The Sham that was the Opposition Primaries

[Judi Lynn]

The Sham that was the Opposition Primaries
By Tamara Pearson
Source: Venezuelanalysis.com
Sunday, February 19, 2012

The opposition didn’t hold primaries on Sunday for their presidential candidate as well as some mayoral and state candidates because they care about democratic methods and membership participation. The Democratic Unity Table (MUD), the opposition electoral umbrella group, unites individuals and parties who signed the Punto Fijo Pact (a power sharing agreement between AD and COPEI which prevented anyone else from governing for forty years), who supported and carried out the 2002 coup attempt, who own a vast amount of Venezuela’s large businesses, and who regularly visit Washington asking for funding and support, so participation, transparency, and democracy are clearly not high on their list of priorities.

The opposition members competing to be presidential candidate came from the most elite sectors of society, and paid the MUD the equivalent of US$ 232,000 each to participate in the primaries. In this sense the primaries were one more theatrical performance where the super rich pretend to care about general opinion in order to convince the poor and working class to vote for them.

Further, the forever divided opposition, always competing among each other and squabbling over positions, making behind closed doors deals, then betraying each other, needs “unity” and one single candidate in order to stand a chance against Chavez. Unable to reach any agreement, primaries were the best way for them to choose that person.

The most the opposition will ever represent to ordinary Venezuelans is an alternative to Chavez. That fact, along with Henrique Capriles Radonski’s vague and meaningless campaign slogan “There’s a path,” was hardly enough to get people jumping and marching with excitement, so when it came time for the primaries, the opposition ultimately lied about voter turnout in order to make their “movement” seem stronger, to give it motivation in the lead up to the October presidential elections, and give their presidential candidate more legitimacy.

More:
http://www.zcommunications.org/the-sham-that-was-the-opposition-primaries-by-tamara-pearson

[naaman fletcher]

1. lol

Judy,

Who would you have suggested pay for the primary if not the candidates running in it?

what a joke of an article.

[Bacchus4.0]

2. she is a fiction writer apparently so VenAnal is a good place for her n/t

s

[Peace Patriot]

3. Candidates have to pay $232,000 each to appear on a ballot?

Sounds like a rightwing wet dream of a "primary"! The poor, and even the middle class, are automatically excluded from even a chance at leadership of this political group!

And you approve of this huge price tag for merely appearing on a ballot as the only way that a primary can be conducted? How about if a janitor or a teacher or a steel worker or poor homemaker and mother, or a small business owner, wanted to be heard, had political ideas and felt that they had leadership qualities? There are probably not many people like that who would have rightwing political ideas, but say that there are some. Would you approve of their being excluded from the primary ballot if they don't have $232,000 in their fist? You would bar participation in that way?

So much for the representative nature of Venezuela's rightwing. How can you support this price tag for participation? It means that Venezuela's rightwing will NEVER be representative and will continue to get drubbed in elections against Chavez or his successor. You clearly don't like Chavez, so how is Venezuela's "opposition" going to defeat the chavistas, hm? I mean, besides having the corporate media as their propagandists and the USAID as their "trainers" and funders?

GENUINE representation of the interests of ALL Venezuelans is the ONLY way they are going to take back the presidency, in a system, like Venezuela's, with honest, transparent vote counting. The $232,000 price tag in their primary pretty much means that they never will. You are consigning them to the dust.

FYI, I would genuinely like to see a real "opposition" in Venezuela. I've been complaining about these whiners, liars, greedbags and coupsters for a long time. They are so in the pocket of the rich oil elite and so controlled by USAID "messaging"! WHEN are they going to provide constructive criticism and an alternative plan for Venezuela that includes continued social justice and continued independence (the two most important accomplishments of the Chavez administration)?

There may be an argument--in theory, anyway--for fewer nationalizations, for more incentives to business (especially small business), for less inflation (not for deflation but for a bit of a slowdown), or for even more rapid development of a professional police force (than the Chavez government is accomplishing), or for more strenuous efforts to diversity Venezuela's economy (too oil dominated).

But to be worthy of the presidency, the "opposition" needs to present a coherent plan to build upon the significant achievements of the Bolivarian Revolution. All they do is tear it down, with Faux News/Tea Party-type bullshit. They are like two year olds who want their lollipop back (control of the oil for their own benefit). And I don't see them ever getting serious, and being useful to their country, if they require candidates to have $232,000 in hand, merely to run in their primary. What a stupid "message"! It's the same old-same old with them. Will they ever get unstuck from Exxon Mobile, the CIA and the USAID, and their own wealth and fancied privilege, to be able to see Venezuela AS A WHOLE and propose a platform that treats ALL Venezuelans fairly?

You shouldn't be defending this $232,000 price tag for appearing on a primary ballot. You should acknowledge it for what it is--stupid and typical.

I don't much care for even decent rightwing arguments and candidates, because, bottom line, they almost always favor the rich with one "trickle down" theory or another. But I most certainly value debate and dialogue, and a wide spectrum of opinion. Really, if the chavistas ever do become "authoritarian" (and I don't believe they have, to this point), it will be because the "opposition" is so goddamned stupid and vacuous. The chavistas stepped into the void of a failing economy and society in 1998. They stepped in with IDEAS such as universal education, ending illiteracy, medical care for all, bootstrapping the poor, providing adequate nutrition to all, using the oil profits to benefit all Venezuelans, strict regulation of the banks and so on--a real leftist program, to which the right reacts with crossed fingers as if Dracula had seized power. Chavez ain't "Dracula." He's just a good president, a lot like our FDR, a leader for the poor majority against the predations of the rich few. The Bolivarian Revolution has been an understandable reaction to the violence, oppression and poverty for most people, of the prior governments. The "opposition" needs to prove that they are different from those prior governments, and that they have something constructive to ADD to the progressive advances of the Chavez government--on education, poverty reduction and so on, and on Venezuelan independence and regional influence (which Chavez has advanced). "Tea Party" crapola won't do, except in rigged elections like ours.

I wish they would stop being clowns and tools. I wish they would disavow their extremists and coupsters. I wish they would become a true "loyal opposition" of whom it was possible to believe that they could govern wisely and well, without sending Venezuela backwards into vast poverty and unfairness. Their $232,000 price tag for leadership shows that they just don't get it. They don't understand WHY they have failed, time and gain, to unseat Chavez. They remain oblivious to the needs and desires of most Venezuelans.

[naaman fletcher]

4. So then,

How would you suggest that the primary be paid for?

[Peace Patriot]

5. This was a first, as I understand it--the first "opposition" primary.

So I don't know the rules. In the U.S., taxpayers pay for primary elections. The candidates may have a filing fee, but nowhere near $230,000. More in the $1000 range. But that doesn't pay for the primary election, merely for the paperwork of filing (if that). Nor does the political party pay for a primary. It is an official election, run by the secretaries of state, and paid for by taxes.

I simply don't know how Chavez's party pays for its candidate selections. The same way? I strongly doubt it. They would never exclude the poor from running for office. I seem to recall they had a convention last time, but I'm not sure.

This "opposition" primary was run by the official Venezuelan national election commission. Why were candidates' fees so high to be on the ballot, and where did the money go? It seems clear that the big fee was a party requirement, not an election commission requirement. But I don't know what this large fee was used for. (Did it pay for the actual primary election costs--the cost of ballots, of election officials and monitors, etc.? Or did the party use it for publicity and get-out-the vote efforts or other purposes?)

In any case, all costs of elections should be generally shared--should come out of government funds, paid for by the taxpayers. There shouldn't be an exclusive club of rich people who can field candidates because they have hundreds of thousands of dollars to spare. That is as inimical to democracy as our filthy corporate campaign contribution system.

It surprised me--even for the rightwing. It also surprised me that it is legal in Venezuela for anybody to put such a high price on putting a name on a ballot. Venezuela has quite good election rules, on the whole--very democratic, very pro-citizen participation. This very high cost for a mere candidacy in the rightwing party is an anomaly.

[Bacchus4.0]

6. State funds for the Chavista candidates but none for the opposition.

if I am wrong, one of our Venezuela residing members can correct me.


am I correct in that?

[txlibdem]

7. And they make opposition candidates walk through a pit of fire, too.

[naaman fletcher]

8. well,

First of all, it is not true that primaries in the US are already funded by the government.

Second, if a poor teacher wanted to run, her supporters could contribute money to her.

That being said, if one in fact thinks that Chavez is the only possible "legitimate" president of Venezuela, then of course all of that is meaningless.

It sounds to me thought that your scorn should be directed at Chavez for not funding this primary.

[Peace Patriot]

9. Primary ELECTIONS are funded by the state governments in the U.S.

When I get my Democratic Party ballot for a primary election, neither the ballot nor the election itself is paid for by the Democratic Party--never heard of such a thing. It is an OFFICIAL election, overseen by the secretary of state and paid for by our taxes.

This may not be true of caucus type primaries. I don't know how they are funded. And it is not true of party conventions. But it is true, as far as I know, of official primary ELECTIONS. And most candidates are chosen, these days, by official state primary elections. Recently, California's political primaries were opened up to all voters. It is a general vote and thus, it is extremely unlikely that the Democratic Party is paying for its particular ballot. The party may be paying a form of filing fee--just as candidates do--but it is very unlikely that such a fee is large enough to cover costs. But most importantly, candidates pay the state, NOT the party, their nominal filing fees. If the state were charging the party for the cost of a primary election, candidate filing fees would be going to the party not the state--and that is not the case.

Maybe the rule in Venezuela is that, if the party decides to hold a convention, the party pays for it, but if they want an official ballot and election, the party has to pay the national election commission to conduct the election, and thus duns the candidates for the cost. If that is the case, then the "opposition" party needs to LOWER that cost to the candidates, for instance, by general fundraising. It is all too typical--of their oligarchic bent--that they would favor candidates with hundreds of thousands of dollars in hand, and greatly disfavor candidates who have to raise donations one dollar at a time--just to get on the primary ballot. It tells you who they are.

If they chose candidates at a convention, then it would be more possible for a poor candidate to get nominated. Though "brokered" conventions (backroom deals by the powers-that-be) can happen, a two-hundred thousand+ dollar filing fee will FOR SURE exclude most people from being a candidate. I simply don't know if they were required to do this or chose to do this. If they were required to do it, then they should have thought ahead about issues of inclusiveness and fairness. As it is, they are the $200,000+ buy-yourself-a-candidacy party!

[naaman fletcher]

10. So take this up with Chavez then.

Demand that the government fund opposition primaries.

[ChangoLoa]

11. The State rented the infrastructure, the logistic and the machines. Problem solved. nt

[joshcryer]

12. Blatant propaganda. Embarrassing.

The most odious thing I have ever seen. Venezuela's elections are the cleanest in all of Latin America, if not the hemisphere. I can't believe this is being posted here.