The Return of the Coup in Latin America
by Manuel E. Yepe - CounterPunch
April 26, 2016
Venezuela and Brazil are the scenes of a new form of coup d’état that would set the continent’s political calendar back to its worst times. Meanwhile, in Argentina, the brutal model for the demolition of democracy is set forward by the continental oligarchic right and the hegemonic forces of US imperialism who wish to impose their model in the region.
As we can see in the previews that test the memory of the peoples in the continent, it is difficult to accept that the new types of coups are actually softer and more covert than those which Latin America suffered for so long.
What has been shown so far in Argentina is no less cruel, in terms of contempt for the masses, than the coups carried out by the bloodthirsty dictatorships that sprouted in time of Operation Condor.
In Venezuela the president of the opposition majority in the National Assembly, Henry Ramos, openly declares that in view of the severity of the economic crisis, he fails to see Maduro concluding his term and adds they should put an end to Nicolas Maduro’s legitimate government within six months. Such statements did not compel the Secretary General of the Organization of American States, Luis Almagro, to formulate even the mildest rejection to such a coup-like declaration. This indicates they are returning to the era of open and brutal coups in the backyard of the United States of America.
Meanwhile, in Argentina, the newly-elected president, Mauricio Macri, moves forward the implementation of his “democratic model” with a brutal demolition of all the advances the nation had made after the collapse it suffered as a result of the neo-liberal economic and political crisis from which it had been rescued by the consecutive popular governments of Nestor Kirchner and Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner.
Argentinean writer, journalist, and researcher Stella Calloni, explains that the current coup in Argentina began the same day Macri took office. He is an extreme right businessman who, since 2007 (according to Wikileaks) offered his services to the US embassy in Buenos Aires.
“The coup offensive began with decrees that allowed for the intervention of institutions and absolutely illegal measures, such as the appointment by decree of two judges to the Supreme Court. All economic measures favor the powerful and mark a path of exclusion for the common people,” says Calloni.
Violating the constitution and the laws, and ruling by Necessity and Urgency Decrees(NUDs) since December 2015, Macri took a road that evidently seeks to deliver the country to the global hegemonic power and the destruction of a work that had earned Argentina worldwide admiration and respect. He is delivering the country to the sinister designs of the International Monetary Fund and other agencies, banks and foreign institutions. All his economic actions favor the powerful and mark a path of exclusion for the population”.
“The negative opposition in Congress is part of the ongoing coup the US and its local puppets are carrying out against Venezuela,” Calloni says.
While the United States and its network of partners and local employees –with applause from the hegemonic power– support Macri’s unconstitutional decrees, in Venezuela, the decree of “economic emergency” signed by President Nicolas Maduro, was rejected by the legislative opposition with the acquiescence of the same power.
Never before was the right more willing to violate the Constitution and call to sedition, warned former Venezuelan Vice-President and journalist Jose Vicente Rangel.
“Seldom in our country had a coup been announced so clearly and at the same time so elusively; the option would be the presidential recall, but this option –within our constitution– is only tangentially alluded to.”
According to Rangel, the opposition sails in two rivers by affirming, on the one hand, that within six months Nicolas Maduro will leave –by peaceful and constitutional means–Miraflores Palace (seat of government) and, on the other, that they will not even wait that long to oust the Venezuelan president.
“The right has grown presumptuous after its legislative victory of last December 6. But they still remember the failed coup of 2002: a resounding failure that made them switch to peaceful methods –as the ones they are apparently trying to use now– to overthrow the socialist power, But neither the soft blows, the carnival costumes used to confuse, or the violent coups can occur with impunity,” concludes José Vicente Rangel.
This article was translated from the Spanish by Walter Lippmann for the invaluable CubaNews.
Manuel E. Yepe is a lawyer, economist and journalist. He is a professor at the Higher Institute of International Relations in Havana.
More articles by:Manuel E. Yepe
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