Can Venezuela Pull a Malaysia?

Najib Razak, ex-Malaysian
prime minister, who lost an
election this month.

A notoriously corrupt strongman appears to hold a lock on his country's leadership. In the run-up to elections, he uses oil income to saturate the country with his campaign ads, controls most of the media and uses gerrymandering and other tricks to ensure his reelection victory.

The nation I have in mind is Malaysia, the southeast Asian nation which held national elections ten days ago. But I might as easily be talking about Venezuela, which is to hold a vote tomorrow in which its authoritarian president Nicolas Maduro is expected to use a rigged system to get himself reelected, despite running his oil-rich nation into the ground. In both nations, the government used legal charges and technicalities to bar opposition candidates from even running in the election.

To everybody's amazement, Malaysia's opposition party won the election, and the Barisan Nasional coalition, which had ruled Malaysia since independence in 1957 lost power.

That might provide a glimmer of hope for the opposition in Venezuela in tomorrow's voting. There,

Venezuelan president/dictator Maduro.

Pres. Maduro has taken control of nearly all the media and government institutions and is allegedly using payments and intimidation to win tomorrow's election.

Colombian Pres. Santos reported this week that Colombia had seized a big shipment of food allegedly intended to be used by the Venezuelan government to pay for votes, altho much of the food was already rotten. Santos also charged that the Venezuelan government planned to give Colombians Venezuelan ID cars and have them vote for the government.

But Venezuela differs in important ways from Malaysia, where the opposition candidate who won the prime ministryship had already been prime minister, and so many people had a positive image of him. On the other hand, Malaysia's economy was fairly strong, whereas Venezuela's is in free fall, potentially motivating many people to vote against the government.

But, barring a miracle, Mauro will win reelection tomorrow and continue stiffening his dictatorial rule and worsening his nation's economic disaster. And hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans will continue pouring into Colombia.

And the Malaysian election likely has redoubled Maduro's determination to win at all costs tomorrow. After all, Malaysian's ex-leader may now be put on trial for his alleged monumental corruption.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

Adiós to Venezuela's Democracy

Maduro and followers celebrate their 'victory' in rigged voting in Sunday's election.

During the 1970s and '80s, when military coups installed right-wing dictatorships across much of South America, Venezuela maintained a democracy, if a very imperfect one. Now, ironically, democracy has brought a leftist dictatorship to Venezuela.

Perhaps the best evidence of Venezuelan Pres. Nicolas Maduro's anti-democratic intentions is the fact that he never permitted regional elections supposed to be held late last year - and which his party was sure to lose. Maduro claimed that the country, which has the world's largest oil reserves, lacked the money to pay for elections, and called democracy a luxury for the elites.

Yet, miraculously, Maduro had no trouble finding the money for Sunday's constitutional assembly - which he made sure he'd win.

The Maduro government has also packed the Supreme Court, done all it could to negate the results of unfavorable elections, shuttered hostile media, imprisoned political opponents - and even briefly dissolved the opposition-dominated National Assembly.

But none of the Venezuelan government's anti-democratic measures have come close to Sunday's election of a constitutional assembly, manipulated to ensure a pro-government majority, despite Maduro's extreme unpopularity. The assembly has apparently unlimited powers to rewrite the country's constitution and remake its government.

The voting for the assembly representatives included manipulations such as giving rural voters - who have remained loyal to Maduro - disproportional representation, while reducing representation for city dwellers, who overwhelmingly reject Maduro. (Come to think of it, that arrangement is a lot like the United States' unfair and illogical Electoral College - which gave us president Trump.) And the voting system also gave pro-Maduro social organizations preponderant weight in the voting.

Government workers were ordered to vote or lose their jobs. Even so, media observers reported that voter turnout was light.

What's more, many experts say that Maduro lacked the authority to call this vote without first holding a popular referendum. But Maduro knew he'd lose any such referendum.

The Venezuelan opposition boycotted the vote in order to not give it legitimacy. As a result, Maduro's victory will be close to 100%, whether votes are counted fairly or not.

The new Constitutional Assembly's powers aren't defined, and may be unlimited. Expect Maduro to order his minions to eliminate the country's hostile National Assembly and to remove the attorney general, Luisa Ortega, a courageous politician who stood on principle in the face of the government's violations of human rights and trampling of its own Constitution.

