Kalends of September for chavismo, or so it seems

The regime has made its business to turn into a fateful day the vast opposition rally planned for next Thursday September 1st. The regime has a lot to lose on that day, but it made sure that its losses would be greater than necessary. And, personally, at this point I do not see how the regime could rake any gain.

It all started when the opposition tired of waiting for a Recall Election date decided to mount a massive protest against Maduro's regime, that is, demanding his exit as soon as possible. Of course, the chosen way is to hold a Recall Election before January 10 2017. The opposition to Maduro has nothing to gain from any unconstitutional settlement of the political crisis: all polls give the opposition soaring numbers since last December stunning electoral victory. Besides, even if the opposition did not enjoy a 70+ against Maduro and wanted to do a stunt, how would it do that? The Venezuelan opposition has been deprived of arms, newspapers, TV, and even of its politicians as many are in jail.


The regime knows all of this, certainly. It also can read polls. And it knows that outside of the likes of Cuba or Nicaragua it has no international support left, at least of the kind that would speak favorably of Maduro. Even supposed allies like Putin or Correa are, well, rather discreet in their praise, if any.

The battle for the regime is lost. They are unwilling to change the economic system, to open up. As such the economy will keep spiraling down and soon there will be outright bouts of near starvation with all the political mess that comes along. The laws of the economy are finally speaking up in Venezuela and there is no hope that the only economic policy left for the regime, oil at 80 USD a barrel, will happen in the near future. And never mind its personnel as Venezuela is the only country we know of where its interior and security minister cannot travel out of the country least Interpol grabs him and sends him to a trial in the US. Needless to recall the awaited fate of other regime's luminaries.

Faced with what is predicted to be the largest anti regime rally since 2002/2003 the regime decided against the wise move: let it happen and ignore it the best you can, using this as a demonstration that democracy is not dead in Venezuela. Instead it has chosen the worst way to prove that this is indeed a dictatorship.

All sorts of means to block the rally are attempted, too long to list. Here follows the main ones.

- Threats of all type, verbal menaces from higher up in the regime
- Outright fascist firing of public employees that dare criticize in any way the regime's results (examples here, here and here)
- Forbidding Al Jazeera journalists from entering the country to cover the events
- Forbidding any private flight, even drones, until September 5, so that there would be no evidence of the large turnout, as if roof tops were not enough to establish that anyway. And it does not matter as the opposition announced it will fly drones anyway (so I can illustrate for you the mood)
- Blocking access to Caracas for the possibly 100+ thousand people that will show up from all parts of the country
- After months of absence reopen food fairs like Mercal so as to try to divert folks from the march to go and get some of the scarce food. Though it is not clear if it is just counter propaganda planted by the regime.
- Call for its own counter rally downtown Caracas to block the opposition possible march there
- Promises of all sorts for Caracas, all to be done by Christmas
- All sorts of conspiracy theories as to the opposition wanting to reedit April 11 2002 (from the hands of the Empire in the North, of course)

Etc...

But the worst assault has been on Voluntad Popular, the political party of Leopoldo Lopez, the cause celèbre of political prisoners. For the last week there has been an onslaught against the leadership of the party, from accusing the mayor of El Hatillo of smuggling arms, to take San Cristobal mayor from his sick bed in the middle of the night to send him to jail, to outright kidnapping of militants. The vindictiveness of the large concerted attack on Voluntad Popular is simply amazing. Other political parties are not buying: they know they are next. And the OAS least raised its tone as its secretary has issued, in Spanish for now, a long letter which resumes all fo the above and can be read as a stern warning against the regime.

We must wonder what is the regime seeking. Can it be so clumsy? Is there some master plan behind?

I am afraid that the regime seeks an act of violence that it can provoke easily itself by sending under cover to the rallies Thursday delinquents that will pretend to pin on the opposition a violence that the regime will have started itself. That would explain all of the conspiracy theories blurted these past few days and the arrest of Voluntad Popular leadership which will presumably bear the brunt of the accusation. The ridicule for the regime's cause that Voluntad Popular would have committed the crimes AFTER their incarceration does not seem to have been considered. But that is not the point.

