Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: the powerful president of a Latin American country, still strong despite widespread concerns about his human rights record, moves to extend his power by striking down presidential term limits. He pushes for a referendum that would amend the constitution, allowing him to run for re-election after his current term expires. A chorus of voices from his own country — some of them genuine human rights activists, others of them members of the ruling oligarchy out to protect their own business interests — protest the measure, claiming that it is a sign of encroaching dictatorship. Right-wing commentators in the U.S. join in, arguing that to abolish term limits would be tantamount to making the leader “president-for-life.”
The story is by now familiar to all watchers of Latin American politics. But there is one notable exception to the right’s concern about presidential power. Reuters reports:
Colombian President Alvaro Uribe stepped closer to re-election on Tuesday when a congressional committee approved a bill aimed at allowing him to run for a third term next May, but a tough vote looms in the full House. The measure, calling for a referendum to change the constitution, had been stalled for weeks in the committee but the government has launched an all-out lobbying effort. Congress already changed the constitution once to allow Uribe, a U.S.-backed conservative, to stand for re-election in 2006.
Although the committee’s approval of the bill on Tuesday was not decisive — as Reuters notes, the real test will be the full House vote — the right’s silence throughout Uribe’s campaign against term limits has been striking. None of the self-styled champions of Latin American democracy in the U.S. — the Wall Street Journal editorial page, The New Republic, The Weekly Standard, and so forth — have seen fit to criticize Uribe’s move.
Compare the reaction when Uribe’s left-wing colleagues made similar efforts. In February, Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez won a referendum striking down term limits and permitting him to run for office again in 2012. The move was roundly denounced on the right as proof of Chavez’s dictatorial tendencies. “Like his idol, Fidel Castro, who reigned in Cuba for a half-century, Mr. Chávez can now move toward his goal of becoming President for life,” the Wall Street Journal editorialized. Chavez’s previous attempt to abolish term limits was similarly depicted in the press as a “president-for-life bid.”
In June, Honduran president Manuel Zelaya’s attempts to hold a referendum on a constitutional amendment to end term limits — this one non-binding, and thus with no concrete political ramifications — were used to justify the military coup that deposed him. National Review opined that the referendum “would set [Honduras] on the path to Chávez-style authoritarianism” and that the “soldiers who escorted Pres. Manuel Zelaya from his home on Sunday were acting to protect their country’s democracy, not to trample it.” When Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega called for the abolition of term limits in July, Costa Rican rightist Jaime Darenblum took to the Weekly Standard to accuse Ortega of “following the Chavez playbook” and moving “one step closer to creating an autocracy.”
These critics denied any partisan motive, insisting that their only concern was for democratic institutions and constitutional procedure. Mary Anastasia O’Grady, the Wall Street Journal editorial writer who has been the most ardent American defender of the Honduran coup, proclaimed in its wake that “The struggle against chavismo has never been about left-right politics. It is about defending the independence of institutions that keep presidents from becoming dictators.”
But when Uribe takes identical steps? Not a peep. The message is clear: the term-limits issue is fair game when it can be used to foster hysteria about chavismo and paint every left-of-center Latin American leader as a would-be totalitarian. When the leader in question is a right-wing U.S. ally, however, there is no need to worry about such procedural niceties. An enemy of Hugo Chavez is a friend of ours, regardless of how he stays in power.
To be clear, this is not to excuse all the actions of leftists like Chavez, Ortega, and Zelaya. Their encroachments on civil society are genuinely troubling, even if they do not justify the almost comically alarmist rhetoric prevalent on the right. On the other hand, Uribe’s government has a terrible human rights record of its own that his right-wing apologists are eager to paper over. (TFT’s Marc Lizoain recently noted Uribe’s extensive ties with paramilitary death squads and his government’s extrajudicial murder of civilians.)
Nor is this to say that Uribe’s re-election push is a sign of dictatorial tendencies in and of itself. The United States did not have presidential term limits for the first 175 years of its existence, and the country still managed to avoid becoming a strongman-led dictatorship. Pundits would do well to tone down their hysteria over the implications of allowing democratically elected presidents to be democratically elected again — whether the leader in question is Chavez or Uribe.
Regardless, the hypocrisy on display is noteworthy, if not particularly surprising. Although they may wax rhapsodic about democracy promotion, American hawks have never really gotten over their soft spot for right-wing Latin American authoritarians. (Recall that the neoconservatives cut their teeth in the 1980s as supporters of Pinochet, the Contras, and any number of other murderous military juntas.) Still, if rightists want their denunciations of Chavez and his allies to be taken seriously, they should try to exercise a little more consistency.
[Cross-posted in modified form at LobeLog.]
Ryan Vaquero says:
Sorry, what exactly is "genuinely troubling" about Chavez's platform of participatory democracy? During Chavez's time as president of Venezuela, he has significantly decreased poverty, closed the digital divide gap in extraordinary programs which give hundreds of thousands of people access to the internet and technology training and, in fact, developed policies which give the people significantly more influence over public policy-making in a country which has traditionally been run by a very small elite sector of the very wealthy. What I find troubling is that in the US democracy, information is still so heavily controlled within the mainstream media that it is just accepted as fact that Chavez is doing SOMETHING -- no one ever seems to be able to specify exactly what that is -- which harms civil society. I find it absurd. The experiments in participatory democracy happening in Venezuela, Brazil, Bolivia, Ecuador and the other hyper-progressive presidencies happening in these countries put the US oligarchy to shame. Unless you have something specific to complain about Chavez, I don't think you should have any "concerns" ... Lula is the most popular president (according to polling data) in the entire world. So, what's the problem?
