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Let’s set the record straight once and for all. There is no need to keep
kidding ourselves into thinking that our U.S. taxpayer dollars are being used
by this little known entity, the National Endowment for Democracy, to truly “promote
democracy abroad”, as its mission proclaims. Since its founding in 1983
via Congressional legislation, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) has
come under severe criticism and scrutiny from Republicans, Democrats, and other
concerned citizens, for its clear roots in Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) activities
and its misdirected motives. And now, the NED is once again at the forefront of
controversy and inquiry but this time in one of the Bush Administration’s
latest areas of “focus,” the hemisphere’s largest oil-exporting
nation, Venezuela.
On Thursday, July 7, 2005, a Venezuelan Judge determined the Federal Prosecutor
had presented sufficient evidence to allow a case against four members of the
opposition organization Súmate to proceed on its merits. The case against
the two Súmate directors, Maria Corina Machado and Alejandro Plaz, and
their accomplices, Ricardo Estévez and Luis Enrique Palacios, is based
on the organization’s use of a $53,400 grant from the National Endowment
for Democracy to “conspire against the government”. Súmate
was co-founded in late 2002 by opposition activist Maria Corina Machado, a signer
of the famous “Carmona Decree,” the mandate implemented during the
April 2002 coup d’etat against President Hugo Chávez by “dictator
for a day” Pedro Carmona that dissolved Venezuela’s judiciary, congress,
constitution and all public powers. The organization’s initial mission
was to “promote a recall referendum against President Chávez”
based on Article 72 of Venezuela’s Constitution that permits recall referendums
on any public official’s mandate after the midway point of the functionary’s
term has been reached, hardly an apolitical objective.
Yet Súmate and its directive were prime players in the debilitating
oil industry sabotage and strike that caused the nation billions of dollars
in damages and set back oil production for almost a year. And at the tail end
of the strike in early 2003, Súmate still couldn’t play by the
rules. Instead of waiting for President Chávez to reach the midway point
of his presidential term, in August 2003, the organization demanded a “consultative
referendum” on the President’s mandate in February 2003, and protested
to the international community (read “USA”) when it didn’t
get its way despite the fact that its request was unconstitutional.
In September 2003, Súmate entered into a contract with the National
Endowment for Democracy for a $53,400 grant destined to implement a program
of non-partisan “elections education.” Yet the goal of the program
itself, to “promote a recall referendum against President Chávez”
and the language used to justify the grant, claiming “…Chávez’s
revolutionary rhetoric, public disregard for democratic processes and institutions
and vitriolic attacks on his opponents, escalated political and social tensions
and hardened the opposition,” was clearly anti-Chávez. The concept
of promoting a recall referendum against the President, though within the constitutional
rights of all Venezuelans, is inherently a partisan act. Súmate was not
pretending to educate or work with all Venezuelans on elections in general,
but rather was specifically “promoting” and campaigning for a referendum
against President Chávez, with the goal of prematurely terminating his
mandate. And that is precisely what the organization worked towards, utilizing
the funding from the National Endowment for Democracy, along with additional
and larger grants from the United States Agency for International Development
(“USAID”) and funds from the National Democratic Institute and the
International Republican Institute, both entities financed by NED and USAID.
Day after day during a period of almost a year, Súmate launched an aggressive
and manipulative campaign against President Chávez in the mass media,
aided in intimidating voters by threatening job loss for failure to sign petitions
in favor of the referendum and later engaged in mass fraud during and after
the referendum was over. In fact, to this day, Súmate continues to promote
a thesis of fraud regarding the recall referendum last August 15, 2004, which
ratified President Chávez’s mandate with more than 60% of the vote
– certified as transparent and legitimate by the Organization of American
States, the Carter Center and the U.S. Department of State.
Súmate continues to engage in an antagonistic campaign against the Venezuelan
Government and its democratic institutions, including the National Elections
Council (Consejo Nacional Electoral - CNE), responsible for conducting all electoral
processes. Súmate, along with other opposition political parties, is
now promoting a thesis of abstention and lack of confidence in the CNE and the
upcoming congressional elections in Venezuela, hardly a position that encourages
“participation in the electoral process”, or “elections education”
and clearly not apolitical. In fact, Súmate has been deemed a political
party by many analysts and spokespersons for the Venezuelan government.
Curiously, Súmate has also received an unprecedented and almost inexplicable
level of support from the U.S. Government, and not just financial support, but
rather political support on a very public and international level. In November
2004, after an initial court date had been set for the case against the Súmate
directors, NED President Carl Gershman, accompanied by Latin America Program
Director Chris Sabatini, made a historic visit to Venezuela with the objective
of convincing the government to drop the case. Gershman met separately with
then Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Ivan Rincon and Attorney General Isaias
Rodriguez, threatening both functionaries that if the case were to proceed against
the Súmate members, relations between the two nations would worsen and
a World Bank grant to Venezuela’s Supreme Court for a judicial reform
program would be cut. Days afterward, Gershman came through on his promises.
The NED, surely with the powerful aid of its boss, the Department of State,
had pulled its strings with the World Bank and cut the funding to Venezuela’s
judiciary, and just twenty-four hours after Gershman returned to U.S. soil,
a well-crafted letter from “70 respected international democrats,”
all either board members of the NED or beneficiaries of NED-related programs,
was released from NED’s public relations office, condemning the case against
Súmate and accusing the Venezuelan Government of political persecution
and violation of democratic principles. And before Gershman parted from Venezuela,
he revealingly declared to the press, in a fit of anger perhaps for not getting
his way, that “Venezuela is neither a democracy nor a dictatorship but
rather something in between.” Clearly such a statement evidences NED’s
opposition to Venezuela’s democratic government.