A desperate regime is building a narrative to justify its September repression in the eyes of the followers it still has. In short, the regime is preparing itself to cut loose from the civilized world and drive into oblivion the Venezuelan populations just as the Cuban one was pushed down to nothing within months of the arrival of Fidel in 1958. All seems to point out to that strategy, from ignoring the OAS to put in jail Voluntad Popular leadership, the most active in the streets, the one that apparently must be threatening the most chavismo.

Let's not forget that the loudest voices inside chavismo are the ones most likely to go to jail as soon as they set foot outside of the country. They have nothing to lose anymore. Hence...

Which does not mean they will succeed and as they fail, well...

Voluntad Popular is ready for the major poltical leagues

Today's press conference at Voluntad Popular

Long time readers of the blog remember that I have been following the growth of Voluntad Popular, Leopoldo Lopez vehicle, since almost its birth. I covered the official launch in Valencia, very soon 4 years ago.  Since then we have kept in touch and monitored its progress. I am happy to report today that Voluntad Popular has graduated to the major league.  Disclaimer: even though I have voted for them or supported their formula I would never be an unconditional for them or anyone else (I did vote Machado for the 2012 primaries even though Lopez rallied Capriles).

These past 4 years I have written about their growth, their initiatives, at least when these could be of interest for people living overseas such as the Venezuelans trying to vote in embassies and the help VP tried to bring them. Never mind writing often on the epic battle of Lopez against the regime attempt to block his political career, a battle he won in international courts even though the regime keeps playing a deaf ear to its international obligations. Then again, when has fascism paid heed to legality?

The true trilogy of evil: empty
wallets (slang), high crime and
scarcity of all, including toilet paper

I have thus being privileged to be a regular guest at VP, be it when Lopez launched his candidacy, or a few days after he gave up his ambition to favor the one of Capriles in 2012, already itching for the good fight against Chavez electoral machinery. A few months ago I was invited to tour their new headquarters, a flat on Centro Plaza, a good deal in a rather derelict building but aren't they all in Caracas these days..... I returned this week to make the promised report, coincidentally with the reply of Lopez to the fascist regime attack against him and Capriles with Machado. The true "triology of evil" that Maduro pretends to believe us these guys incarnate is in fact the trilogy of poverty, crime and scarcity. With the poster just produced today on the left for show.

The headquarters of Voluntad Popular are bristling with activity, full of energy. And not only because in one month we have elections, I already had that impression a few months ago when they had just moved in and there were half of the folks I saw today.

What welcomes you when waiting for your host to fetch you is an exhibition hall. A long hallway that can also be used for other purposes is decorated this month with a selection of political cartoons from Zapata, Rayma and Edo. It is called "La Ventana", the window, as a place where prosecuted folks are welcome to expose, and other to come and look over and see what the regime would like to disappear.

Defending freedom of expression.

This is, in short, the tone of the visit: the rather young and dynamic team working for Voluntad Popular leaves no stone unturned, from mere electoral activities to more intellectual pursuits, even if in a hurry. But we are a country in a hurry, in a hurry to leave behind chavismo, so I can relate. Contemplation must be brief and purposeful.

The call center

There are rooms for everything, and all full of busy people. Below I will spare you the numerous meeting rooms and just show you where the action takes place (by the way, all rooms sparsely crowded with items, we sense that they want to have as little as possible on their desks least some repressive raid were to happen: whatever the Nazional Guard seizes, personal or not, is rarely returned even if you are 100% innocent).

Media Watch

Let's start with the call center, the key to any serious political organization.  There are about five rows as the one in the picture above. I did talk briefly with one of the guys in charge and they are happy with their work, having created in a few month a structure that allows them to avoid the use of expensive pollsters, at least on simple issues. I will not give you details since it is after all their weaponry, but I can tell you that their own "polling" matches rather well the few polls found on newspapers.  Of course, almost no one looked more than 30 years old.  In fact, I felt like an old troll in many rooms.....

VP's hope

Next is the room monitoring the media. Today since all media TV is either silenced or controlled by the government 5 TV sets are more than enough, and two were off....  There is way more work going on the computers where web pages, twitter and newspapers are closely monitored.

