[Marxism] "Endogenous Right" vs. "False Left" in Venezuela

["Fred Fuentes" <fred.fuentes@xxxxxxxxx>]

http://counterpunch.org/maher03062008.html

Counter-Attack of the Bureaucrats:
"Endogenous Right" vs. "False Left" in Venezuela

By GEORGE CICCARIELLO-MAHER

In the aftermath of the December referendum defeat, internal tensions
within the Chavista coalition have begun to deepen as various sectors duke
it out to control the future direction of the Venezuelan Revolution. To be
clear: this process is a necessary one. But recent weeks have see the
so-called "endogenous right," the well-known bloc of moderate, centrist,
bureaucratic-minded Chavistas, landing a series of body blows to more
leftist elements, threatening internal democracy and the radicalism of the
Revolution in the process.

In this counterattack, the role of Chávez himself has been ambiguous, at
times demanding revolutionary self-criticism and at times assailing such
criticism as a threat to unity.

Tascón in the Crosshairs

Intra-Chavista tensions exploded after the president named José David
Cabello, younger brother of conservative Chavista strongman and Governor
of Miranda State (and arguably second-most-powerful Chavista) Diosdado
Cabello, to head the Venezuelan tax agency (SENIAT). This choice itself
was dubious: as infrastructure minister, José David Cabello had
accomplished little of note. Further, former SENIAT head José Vielma Mora,
a straight-shooter who could do no wrong in the agency, had revolutionized
tax collection in the country (that is, established tax collection where
there had been very little previously).

In response to what was arguably a political (and nepotistic) appointment,
Chavista firebrand Luis Tascón (best known for making public a list of
those who signed the 2004 petition for Chávez's recall), an assembly
member hailing from the combative state of Táchira, came forward with what
he claimed was evidence of the younger Cabello's corruption while in
MINFRA. While the evidence was perhaps inconclusive, Tascón was merely
following Chávez's own recent demand that revolutionaries denounce
corruption, and calling for an investigation into the matter.

The counterattack was fierce and swift, and came not from José David
Cabello, but from his elder brother, Diosdado. Focusing his ire on the
fact that opposition news outlet Globovisión had been invited to Tascón's
press conference, Cabello appeared on Venezolana de Televisión (VTV),
dismissing Tascón as an "instrument of the Empire," who was only sowing
discontent and division within the Chavista ranks, a charge which was to
be repeated by Assembly President Cilia Flores. Cabello went on to suggest
that Tascón had "traveled for a month to visit Bill Gates," saying that
"that must have been where they injected him with a microchip." Tascón,
according to Cabello, represents "the false left, which is our true
enemy."

A "Unanimous" Expulsion?

Cabello was joined, moreover, by Jorge Rodríguez, until recently vice
president and currently devoted entirely to the formation of the new
United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), and both declared on national
television that Tascón had been "unanimously" expelled from the
yet-to-be-born party. This declaration was peculiar, not least because it
would be near-impossible to get all 1,676 members of the Party's Founding
Congress to unanimously agree to anything. Further, since the party has
yet to officially exist, no-one is more than an "aspiring militant" at
this point. Tascón, an "aspiring militant" to a party which does not yet
exist, was nevertheless allegedly expelled via a "unanimous vote" which
probably never happened.

Tascón was no stranger to controversy within the Chavista ranks. When he
released the "Tascón List" of recall signatories, he earned the adulation
of many but also the ire of more than a few, and not only within the
opposition (where he has come to be solidly hated). Tascón has himself
boasted in recent days that he has been expelled on four separate
occasions from the official organs of Chavismo (the MVR and PSUV), most
recently for his defense, however limited, of Raúl Baduel, the retired
general and longtime Chávez ally who openly broke with the President in
November over the planned constitutional reform referendum.

"If I had criticized a mayor in any small town in the country, nothing
would have happened," insists Tascón. His only error, it seems, was to
pick a fight with the brother of such a powerful figure. He went on to say
what is more or less an open secret in Venezuela: "Diosdado [Cabello] is
the head of the endogenous right." Tascón, moreover, does not think his
own revolutionary credentials are in any doubt: "Everyone knows that on
April 11th [2002, during the coup against Chávez], I was in Miraflores
[Palace], and on the 13th of April, I was with the 2nd [Army] Division in
Táchira convincing the commander to resist the coup. Where were Diosdado
and Cilia Flores?"

Diosdado Cabello is, according to Tascón, "very powerful, he is even more
powerful than [former Chávez advisor Luis] Miquilena during his time in
the government." Miquilena, we should recall, was the chief representative
of the "endogenous right" of a previous era: after a stint as Chávez's
chief advisor, wielding almost absolute authority behind the scenes,
Miquilena left the Chavista coalition in early 2002, taking with him a
legislative majority and eventually supporting the April coup.

