Can the Venezuelan parliamentary opposition resist fascism pressure?

Heliodoro in his credibility salad days

We treated yesterday to yet another vaudeville scene from the Venezuelan parliament. Juan Carlos Caldera, a Primero Justicia representative that was chastised last year for accepting some campaign money from a pro Chavez "businessman", a.k.a. bolibourgeois, came out with yet a new recording of an inner chavismo conversation. Is anyone left without a bugged room or phone in the country?

Since I did not comment in detail the tapes from the Mario Silvagate, I certainly will not get into this one. Who knows, maybe Alma Guillermoprieto will do us the favor.  As usual what we heard was a mafia like talk about how to corrupt opposition politician.  But there was a twist in it: besides a state security agent and one of chavismo more prominent bolibourgeois, William Ruperti, there was an opposition representative! Heliodoro Quintero in the lists of Un Nuevo Tiempo, Zulia's state local party, was the participating in inciting Ruperti to give money to Caldera (which does not excuse him, by the way, since Ruperti money is toxic under any circumstances).


Quintero was promptly dismissed from UNT but that is really not the solution of the problem.  The problem is that the opposition is going to have to get new methods to pick the people it picks for its lists.

How can the opposition politicians resist the onslaught of blackmail, violence, money applied against them to have them desert and betray outright their colleagues?  This is a regime that has absolutely no democratic bone in it and for them buying a parliamentary majority and destroying the parliamentary opposition is simply a matter of fact.

Their scope goes from buying outright representatives like Ojeda, to blackmail into submission other deputies like Nuñez, or do a character assassination like they are trying to do with Nardo. There is also the option to demolish, literally, representatives like Machado or Borges....  And now with Heliodoro we have recruitment and active collaboration which is, I suppose yet another from of representative purchase. All of this is mere fascism methodology: communist were more direct, limiting themselves to awful blackmail and simple physical elimination.

Truly, the opposition MUD will need to screen better its candidates. Who knows how much information Heliodoro was privy that went straight to the desk of Diosdado Cabello.
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PS: the transcript here, if you have stomach for it.