The electoral campaign is monitored from several rooms.  In the one below there are young designers trying to come up with all the necessary material.

Campaign creation room

In another there is support to the candidates with the chart pinning the picture of each candidate running for town hall. Limited means make them run more "traditional" material visual aids. There are about 40 running and they are optimistic about getting a significant representation. What is noteworthy here is to observe that on the map there are everywhere. True, maybe Zulia, Falcon and Bolivar are still rather empty, but everywhere else VP is running a guy, sometimes in big tickets like San Cristobal or Maturin. At any rate, in barely 4 years, VP has cultivated a growing nationwide presence, something that cannot be said for, say, UNT, and with caveats for PJ.

Last but not least, Voluntad Popular is finishing up its program and political concepts. The Orange book will be published soon and I saw the provisional cover.  Well, they are still working on the set up but the good thing is that after months and years of discussion across the country with the many grassroots groups they are finally getting there. It is not useless to remind folks that VP was the first political party since 1998 to hold an internal primary. Chavismo had some but they forgot about the whole thing as soon as they observed that some dared criticize Chavez proposals.  And the others are content in their pyramidal set up, if there is indeed a pyramid to be found for them.

Simonovis remembered

Details are not forgotten. In an office I did find out that political prisoners are not forgotten and several cartoons asking for the freedom of Simonovis were on the wall.

To finish this post, let's talk about the press conference system of VP.  I receive on my mail regularly, at least once a week, a press communique of the weekly agenda. It is about the response of VP to a particular situation. It may be held in the press room of the headquarters or somewhere else, in particular if it is locally related to a given campaign. But the most salient feature if you ask me is that the official position of VP is not always announced by Leopoldo Lopez. In fact, there is great care taken to promote as many voices from VP as possible and many spokespeople are formed by giving these press conferences and holding the questions.  VP may be the creation of Leopoldo Lopez when he left his original associates but he has had the wisdom to make the party a real political group, a confluence of ideas and interests.

Presenting the poster.

Today it was Lopez in charge of the conference.  Normal, he had been attacked vilely last week and there was a need to a direct reply.  I am not going to go into the details of that short and to the point briefing, which is by the way, always the case, short and to the point, whomever is in charge of directing the event at VP.  I did do a live tweet that you can check here if you wish. But live tweet is not the way to cover the energy of Lopez. And I must say, a certain anger I sensed by being branded a fascist when he has been repeatedly the victim of a regime that does not bother much anymore in democratic pretense.

The highlight of the presentation I would say was to once again ridicule Maduro. For him being so worried about Twitter removing 6000 fake accounts out of his 1 million plus followers is equivalent to a teenage girl tantrum, according to Lopez. Again, more evidence that Maduro is located between pusillanimous and ridiculous. The ever repeated leitmotiv that no matter what corruption is denounced, there is NEVER a big fish toppled by it was not forgotten.

The communication machinery, a concern from the very start by Lopez and Voluntad Popular, is smooth and quick to respond. When I was starting to put together this post I received already the summary of Lopez intervention and this video which is quite chilling if you understand Spanish. There is a clear expose of what is the real "evil trilogy" of Venezuela, shortages, corruption, violence, etc...



The web site of Voluntad Popular, a work always in progress in real web sites, is full of news, videos and how to join it. But you can also follow or visit  @VoluntadPopular to see pictures of all the constant activities of the group across Venezuela, some impressive considering the small locales they visit. They also report with pictures on the nasty stuff they find around. You can also follow @leopoldolopez who happens to have 100,000 more followers than @nicolasmaduro, interestingly. Real followers I would bet as Twitter does not seem in the need to clean up fake accounts with Lopez as it did with Maduro....

I am no political expert to judge how successful Voluntad Popular is, we will need to see if they get at least 15-20 town-halls next December. However after this visit I have a sense that whatever it is that VP is doing, it seems to be doing it right. And certainly the constant harassment the regime has against VP is proof that these young activists are having an effect.

Lopez has read VN&V

To conclude, a picture I took during a short meeting I had with Lopez's team at the end of the visit, where he posed along the VN&V web page screen to greet readers of this blog.