Ortega charged that Venezuela was turning into a dictatorship.

In fact, immediately after the vote, Maduro called for removing National Assembly legislators' legal immunity and for replacing Ortega. Two prominent opposition leaders were quickly arrested.

The travesty will continue as long as Venezuela's armed forces - the police and military - continue backing Maduro, and so far they show no signs of wavering.

Already, the governments of Colombia, Mexico and Panama have said they will not recognize the voting's results. But if not, how will they deal with a government they consider illegitimate?

The U.S. and other nations have threatened the Maduro government with sanctions for holding the assembly vote. But don't expect the Trump administration to make the single move which could topple Maduro - cutting off oil sales to the United States. That's because doing so would hurt too many big corporations and lose Trump popularity among drivers.

Maduro and Trump, two incompetent, populist leaders, are also co-dependent.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

Gustavo Rojas Pinilla: Political Chameleon

Flowers on dictator Gustavo Rojas Pinilla's tomb in Bogotá's Central Cemetery.

Grl Gustavo Rojas Pinilla.

General Gustavo Rojas Pinilla, who seized power 60 years ago this week, was Colombia's last outright dictator: he shuttered newspapers and massacred university students. But Rojas Pinilla was also a populist hero - and a progressive who gave the vote to women - and even the inspiration for an idealistic leftist guerrilla movement. Today, he retains a sort of progressive aura in the public memory. Go figger.

In 1963, Colombia was hemorraging from La Violencia, a vicious fratricidal war between Liberal and Conservative guerrilla armies. The far-right President Laureano Gómez was too sick to govern. Colombians called for a strong hand to stabilize and pacifize the country.

A memorial on Ave. Septima to the university
students massacred by Rojas Pinilla's
government.

Popular sentiment backed by the military turned to the accomplished general Rojas Pinillas, an engineer who had also directed infrastructure projects and been Colombia's delegate to the United Nations. His June 13 coup was bloodless and Rojas set about mending the country. He pardoned the guerrillas, introduced television and began a series of infrastructure projects financed by strong coffee prices.

But power corrupts, and the benevolent Rojas turned tyrannical. When spectators booed his daughter at an event in the bullfighting stadium, Rojas responded the next week by infiltrating the stadium with toughs, who beat and stabbed to death an undetermined number of government opponents. The newspapers censored by the government ignored the massacre. The very Catholic Rojas also persecuted protestant evangelicals.

The Justice Palace in flames following the
1985 M-19 guerrilla attack.

In 1955, students protesters marching down Ave. Septima were swept by government gunfire, killing some dozen of them. The next year, Rojas closed El Tiempo y El Espectador, Bogotá's two main newspapers (they promptly reopened under new names), and others.

But it was apparently the resurgence of La Violencia which finally turned public opinion and political party leaders against Rojas, forcing him out of power and into exile.

He was replaced by a military junta which oversaw the transition to a quasi democracy (for 15 years the Liberal and Conservative parties simply passed the presidency back and forth).

A plaque in Bogotá's City Hall denouncing
the attack by 'subversives' on the Justice Palace.

But Colombia wasn't done with this savior-turned-tyrant. Rojas returned, now transformed into nationalist populist. At the head of his ANAPO party, in 1970 he ran for president against conservative Misael Pastrana and lost narrowly - according to the official results. Rojas supporters cried fraud, likely with good reason. The election stood, but out of that allege fraud were born the M-19 guerrillas, whose legacy continues in Colombian politics.

The Justice Palace on Plaza Bolívar in Bogotá was
destroyed in a 1985 M-19 guerrilla  attack and
rebuilt about the year 2000.

The M-19 - young, educated, idealistic and media-savvy, carried out a series of dramatic operations which culminated disastrously with their 1985 attack on the Justice Palace on Plaza Bolívar. After the M-19 took the magistrates hostage, the military counterattacked with tanks fire. The Justice Palace was destroyed and about 100 people were killed, including 11 of the 12 justices. The building was burned and gutted.

A plaque in Bogotá's City Hall memorializes
people disappeared during the Justice Palace
conflict.