Anne says:
I can't come to any definite conclusions until I've actually visited and spent some time in Venezuela, but for now I have to agree with Ryan. The US government's anti-Chavez propaganda contradicts most conversations I've had with actual Venezuelans or individuals with an intimate knowledge of the country's history.
E. Tasereo says:
Mr. Vaquero's comment displays an alarming ignorance of the real impact of Chavez's policies and approach not only on his people but throughout Latin America. Let me provide some of those "specific examples" he asks for:
One of our staff is Venezuelan-born, and her family has directly experienced the kind of "participatory democracy" Mr. Vaquero refers to. Chavez's government has privatized (read: taken illegal control of) cattle ranches and other private enterprises and handed them out to his sympathizers, who then, at least in the case of the ranches, proceeded to host huge BBQ feasts rather than managing them responsibly and ensuring the people have enough to eat. Under his "leadership", basic food supplies like sugar, milk and flour have become scarce in grocery stores. Robbers brazenly clean out houses (one account told to me includes the robbers raping the daughters of one of the households robbed in front of their own families). Policy proposals designed to curtail more and more of the people's civil rights somehow never make it into the mainstream media, but are talked about and discussed on the ground in people's homes. The People of Venezuela have LESS influence and less power than ever before, Mr. Vaquero.
In Honduras, my colleagues and friends there are sending out passionate emails against their own President Zelaya, whom they supported until he became friendly with Chavez and attempt to implement similar political policies in Honduras. Note this: the very people of Honduras supported Zelaya, but have now turned against him. They have emphatically stated that the supposed "coup" was not in fact a coup, but a desperate measure to save their democracy which Zelaya was in the process of destroying, and denying.
In Colombia, the love the people hold for their president equals the resentment they feel against Chavez. Uribe has done what no other president has been able to before him, and that is to weaken the guerrila forces to the point where they have had to seek the help of other countries to survive--and the fact that they have is due in great part to the support, both financial and political, received by Venezuela. You can see the signature tactics of these terrorist forces in what is happening now in Mexico and in some places in the Southwest: the kind of kidnappings, the kind of torture, the kind of extortion practiced. Again, these are direct personal accounts from friends who were born and live in Colombia.
So this is not simply about the US. This is about the personal sentiments and preferences of the Latin American people, many of whom do not in fact appreciate, nor desire, a political existence remotely close to anything Chavez, Correa or others of similar minds, want to implement.
Indeed, the fact of doing "SOMETHING", as you say, has no value. It all depends on what that something is. It is in fact worse than doing nothing if a.) "no one ever seems to be able to specify exactly what that is" and b.) the eventual material impacts on the people are negative.
ftpal says:
Mr. Tasereo,
Why not at least acknowledge that Chavez has a large margin of electoral support?
Why not also acknowledge that there is a long history of government in favor of the wealthy in Central and Latin America?
29% percent in Venezuela are poor or extremely poor according to the U.S. Dept. of State.
According to the UN, the top 10% has 48 times the income of the poorest 10% in Venezuela. (compare with Colombia 64 times, Honduras 34 times, U.S. 16 times, Sweden 6.2 times.)
What do you propose should be done about the poverty and structural inequality that has developed over this history?
Before Chavez, I did not observe real advocacy from Venezuelan politicians.
Fair and well functioning government institutions, accessible public schools, good affordable health care, roads, and many other public goods are needed to overcome poverty.
But, it is unlikely that these will be provided without progressive taxation.
Given the opportunity, poor people in Latin America are going to vote for people who will try to solve their problems.
Refs:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Venezuela
http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/35766.htm
http://hdrstats.undp.org/indicators/145.html
ftpal says:
Daniel Luban wrote...
>>>> "In June, Honduran president Manuel Zelaya’s attempts
>>>> to hold a referendum on a constitutional amendment to
>>>> end term limits ... "
As I understand it, the referendum was more general and just measured popular support for potential National Constituent Assembly.
For a discussion of this point see:
http://www.counterpunch.org/thorensen07012009.html
Freddie B says:
Hey Daniel, have you forgotten what Uribe did for his country? Here is a reminder:
Restored order, bringing the 50% rebel and narco of countryside back under government control. Many had lived with the other militias, extortion rackets, shootings and kidnappings and are now grateful. Security has increased. New free-market reforms, etc...
He is now the most successful leader in Latin America, while the others are populists, he is the most popular in his own country.
Now, lets see his neighbor to the east and see why he doesn't deserve the respect of his people and the World and see why this guy is a dictator and a clown:
Chavez Closes 34 Radio Stations
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/08/02/world/main5205473.shtml
Venezuela's murder rates surpass Colombia's under Hugo Chavez
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/southamerica/venezuela/3184293/Venezuelas-murder-rates-surpass-Colombias-under-Hugo-Chavez.html
Chavez will send troops to the Colombian border
http://colombiareports.com/colombia-news/news/5143-chaves-says-to-send-troops-to-colombia-border.html
Chavez takes on Venezuela now, calls Uribe ‘shameless liar’
http://www.indianexpress.com/news/chavez-takes-on-venezuela-now-calls-uribe/243694/
Venezuela's Chavez Calls Obama 'Ignorant'
http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=7145793
chavez calls on obama to follow path of socialism
http://www.topix.com/us/politics/2009/03/chavez-calls-on-obama-to-follow-path-of-socialism
Chávez Calls Brazil US Parrot. Lula Tells Him to Mind His Own Country
http://www.brazzilmag.com/content/view/8314/54/