Just last month, Súmate director and defendant Maria Corina Machado
received a surprise invitation to meet with President George W. Bush in the
Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D.C. Ms. Machado appeared in a
fantastical photograph holding hands with President Bush in the Oval Office,
smiling from ear to ear. Upon her exit from the momentous visit, Machado gave
a press conference on the White House lawn, a place fit for prime ministers,
presidents and high-level officials. She was the first Venezuelan during the
Bush presidency to be invited and received in the White House, not a single
member of the Chávez Government has received a similar invitation. On
the contrary, the Bush Administration has participated in and supported a coup
d’etat against President Chávez in 2002, a vicious oil industry
sabotage that caused almost irreparable damages and an ongoing destabilization
campaign, including an international media war intended to discredit the Venezuelan
leader, that has polarized Venezuela and fomented violence, conflict and animosity.
Yet Súmate and its members have received the royal treatment from the
U.S. Government – democrats and republicans alike. Just recently, during
a visit of several U.S. Congress members to Venezuela, it was declared that
Súmate would receive “even more financing” from the NED and
USAID. The day after the court decided to allow the case against Súmate
to proceed on its merits, Tom Casey, Acting Spokesman for the U.S. Department
of State issued a press release entitled “Súmate Trial Decision,”
expressing the U.S. Government’s “disappointment” in the judge’s
decision to try the Súmate leaders and alleging the Venezuelan Government
engages in “political persecution and continued threats to democratic
rights and institutions.” Once again, the U.S. Government failed to recognize
that Venezuela too cherishes the doctrine of separation of powers. The case
against Súmate now falls within the judicial power – and the prosecutor’s
office that is bringing the case falls within the moral power, a branch nonexistent
in the U.S. Venezuela has five independent branches of government: executive,
legislative, judicial, electoral and moral – neither controls nor influences
the other. The U.S. Government has consistently attempted to pressure the Venezuelan
executive into acting on the Súmate case, disrespecting outright the
independent and separate nature of Venezuela’s political system and trying
to dominate and intimidate the Venezuelan Government.
So why is the U.S. Government so afraid of the case against Súmate?
Most likely because the case exposes the nefarious and deceitful nature of the
National Endowment for Democracy and other U.S. Government facades for civil
society intervention. The NED is a U.S. Government agency, though often referred
to as “quasi-governmental” because it insists on its status as “private,”
despite the fact that 99% of its funding comes from Congress (tax money) and
it was established through Congressional legislation in 1983. The NED is also
required to report to Congress annually on its activities and exercises its
functions under direct supervision of the Department of State. In fact, each
NED representative in the more than 75 nations where the organization operates
is stationed usually in the U.S. Embassy, working under the supervision of the
U.S. Ambassador.
In early 2001, NED quadrupled its financing to groups in Venezuela and increased
the amount of grants it was dispensing, funding new social organizations and
political parties that had emerged within the growing opposition to President
Chávez. NED spokespersons have not denied the fact that all of the entities
it finances in Venezuela fall within the anti-Chávez spectrum. Furthermore,
after the April 2002 failed coup against President Chávez, the NED received
a special $1 million grant from the Department of State for its work in Venezuela.
Instead of cutting funding to those groups that had participated in the illegal
coup that briefly deposed Venezuela’s legitimate government, the NED actually
increased such funding, rewarding those very same groups that had wrecked havoc
on Venezuela’s democracy.
The NED has been engaging in ongoing efforts to strengthen organizations and
political parties working to overthrow the Chávez administration or eventually
oust the President from power through electoral processes. Its work consistently
undermines the objectives and missions of the Venezuelan people and their Government
by funneling millions into groups working against the wishes of the majority
and providing and resources aimed at building a solid opposition party capable
of challenging the Venezuelan Government. While it is perfectly legitimate in
democratic nations for diverse political parties and groups to co-exist, such
efforts should never be funded by foreign governments, especially those governments
with major self-interests in the nation and contrasting political positions.
The NED is one of the U.S. Government’s most powerful tools to discretely
and subtly promote its interests abroad and penetrate civil societies with the
objective of influencing the internal affairs of nations to placate U.S. needs.
Ethiopia recently expelled the NED and USAID and their affiliates, the International
Republican Institute, the National Democratic Institute and IFES for “meddling
in domestic electoral affairs” (see The Daily Monitor, April 1, 2005,
Addis Abba, Ethiopia). And in May, 2005, Russia’s security chief, accused
the U.S. Government of “using non-governmental organizations that promote
democracy to spy on Russia and bring about political upheaval in former Soviet
republics”, referring specifically to the NED and USAID-funded International
Republic Institute (see The Guardian).
The NED and USAID played key roles in recent elections in the Ukraine, Georgia,
Belarus and other Eastern European nations that all resulted in outcomes favorable
to U.S. interests. In Venezuela, the case against Súmate is exposing
the NED’s dirty work and threatening its ongoing existence and success
around the world, which is why it has provoked the involvement of the highest
levels of the U.S. Government. This case may very well turn out to be the death
of the National Endowment for Democracy, or at least the start of its slow descent
into oblivion.
**For more information about the National Endowment for Democracy and its violation
of Venezuela’s sovereignty using U.S. taxpayer dollars, read “The
Chávez Code: Cracking U.S. Intervention in Venezuela” by Eva Golinger,
available on www.venezuelafoia.info/codigo.html.
Versions available in English and Spanish
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