A few years later, the M-19 turned in their weapons and became a political party. In 1991, they even played an important role in the writing of Colombia's new Constitution, and can be credited for its progressive features.

Today, some of the ex-M-19 leaders are in Congress, and one, Gustavo Petro, is mayor of Bogotá.

Rojas' legacy has also persisted in more destructive ways. His grandson, Samuel Moreno Rojas, was mayor of Bogotá from 2008 to 2011, and allegedly stuffed his pockets in a huge corruption scheme. Now, Samuel and his brother Ivan, a senator, are in prison awaiting trial. They claim to be innocent.

Ironically, Samuel Moreno is accused of taking kickbacks on contracts for work on Ave. 26 - which his grandfather had constructed.

And Rojas' legacy probably isn't over.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

Tribute to a Dictator

Rojas Pinilla's Colorful Tomb

The other day, these women dressed up Colombian dictator Gustavo Rojas Pinilla's tomb in Bogotá's Central Cemetery to commemorate the anniversary of his Jan. 17, 1975 death.

Rojas' five-year reign from 1953 to '57 was Colombia's last all-out dictatorship, although several authoritarian but democratically-elected governments have followed.

Rojas played a contradictory and paradoxical role in Colombian history. A hero from the war against Peru, his dictatorship is remembered quite positively, including naturally by these women, who talked about Rojas' public works projects but dismissed my suggestion that Rojas' government had violated human rights. Of course, context also counts. Rojas took command with a coup amidst a near civil war called La Violencia between the Liberal and Conservative political parties.

Rojas managed to stabilize the country, built great public works projects and gave women the vote, for which he is remembered positively. However, during his government the seeds were planted for Colombia's ongoing guerrilla insurrection.

Plaque on Seventh Ave. in Bogotá
commemorating students massacred by
the government in 1954. 

I had to search hard to find mention of the Rojas dictatorship's dark side: discrimination against non-Catholics, shuttering of newspapers, repression of the country's traditional labor unions, massacres of university students and even of bullfighting fans who had booed his daughter.

After being forced from power in 1957, Rojas fled Colombia - to either Spain or the Dominican Republic, historians aren't certain. But he returned, converted into a leftist populist, and ran for president in 1970. The official results gave Rojas' conservative opponent, Misael Pastrana Borrero, a narrow victory, but Rojas' supporters claimed fraud.

Those fraud claims gave rise to the M-19 guerrillas, who would play a prominent role in Colombia from the 1970s through the '90s.

In yet another strange twist of history, current leftist Bogotá Mayor Samuel Moreno Rojas is Dictator Rojas Pinilla's grandson.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

So Long to Democracy in Venezuela

All Vote Together, in Venezuela's National Assembly

With the seating of a new Venezuelan National Assembly, with only a slim Chavez majority, imminent, Chavez has found a way to be rid of that nuisance while retaining democratic appearances - made it irrelevent.

In the past days, the outgoing parliament has given Chavez power to rule by decree for 18 months, further restricted the media, including the internet, neutered the university's political power and, most dramatically, slashed the frequency in which the new Assembly will meet. To minimize annoyance from any local anti-Chavez politicians, the government has created pro-Chavez 'communes', and transferred much of the budget to them.

Is Venezuela still a democracy? Well...it does hold elections - but then so do Cuba, Iran, Belarus and lots of other dicatorships, which also happen to be Venezuelan allies.

Why should Colombia be concerned? Historically, authoritarian governments are much more inclined to launch military attacks, and Chavez constantly seeks external demons to blame domestic problems on. More authoritarianism in Venezuela also means less oversight from the media or opposition political parties - and so more opportunity for Chavez to support Colombia's guerrilla groups, which are considered terrorists by Colombia's and many other governments.

It's quite sad, since Venezuela had South America's longest tradition of democratic government. But those governments were corrupt and did not solve the country's poverty, despite its great petroleum wealth and other resources.

It will be sad watching Venezuela's likely accelerating slide into a dictatorship resembling Cuba's.

However, as in North Korea, Belarus, Cuba and Zimbabwe, the rest of the world will do (and can do) little to rescue democracy. In any case, the U.S., which did so much to prop up authoritarian right-wing governments when they served its interests, will also tolerate left-wing authoritarianism when the alternative would mean higher gasoline prices.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours