations" ... which is true, though mostly because the so-called NGOs are largely at the dictate and subversive funding of foreign interests (US National Endowment for Democracy?-NED!) and that the legitimate government of Venezuela has quite rightly sought to legally restrict their access to international funding.
Why object to that? Especially since you could be sent to the Federal pen in the United States for an anyway similar sourcing of funds!
Quite rightly, Human Rights Watch opines that President Hugo Chavez "has actively sought to project himself as a champion of democracy, not only in Venezuela, but throughout the region" but then concludes, that "Venezuela will NOT achieve real and sustained progress toward strengthening its democracy, nor serve as a useful model for other countries in the region, so long as its government continues to flout the human rights principles enshrined in its own Constitution."
So please, Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro, where should I surrender myself for taking advantage of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Article 19) in authoring this somewhat critical article of current affairs in Venezuela's colorful political and economic scene?
...and will I subject to inhuman torture (as alleged by a US Court as excuse for NOT extraditing CIA-killer Luis Posada Carriles) ... or, maybe, I'll even get hung, drawn and quartered for having the incredible audacity to claim that Venezuela remains an incredibly beautiful country with a tremendously welcoming and generous people!
Oh, the sheer criminality of it all! Oh, dearie me!
Roy S. Carson
vheadline@gmail.com
Venezuela is facing the most difficult period of its history with honest reporters crippled by sectarianism on top of rampant corruption within the administration and beyond, aided and abetted by criminal forces in the US and Spanish governments which cannot accept the sovereignty of the Venezuelan people to decide over their own future.
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