In recent days, it has come out that the alleged expulsion vote against
Tascón had not occurred at all, and that a debate was scheduled on the
matter in the party's founding congress for future days. But the fact that
two Chavista heavy-hitters had spoken in the name of what is supposed to
be a democratic and grassroots party certainly does not bode well. And the
fact that Chávez himself has admitted to having intervened personally to
demand Tascón's expulsion, for a "lack of discipline and
irresponsibility," bodes even worse.

The "Uncontrollable" Lina Ron

For a few days, this tension simmered gently, but it returned to the
surface with a bang. On February 24th, an explosive device detonated at
the headquarters of the Venezuelan Chamber of Commerce (Fedecámaras),
killing one. Fedecámaras, recall, has long been antagonistic to the Chávez
regime, having participated in the 2002 coup, and it was none other than
Fedecámaras president Pedro Carmona Estanga who would step in as interim
president, dissolving all constitutionally-sanctioned powers and
establishing a short-lived dictatorship. Since then, Fedecámaras has toned
down their hostility slightly, but is still seen by most Chavistas as
enemy number one (several revolutionary collectives staged a militant
protest on its steps in early 2007). The victim, it has since been
claimed, was a Chavista, and a member of the "Venceremos Guerrilla Front"
which has allegedly claimed the bombing in an effort to "rescue the
Bolivarian process."

Three days later, February 27th, marked the 19th anniversary of the epic
anti-neoliberal Caracazo riots of 1989, in which the army was deployed to
the poor barrios of Caracas, slaughtering thousands. Repression was
concentrated in the historically-militant 23 de Enero (January 23rd) zone
of Western Caracas, and exactly 19 years later, 23 de Enero would again
find itself at the center of police attention in the aftermath of the
Fedecámaras bombing. In a symbolic occupation of the Archbishop's Palace
organized by Chavista students, National Assembly deputy Pedro Lander and
revolutionary organizer Lina Ron denounced the police searches that had
been carried out, and rejected the "criminalization" of the deceased
Venceremos militant.

Ron even went so far as to deem the deceased a "martyr" of the revolution,
coming dangerously close to supporting the Fedecámaras bombing. That the
government would respond to such a claim would seem to be a strategic
necessity, but the way Chávez did so raises some urgent questions.

Echoes of Chile?

Calling in to the Chavista evening show La Hojilla ("The Razor"), hosted
by firebrand Mario Silva, Chávez went on the offensive:

   "I can't understand her I won't say that she's an infiltrator, no. I
wouldn't say that she's consciously operating in the ranks of the
counterrevolution, but it would be interesting to research the
terrible damage that the ultra-left did to Salvador Allende, how the
ultra-left was infiltrated by the CIA without realizing, and generated
events that provided the justification for the right to do what they
did Lina, you need to show some revolutionary discipline!"

This is a far cry from Chávez's traditional line about Allende's fall:
that the revolution was unarmed, and that Allende failed to make arms
available to the workers and the people through the creation of radical
militias. In the early years of Chávez's efforts to organize a clandestine
revolutionary force within the military, this view even became a code that
the rebels would use to greet and identify one another. Quoting Fidel
Castro's words, spoken in response to the 1973 coup, they would greet one
another with the following: "If every worker, if every laborer had a rifle
in their hands, the fascist Chilean coup would never have happened." But
now it seems as though Chávez wants to portray some armed popular
organizations as the enemy, not the savior, of the revolutionary process.

This was not the first time Ron had been deemed "uncontrollable" by the
President to whom she swears allegiance to the death. Within a span of
months in 2002, Chávez had deemed her both "a soldier who demands the
respect of all Venezuelans" and "uncontrollable," and prior to that, as
Chávez was briefly overthrown in an April 2002 coup, Ron languished in
jail for her insistently radical street action. And nor will this be the
last time the two tangle: it was only recently that Chávez named Ron to a
PSUV steering committee, and once this conflict eases, she may very well
find herself back in the good graces of her beloved Comandante. This
back-and-forth, perhaps, is the inevitable result of the distance that
exists between a revolutionary leader and a popular insurgent, but it is
worrying nonetheless, and especially for what it suggests.

A Critical Moment for the PSUV

In this struggle, now thankfully out in the open, between the radical and
conservative sectors of Chavismo, no strategic arena is more crucial than
the nascent PSUV. But as we have seen, this conflict between Chavista left
and right has led to an imposition of authoritarian solutions in what was
meant to be a directly democratic party structure.

And this pre-emptive attack on party democracy didn't stop with the
expulsion of Luis Tascón. The party's temporary "leadership" recently made
public the list of candidates for upcoming elections to the party's
national directorate. While many had hoped that the party structure would
allow local leaders, elected by their battalions, to reach the founding
congress and occupy leadership roles, this has evidently not been the
case, since all 69 candidates are national leaders. The right has a
significant presence, too, in the candidacies of Cabello the elder,
Rodríguez, Francisco Ameliach, Nicolas Maduro, and that pillar of
opportunism Francisco Arias Cárdenas.

