Venezuelan choices worsened by another political failure

Oct. 30, 2017
Venezuelans know they would not be confronting only the authoritarian regime of President Nicolas Maduro if they resumed protests after yet another political failure.

Venezuelans know they would not be confronting only the authoritarian regime of President Nicolas Maduro if they resumed protests after yet another political failure.

Outsiders rightly worried about collapse of what should be a vibrant democracy, meanwhile, should realize that Maduro is becoming a puppet.

Cuba is supporting Maduro with military and security forces. Russia and China, both economically tied to the island nation, are reinforcing him, too.

Russia's Rosneft has invested in Venezuelan heavy-oil development and provided large loans.

In Cuba earlier this year, Rosneft agreed to supply state-owned Cubametals 250,000 tonnes of crude oil and diesel, helping to compensate for rapidly declining cut-rate supply from Venezuela.

China probably is protecting its own interests by becoming state-owned Petroleos de Venezuela's main banker. Venezuela owes it as much as $60 billion and can't meet production obligations.

China has become an important ally of Cuba as well as its second-largest trading partner-behind Venezuela.

Moscow and Beijing therefore would not welcome Venezuelan protests more serious than those of last summer. They know their friend in Havana has muscle in place to keep dissent in the streets and out of Miraflores Palace.

Yet Venezuelans struggling with zooming inflation, general deprivation, and crumbling services might see uprising as their only option.

In elections Oct. 15, Maduro's party won governorships in 18 states; the opposition coalition won in only 5. Maduro said his party won 54% of votes nationwide.

Before the election, polls indicated support for Maduro and his party at only 20-30%.

An ominous question for the splintered opposition is whether its few victorious candidates should yield to governmental demands that they be sworn in by the Constituent Assembly.

That's the entity created, by July 30 elections largely seen as fraudulent, to write a constitution consolidating presidential power.

If opposition governors let themselves be sworn in, they'll legitimate the assembly. If they don't, they won't be sworn in.

In dictatorships, choice works that way for the ill-positioned. So ill-positioned-meaning most-Venezuelans still suffer.

(From the subscription area of www.ogj.com, posted Oct. 20, 2017; author's e-mail: [email protected])