If the situation were not so dangerous, it would be clear that President Maduro was in the wrong profession. Under normal circumstances his true vocation would seem to lie in Hollywood as a writer of ‘B’ movies of the fantasy or even comedic variety. What else could be said about a man who proposes to annexe two-thirds of a neighbouring state, take a census and issue ID cards to its population, divide it up into administrative units, issue exploration licences there to Venezuelan state oil and steel companies, give an ultimatum to any operator working in waters offshore three months to leave, distribute maps of the new state to all schools, colleges and universities, designate national parks and environmental protection zones there and set up an Integral Defence Zone called ‘Guayana Esequiba’?
Of course you cannot create a new state without an administrator, both political and military, so the ever imaginative Nicolás Maduro also appointed Major General Rodríguez Cabello to the dual post, who will exercise his authority from Tumeremo. And exactly where in Essequibo, a Guyanese might ask, is Tumeremo? Well it isn’t. It is a Venezuelan mining town on the other side of the Cuyuni River. Many moons ago it was a Capuchín mission before being abandoned in the early nineteenth century. It marks the nearest point to this country any of the Venezuelan missions ever came.
It is not as if anyone in government in Caracas is concerned about what Essequibans might think about their county being absorbed into another state, being broken up into alien units, or being ruled by an imposed Spanish-speaking military administrator. And this is an area whose citizens exercised their democratic right to vote in a national government in 2020 and their local governments earlier this year, and whose indigenous inhabitants voted into office their own village councils.
Short of a military invasion, Mr Maduro’s ukases are all fairy-tale stuff. While he created a military division to deal with Essequibo he did not announce any armed intervention, and so he described the orders as “provisional”. The question is, provisional on what or for how long? The National Assembly was exhorted to swiftly change the law to create the new state, but after it does that, then what?
This all follows the Consultative Referendum in Venezuela last Sunday, where citizens were asked to vote on five questions, the last of which related to effectively annexing Essequibo. President Maduro was hoping for a large turn-out of voters, but that did not happen; there were no queues anywhere, and polling stations remained empty in many places for most of the day, despite the earlier coercion and threats directed against public employees and others with connections to the State. But the referendum itself took place in a certain political context. It had been preceded by an opposition primary, where the voter turn-out was large, even in Chavista areas, and where María Corina Machado who is disqualified from standing in next year’s presidential election won an overwhelming majority.
President Maduro is under pressure from the United States, but after a compromise with the united opposition in relation to the election, he won a six-month lifting of sanctions. Mr Maduro knows the odds are very much against him to win an open poll, but seems to have thought he could improve his chances by playing the nationalist card in relation to Essequibo thereby recovering some political initiative. That all depended on a large voter turn-out, however, which didn’t materialize, so he was forced to recognize that rhetoric alone against Guyana’s government, the ICJ and Southern Command really couldn’t help him electorally speaking.
Since the President couldn’t be seen to be weak ‒ although he is still insisting he received backing from a very large number of voters ‒ he has now moved on to Plan B, although whether he envisaged he would actually have to do this is a moot point. It may be that he expected major popular support and now finds himself cornered, and that this is his poorly thought-out response. The problem with it is that it has its own logic. Even if he does not have it in mind to make an incursion into Guyana, he may feel impelled to follow this course eventually, because he cannot keep ‘provisional’ measures in place indefinitely without appearing feeble and ineffective. It can only be hoped that in addition to the measures, he has worked out a route whereby he can retreat from them without losing too much face.
It can only be wondered at that a state in such dire economic straits is prepared to expend much needed finance on setting up a complicated bureaucracy in relation to its supposed ‘creation’ of a new state. A military intervention in particular, would put an even greater strain on Caracas.
Since the Essequibo gamble hasn’t worked in relation to next year’s election, it may be that President Maduro is prepared to accept the reimposition of US sanctions so he can perpetrate another fraudulent poll. Alternatively, he may cast around for an excuse to postpone the election, and it has to be remembered that from the beginning the Venezuelan opposition was afraid that the government would indulge in military adventurism in Guyana with this very end in mind. Whether he gets trapped in the logic of a situation of his own creation, or whether Mr Maduro actually has it in mind to take armed action against this country, Guyana faces potential peril, as President Irfaan Ali recognized in his address to the nation on Tuesday night.
With reference to Venezuela he said that they had “literally declared themselves an outlaw nation.” This is true, although the problem is they were something of an ‘outlaw nation’ already, and with some exceptions, moved in ‘outlaw’ circles internationally speaking. One of their more recent friends which certainly does not fall in the ‘outlaw’ category, is Brazil. On Wednesday we carried a Reuters report quoting Mr Celso Amorim, President Lula’s top foreign policy advisor, as saying that Brazil opposes “the use of force or threat thereof.”
President Ali told Guyanese of the various measures the government was taking in the light of the current situation, which represented a “blatant disregard” of the order made by the ICJ. He had spoken, he said, to UN Secretary General António Guterres as well as several leaders, along with Caricom, the OAS, the Commonwealth and others, including the US, Brazil, the UK and France. He also said that Guyana would bring the matter to the UN Security Council, although where that is concerned, it has to be remembered that one of the permanent members is Russia, which is close to Venezuela.
President Maduro was quoted as saying, “We are going to seek justice and restore Venezuela’s rights over Guayana Esequiba. Our country will come together”. There is no sign, however, of Venezuelans coming together. What the Venezuelan head of state has managed to achieve is to bring Guyanese together.
