Venezuela, a military dictatorship?

Well, readers of this blog certainly know that in Venezuela we are closer to a military regime than to anything else. The logic of the system has pushed Chavez to associate the army to his power as the only way to get some "safety" in his hold to power.

I have been sent this article from Notitarde and I decided to make it my first translation of the year. You can actually go and open the link to see the picture of the writer, a feature of Notitarde, the Valencia newspaper. The provincial commentators sometimes are ahead of Caracas. Indeed, in the provinces we are more aware of the role of the army than for Caracas folks who I must say sometimes miss completely the point.

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Towards the "barracks" country

The coup-monger-president gets clearer and more explicit in the exposé of his "project". From the carefully thought early ambiguities, which fooled and hooked so many- Mayz Vallenilla, Olavarria, Combellas, Escarra and I am not including Miquilena because the veteran communist leader did know of the real reach of the anti nation adventure- he has come progressively and consistently to the enumeration of the exact contours of his oversized ambition for absolute Power.

Each time Chavez differentiates more from that alleged prophet of democracy, from that "savior of the Nation" who invested the streets and areas of the country, from the hand of Miquilena, as soon as president Caldera erased criminal charges on him –originating from a coup d'etat, hundreds of killed military and civilians- for which grounds he was in jail in Yare.

He spoke of the poor, of "true" democracy, of "street kids" for whom he would forfeit his name if he did not redeem them. Today there are thousand of such street kids and the coup-monger-president keeps using the same name, with total contempt to his former promise. He would govern for all, without exclusion, and at the same time he was beating his chest in his devotion of "love" to the peoples he was threatening to fry "the adecos heads".

Bolivar here. Bolivar there. And sacred oaths to respect the constitution and the rule of law. His would be an activist government, a constructive one, diligent. And above all honest! A commitment that today generates national hilarity in the face of immeasurable corruption consciously and continuously fathered by the coup-monger-president to enrich the lackeys and accomplices, in particular of the rotten military cast. As he was securing his Power, with the submission and obedience of the different public powers, and essentially when he managed, with money, the control of the armed forces, his discourse started to change. He became more defiant. He came out on his external alliances, in particular the one with Fidel and the few remaining communist regimes in the world. He accentuates and continues to accentuate the militarization of the country, to the point that today there is not an administrative sphere exempt of the ominous military presence. He reminds zealously of Peron, the founder of the sadly known "sword international", which had its best expression in Pinochet after decades of long military dictatorships in South America. He hugs Qadaffy and again turns his eyes on Mao Tse Tung. It seems that the time to include Stalin and Pol Pot has not come yet.

But here it comes. Or goes. In his end of year speech to the armed forces, from the ceremonial patio of Fuerte Tiuna, he gave the marching orders to generals, admirals, officers and soldiers, as well as to the reserve, to incorporate definitively in the "revolution". That is, once and for all, without masks, afterthoughts or concealing, the armed forces must act –and they already do, though stealthily- as the fundamental instrument of his administration. In the context of the ever repeated affirmation that his is a "pacific but armed revolution".

In synthesis, the armed institution ceases to be the a power at the exclusive and absolute service of the State and the Nation, -defense of the fatherland, territory, constitution and laws, of the legal state- to downgrade to the condition of a praetorian guard of the coup-monger-president, as it is already operating since the perpetration of human rights abuses, and attacks of civilian rights.

The republic ceases to be civilian and the citizens lose their condition of civilian. The militarization advances speedily, towards the final conversion of Venezuela in an army barrack. With the coup-monger-president as the lone chief, absolute, without appeal. And for life!