The way the candidates were chosen, too, remains unclear and reeks of
top-down dedazo authoritarianism. Allegedly, each delegate from a local
battalion was able to put forward three names. From these, it seems that
Chávez himself (surrounded by advisors, por supuesto) identified which
would stand as candidates (leaving the party base with no idea how many
nominations each had received). Of these, 15 will be elected, to which
Chávez himself will add 5 (thereby guaranteeing a "power quota" for all
influential Chavistas). In another recent show of undemocratic party
politics, Chávez was recently speaking to the PSUV Founding Congress,
where he mentioned having seen the results of an earlier vote to close the
Congress a week early. As he was talking, however, delegates began to
shout that such a vote had never been taken. If we follow the
embarrassment criterion, however, it would seem that Chávez was misled by
Rodríguez and Cabello.

Radicals fighting it out within the PSUV's founding congress have been
left to scramble to compile a "leftist slate" for the national directorate
election, but finding 15 leftists on the list is no easy task. Some have
suggested:

   * Vladimir Acosta, an outspoken professor and critic of bureaucratic
and moderate tendencies within Chavismo who seek a truce with the
opposition.

   * Mario Silva, and avowed communist and host of VTV's La Hojilla, who
nodded in assent as Chávez attacked Lander, Ron, and Tascón, and who
some fear may have close ties with the secret police (DISIP).

   * Roberto Hernandez, National Assembly member representing the
Venezuelan Communist Party (PCV).

   * Vanessa Davies, a former urban guerrilla with the once revolutionary
Bandera Roja (Red Flag) who is now better known as a mild-mannered VTV
television host.

   * Elias Jaua, also of Bandera Roja but now Land and Agriculture
Minister, who issued a scathing if abstract statement
(carefully-worded given his cabinet post) against everything from
divisions within Chavismo to collaboration with the national
bourgeoisie.

   * Erika Farias, head of the Guevaraist Frente Francisco Miranda, an
organization focusing on ideological training for young people, which
combines radicalism with dogmatism.

   *Noeli Pocaterra, Edgildo Palau, national indigenous leaders.

   *Lidice Navas, Fernando Soto Rojas, and Elisa Osorio, three members of
the "Socialist Assemblies," an umbrella group comprising various
revolutionary collectives (like Liga Socialista, Utopia, M-28).

Again, not an easy task, and none of these candidates do justice to the
most revolutionary sectors of Venezuelan social movements. But the
objective, of which many speak openly, is to do anything to prevent
Diosdado Cabello and allies Jorge Rodríguez and Francisco Ameliach,
representatives of the bureaucratic and moderate Chavista right, from
consolidating control over the PSUV at such an early stage. In this, as in
everything, Chávez's own role is ambiguous, as he has given public
endorsement to three members of the "radical" slate: Silva, Davies, and
Farias. But his support, strategic or otherwise, for Diosdado Cabello et
al almost ensures them a spot on the committee, even if not elected
(Chávez himself, as president of the PSUV, is able to name five additional
members).

In one positive sign, retired general Alberto Müller Rojas was recently
named by Chávez as the PSUV's first Vice President. Müller, we should
recall, only recently returned to Chávez's inner circle after an
acrimonious public debate in which the retired general, an advocate of
decentralized militia structures and people's war, accused the President
of cowing to conservative members of the military hierarchy in his
insistence on military "professionalism" and "apoliticism." Both Müller's
substantive political positions and his willingness to express
disagreements openly give cause for optimism, but against what backdrop?

It seems as though Chávez has taken the same lesson from his referendum
defeat that he did from the 2002 coup that briefly removed him from power.
Both prompted an immediate moderation in tone and an effort to build
bridges with sectors of the bourgeoisie. (A notable exception in the
present moment, of course, is Chávez's surprisingly aggressive tone toward
Colombian narco-terrorist Alvaro Uribe and sympathetic words for the FARC
rebels with whom he had been negotiating humanitarian prisoner releases.)

But this is the wrong lesson to learn from the December referendum defeat.
Rather than an alienation of the middle class, the low turnout in that
election indicated the alienation of much of the Chavista base, the poor
and most revolutionary members of Chavismo who remained unconvinced that
the referendum would have deepened popular protagonism in the Bolivarian
Revolution. In the past, such moderating moments in Chávez's discourse
have later been revealed to be merely strategic, providing the necessary
subterfuge for radicalizing the revolution. Given that we are in the
aftermath of Chávez's first electoral defeat, we can hope with some
justification that his attack on the radicalism of the "ultra-left" is
similarly strategic, but if by historical accident this moderation becomes
bureaucratically ingrained in the structures of the PSUV, its effects will
be harder to expunge in the long-term.

Thanks to Federico Fuentes for providing invaluable information for this
report.

George Ciccariello-Maher is a Ph.D. candidate in political theory at U.C.
Berkeley. He is currently writing a people's history of the Bolivarian
Revolution, and can be reached at gjcm(at)berkeley.edu.

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