The last few days have been painful for Venezuelan democracy. The unchallengeable victory of Edmundo González on July 28 has once again put Venezuela’s history in the spotlight, and the lack of knowledge of it in the neighboring country. It seems as if with the arrival of the coup leader Hugo Chávez to power in 1999, the national narrative had evaporated or the historical reference of the nation’s formation had been lost. For the Chavista regime in Venezuela, before them there was nothing different from the founding myth of Bolívar, and the vaunted idea that there was nothing to tell in the neighboring country.
According to the criteria of
It is evident that 84 percent of the minutes published with the respective QR codes for voter identification are sufficient to proceed to unanimously demand that the results be accepted. However, this position has not been accepted by Nicolás Maduro or the high military command.
Now, to overcome the obstacle to democracy, the idea of using the experience of the Colombian National Front to help achieve a definitive solution has been floated. More than figures foreign to Venezuelan history, it is necessary to look at the origin of the so-called Pact of Puntofijo of 1958, which allowed the end of the dictatorship of Marcos Pérez Jiménez and the creation of the conditions for democratic participation.
Between the dictator Pérez Jiménez and the Puntofijo Pact
To understand the Puntofijo Pact, it is necessary to go back to the Pérez Jiménez dictatorship and the exclusion of the political parties AD (Democratic Action), COPEI (Independent Committee for Political Electoral Organization) and URD (Democratic Republican Union) from the political struggle. In fact, on December 5, 1952, the military regime committed electoral fraud and in the following months persecuted and murdered some of the political leaders of the parties.
Faced with this infamous persecution, on September 13, Rómulo Betancourt, who would later become the first post-dictatorship president, issued a statement in which he denounced the events and raised the need to reach a national agreement for the return of democracy. This same position was maintained by the Communist Party. This terrible situation of exclusion began to be contrasted with an impressive road infrastructure plan in the country developed by the dictatorship. Highways, tunnels, viaducts were the rule. As was the petrochemical industry and the flood of foreigners who came en masse to the country to work in the nascent industries.
While the economic situation was relatively stable, the political situation was catastrophic. The government refused to call the presidential elections in 1957, which were guaranteed by the 1953 Constitution, and instead called a plebiscite on the management of the dictator Pérez Jiménez. The result announced by the Supreme Electoral Council was the continuation of the dictatorship with 2,374,790 votes against 364,182 votes.
With the fraud in his hands, Pérez Jiménez announced on December 20, 1957 that he would remain in power for five more years. The streets were enraged, a national strike took place, and on January 1, 1958, a coup attempt failed. Twenty-two days later, the dictator would fall in the face of a social uprising that led to the same low- and mid-ranking military officers rebelling and the “sacred cow,” as the dictator was popularly called, fleeing the country with his family. It is worth remembering the words, as precise and pertinent as they are today, of journalist Miguel Otero Silva in the newspaper El Nacional in 1958: “The first day, the one that ran like a river until achieving the resounding collapse of the infamous Pérez Jiménez dictatorship, has been one of the most glorious events in our history. (…) It is not possible to attempt any political analysis without first paying an emotional tribute to the people, I mean the people, to the entire nation, for the lesson of courage, dignity and civility that has just been given in the face of the machine guns and combs of the dictatorship.”
That was the atmosphere. Power was entrusted to a provisional governing junta led by Rear Admiral Wolfgang Larrazábal. There were voices such as that of General Castro León who raised the need for political parity between parties to ensure the country’s democracy as it was presented in Colombia. after the fall of the dictator Rojas Pinilla. In Venezuela this proposal was rejected. All these ideas occurred in the midst of serious social uprisings.
To put an end to this difficult situation of public order and guarantee the return of democracy, the Pact of Puntofijo was signed on October 31, 1958 by three parties: AD, Copei and URD.Two months later, the second democratic elections in Venezuela in 139 years were held with the victory of candidate Rómulo Betancourt, of the Liberal Party (AD).
This pact functioned as a democratic mechanism that allowed two of the parties that signed the Puntofijo Pact, AD and Copei, to govern between 1959 and 1999. URD withdrew from the Pact in 1962. Democracy operated adequately and with governability thanks to the oil-based economy that stabilized the country. The AD party was voted for more times than Copei, which demonstrated greater ability in front of the voters on the part of its leaders.
This scenario changed when the economic crisis of the 1980s and the fall in oil revenues occurred. Then, the same parties that created democracy began to undermine it. The absurd ouster of AD president Carlos Andrés Pérez is a clear example. After killing democracy, the avengers always arrive, and Venezuela had two: Hugo Chávez and then Nicolás Maduro.
A way out for Venezuela?
It was clear that Venezuela wanted to get rid of dictator Pérez Jiménez, who prevented presidential elections and, on the contrary, won an irregular plebiscite. Political, economic and social forces united to demand the return of democracy and achieved it with a civil-military transition agreement that was produced because the armed forces understood the message.
On this occasion, The dictator Maduro and his regime committed a proven electoral fraud. Surely, the solution must be the recognition of the new government of Edmundo González and a new agreement with the defeated sectors to create a space for governability in Venezuela. One’s own history will always be more useful than bringing examples from someone else’s.
#Puntofijo #Pact #Venezuela #Analysis #Francisco #Barbosa