The Venezuelan opposition prepares
a summer of violence and crime

The Venezuelan opposition, headed by the leader of A New Time, former presidential candidate and governor of the state of Zulia, Manuel Rosales, is about to launch a wave of mass demonstrations, carefully organized and financed. The aim is to exacerbate the country’s political and social situation through the use of violence, including armed violence, and committing political crimes, in order to precipitate a state of instability, as the road to destabilization.
This is the evaluation presented by Latin American political specialists and analysts consulted by the Latin American Circle for International Studies (LACIS). The LACIS is a private, non-profit organization, dedicated to analysis, reflection, research, and the exchange of information, with headquarters in Mexico City.
The Venezuelan opposition acts in league with and is backed by the anti-Chavez exiles living in Miami, as well as some non-government organizations, which while hiding behind a supposed apolitical stance and an alleged interest in the defense of democracy and human rights, are part of a strategy designed and financed by the United States government.
In taking up the banner of the defense of democracy, freedom of speech, and private property, they hope to fill the streets of the main cities of Venezuela and, especially, Caracas, with increasing numbers of people willing to allow themselves to be seduced by positions that while impeccable in their formulation, mask interventionist designs that are based on intolerance toward political paths that differ from the conceptions and geopolitical and geostrategic demands of Washington.
Thus, according to the specialists consulted by LACIS, the ideal pretext was the decision by President Hugo Chávez’s government to not renew the concession held by the Radio Caracas Televisión (RCTV) consortium. This decision has been presented, both within Venezuela and abroad, and particularly to international organizations concerned with human rights, as an attack on freedom of speech, the authoritarian silencing of a dissident voice.
The truth, the specialists emphasize, is that the Venezuelan government proceeded strictly in accordance with the law. It did not renew a concession, in accordance with the sovereign authority of the Venezuelan State. But the Venezuelan government did not expropriate the consortium’s installations nor prevent it from continuing its activities through cable TV or over the Internet. The truth is that RCTV is far from being suppressed, silenced, or trampled upon. In fact, the opposite is the case.
The immediate purpose of this campaign, which it must be reiterated, is not Venezuelan in its origin, but rather is sponsored by transnational interests, is to present the Chávez government as repressive, authoritarian, a fanatical violator of human rights, with the aim of subjecting it to isolation and international sanctions, both on the part of organizations such as the United Nations, the Organization of American States (OAS), and the European Union, as well as by individual countries, at the head of which would be, naturally, the United States. Of course, the LACIS specialists say, the temptation toward unanimity in the communications media is a danger that should be avoided by the Venezuelan government at all costs, but what is truly cause for concern is that the Venezuelan opposition, led by Rosales, has decided that in order to achieve a broad and decisive impact with its mobilizations, it must resort to provocations, in form of violent, even armed, confrontations, with the police and security forces.
Within this perverse perspective, the assassination of a leading opposition figure has even been contemplated, in order to detonate a wide scale explosion of popular indignation that could serve as a cover for the action of paramilitary commandos whose activities would have to be strongly contained by the security forces -even the army- which would inevitably lead to mass arrests, possible martial law or a state of siege, and accusations against the central government in all the international forums, through a parallel increase in the media strategy to discredit the Chávez administration.
Given this panorama, which the LACIS specialists feel to be imminent, it is necessary to alert international public opinion and call upon the truly democratic forces to raise their voices, to form a broad, plural front, and prevent the interventionist and hegemonic plans of the United States and its Venezuelan flunkies from being achieved.