Chávez's defeat a win for democracy

Carlos Alberto Montaner

First, the king told him to shut up. Now, the Venezuelan people have done the same. In addition, the two phenomena are related. When Spanish King Juan Carlos enjoined Hugo Chávez to be silent, he unwittingly created the most formidable slogan against the dictator's apprentice and gave the opposition the momentum the university students needed to overcome apathy and lead the people to the polls once again.

The consequences of Chávez's defeat are enormous. Ostensibly at issue was the approval of a Constitution similar to the one that exists in Cuba (inspired on the Stalinist legislation of 1936). But in fact something more important was at stake: the fate of the so-called 21st century socialism and the delirious plans to conquer Latin America in the cause of authoritarian collectivism. The Venezuelans don't want communism in their back yard, much less to bankroll the adventure of converting Venezuela into today's USSR.

What about Cuba?

The Cuban bosses must have realized one fact: They cannot count indefinitely on the Venezuelan subsidies, which are estimated to total $4 billion a year. Someday those 100,000 barrels of crude will cease to flow, which would force the Cubans into a ferocious rationing of energy, worse than the one they suffered in the early 1990s.

All this happens while Fidel Castro lies in his deathbed, insisting on being nominated to parliament so he can remain president, without any objective other than to impede any changes in Cuba. But the truth is that, if he planned to stay afloat by embedding himself in the Venezuelan budget, as he did previously with the Soviet Union, that kind of plunder will not last very long.

To Bolivian President Evo Morales, too, the news is a hammer blow. His government is the weakest in the chavista axis. The Venezuelan's defeat catches him in the midst of a fraudulent operation to push through a new constitution that will allow his reelection. Against him is half of Bolivia, geographically and ethnically speaking. If Chávez was unable to impose his will, Morales hasn't much of a chance against his battle-hardened opposition.

But it is in Venezuela, naturally, where Chávez's defeat generates the greatest turbulence. The myth of the invincibility of the adored leader is over, and chavismo is much closer to being a primitive gang than a modern political party. If Chávez left the presidency in 2013, who would replace him and how would the new candidate be elected? Now begins the struggle for succession and the group's consequent fragmentation.

Students the true heroes

Within the opposition, an important reshaping is taking place. The most novel factor was the democratic students, true heroes in Chávez's defeat, with three brilliant spokesmen as leading actors. Politically alive remain Manuel Rosales, the governor of Zulia; Julio Borges, leader of the Justice First movement, and Enrique Mendoza, who was very active behind the scenes in support of the people's rejection of Chávez.

However, the key figure may hereafter be the enigmatic Gen. Raúl Baduel, who in 2002 restored presidential authority to Chávez and now has moved in the opposite direction. If Baduel decides to step forward, he will be a character to reckon with. In any case, the democratic opposition will need a single candidate to resist chavismo, approximately the way the Chileans in the Concertación coalition came to an agreement to defeat Augusto Pinochet.

Knowing how to elect

Lamentably, it is still premature to talk about the inheritance that chavismo will leave behind. The lieutenant colonel still has a lot to destroy while he remains in Miraflores Palace. Awash in the most impressive river of petrodollars Venezuela has ever seen, the country today is infinitely worse managed and its society is much more strained than in 1998, when the government was foolishly placed in the hands of an ignorant adventurer whose most notable accomplishment was that in 1992 he tried to shoot the democratic system dead.

Perhaps when this sad episode ends, that will be the only positive inheritance left by chavismo -- for a nation to prosper and triumph, its people must know how to elect. The Venezuelans, it seems, are learning.

December 12, 2007

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