“Democracy is not just turning up to vote every five or four years, it’s much more than that, it’s a way of life, it’s giving power to the people,” said Hugo Chavez in a speech during his time in office as socialist President of Venezuela (1999-2013).
“Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela‘s Presidency Solidifies“. Above illustration: Art by Feminine Perspective’s Rosa Yamamoto: Cropped and Retouched Photo of Pres. Guaido, Original photo by AFP
Background
Feminine Perspective:
No matter who he blames, the Venezuelan President from 20-13 to 2018 is responsible for conditions so bad in Venezuela that mothers are sterilized and having abortions because they cannot feed the children they already have. Many of those children have been pushed out on the streets by starving parents who pray that humanitarians may feed their kids while they can’t. Millions of migrants from the failed economy have fled Venezuela.
Nicolás Maduro was a corrupt Vice President under Hugo Chavez. He built a corrupt empire that continued its crime operations after Mr. Chavez’s death by cancer. Maduro as president then ran a corrupt government in Venezuela (2013-2018) with cabinet members who are drug cartel kingpins and dealers. Maduro used authoritarian means with the apparatus of the state to oppress the population and sideline opposition plus betray the Venezuelan Constitution. He spent most of his term in office preparing for war with the United States while the US applied crippling sanctions which coupled with Maduro’s epic mismanagement and criminality caused millions of refugees to flee the country. Maduro on 10 January 2019, claimed a second term as Venezuela’s President based on a rigged May 2018 election which the country’s elected General Assembly and the UN have both rejected as fraudulent. Maduro survived a drone-delivered assassination attempt in August 2018 but clung to the final months of his 2013 Presidency until expiry in January 2019.
The leader of the elected National Assembly, Juan [Gerardo] Guaidó [Márquez], has also been sworn in on 23 January as president of Venezuela based on a proviso of the Constitution for when an election has failed (any power-vacuum howsoever caused). This emphatically recalls Maduro and quashes his 10 January swearing in. The 23 January swearing-in is a de facto recall of Maduro and the only legitimate claim to the Presidency under the rule of law in the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. To those who have read and accept the Venezuelan Constitution the matter is unequivocal. The exception of Russia and China with very weak arguments is based on fear. Russia and China have likely-legitimate debt with Venezuela and fear losing the functional Maduro repayment program on Maduro’s recall, hence they support Maduro disingenuously, not for humanity but for money which they may be legitimately owed.
“They’ve basically backed themselves into corners with their respective international partners: the United States on the one hand and then Russia, China on the other,” said New York University associate professor Alejandro Velasco to NPR yesterday. Alejandro Velascoho wrote “Barrio Rising: Urban Popular Politics and the Making of Modern Venezuela.”
US-led Invasion is Possible but “not imminent”
The United States is presently talking to allies about sending troops to the failing state of Venezuela. “Not imminent” said US National Security Advisor John Bolton yesterday.
Sources who do not wish to be identified, confirm what is now reported by al Jazeera, the initial number of on-the-ground American and coalition troops would be five thousand. Canada is contemplating participation if the effort has a humanitarian rescue connotation and if goals cannot be achieved by other means such as a UN Peacekeeping mission.
According to al Jazeera the “US White House seeks to overthrow the governments in Cuba, Venezuela and Nicaragua,” and it is all about oil reserves. That may be a little too cynical on the evidence.
Says US National Security Advisor John Bolton, in a televised interview on Fox News , “It will make a big difference to the US economically if we could have American oil companies really invest in and produce the oil capabilities in Venezuela.”
Sanctions that pave the way to Regime Change
Using economic sanctions against left-leaning governments, the US has often set up nations for eventual regime change. Sanctions against Iraq alone killed 576,000 Iraqi children says a 1995 UN report.
Confirming that report and citing Iraq internal child mortality rates collected by UNICEF, Professor Richard Garfield of Columbia University estimates that between 1991 & 2002, excessive deaths in Iraq of children under age 5 is as many as 525,400.
American ‘operators’ have been seen on the ground in Venezuela says a RINJ Foundation worker involved in moving donated goods to internally displaced persons in the country.
Millions of Venezuelan migrants are on the move as streets in Caracas turn violent. Food and medicines are scarce, despite the country’s wealth as the world’s largest proven oil reserves at an estimated 296.5 billion barrels (20% of global reserves). But crippling sanctions had slaughtered the chances of Maduro, who ran a criminal drug cartel-type government.
“The reason is seizing the oil of Venezuela, because we have the largest oil reserves, we confirm that we have the largest reserves of gold in the world, we have the world’s fourth-largest gas (reserves), have large reserves of coltan, diamonds, aluminum, iron, we have drinking water reserves throughout the national territory, we have energy and natural resources,” said Maduro.
Aggravated by extreme American sanctions against the government the Maduro-Recall a de facto legal-coup is now violent in the streets.
From Riches to Rags – the 2015 Oil-Price drop removed the only compensation for Maduro’s incompetence as a President
Maduro squandered Venezuela’s prosperity as VP to Hugo Chavez and after Chavez’s death to cancer in 2013 to 2018 as President.
“Chavez’s first decade… saw Venezuelan GDP more than double… both infant mortality and unemployment almost halved… under Chavez’s brand of socialism, poverty in Venezuela plummeted… its “extreme poverty” rate fell from 23.4 percent in 1999 to 8.5 percent… left the country with the third lowest poverty rate in Latin America… college enrollment… more than doubled, millions of people have access to health care for the first time… the number of people eligible for public pensions had quadrupled.” — wrote David Sirota in Salon (6 March 2013)
Nicolás Maduro who was sworn-in 10 January claiming he was re-elected president in May 2018 for a second term although without an internationally recognised election, still has control of the Venezuelan army. The Air Force commander and the military attache in Washington have both announced support for the presidency of President Guaidó.
Venezuela Constitution Unequivocally Declares Juan Gerardo Guaidó Márquez President under the Circumstances
Relying on the Constitution of Venezuela which sets out the existence of an elected General Assembly and its internal election of a leader, that leader has become interim president following the failed election of May 2018 which should have declared a reliable result but did not owing to corrupt election practices by persons loyal to Maduro.
But Maduro is Mustering parts of the military that still support him in a desperate move to bolster his Dictatorship. Violence has hit the streets.
During his 2013-2018 term in office, Maduro appointed nearly 3,000 generals for an army of 250,000 persons. These general staff members appear to be part of the syndicated crime rings of Maduro’s corrupt empire that has lasted over decade, said Alejandro Velasco to NPR yesterday.
RINJ Foundation volunteers from Caracas.
Background reading: