Interview with Emiliano Terán Mantovani

This interview was not easy to put together, as Emiliano has to move with extreme caution in the face of the overwhelming militarisation that the country is experiencing. 

How would you characterise the Maduro government? 

Since July 28, an electoral fraud has been carried out in Venezuela that will be much talked about when the biggest frauds in the contemporary history of Latin America are remembered. Today, we are facing a reconfiguration of Maduro’s political regime so that it can govern under conditions of complete social, political and international illegitimacy. It is a dangerous reconfiguration because it intends to take repression and social control to unheard-of levels. But allow me first to explore where we are coming from in order to see where we could be going.

Maduro’s government has drifted more and more, over these 11 years, towards decadence in every sense. It has been pulverising the framework of social rights, seeking to suffocate all political and social dissidence, with brutal repression of the entire popular sector, even if one is a critical Chavista. Venezuela has been governed under a permanent state of exception: a legal one, by decree, which lasted more than five years, from 2016 to 2021, something totally unconstitutional but which paradoxically was normalised.

On the other hand, the architecture of power in the Maduro regime was shaped by a gradual restructuring of the state. The precursor is the corporate and militarist state established during the Chávez administration, its authoritarian and vertical ways of doing politics, with its fundamental principle of maximum loyalty to the leader above all else. The structures and networks of state corruption are also an important precursor. These elements saw continuity in Maduro’s government, but now without Chávez’s charisma and political legitimacy, without the enormous oil income that it once had, and in the context of a systemic collapse. And so everything began to be imposed, fundamentally, by force and violence.

The National Assembly, won handily by the opposition in 2015, was disregarded, and a parallel National Assembly of the regime was created in 2017. Military companies were created for the direct and private appropriation and management of wealth. The enormous poverty that the crisis produced was used politically, creating institutional channels for the selective allocation of wealth to state officials and supporters of the ruling party, the PSUV. Access to information was eliminated.

Numerous state and para-state security forces were deployed—a structure of corruption and unchallengeable power in an environment of maximum impunity and militarisation, a ‘mafiasation’ of the state. All of this was justified in the name of “defending the revolution and socialism” and “fighting against the right-wing”. So we had a regime change from within and a new type of dictatorship was consolidated, a clientelist and oligarchic regime, which also allows direct appropriation of regional wealth to maintain provincial loyalties. 

Venezuela is governed like a hacienda—a plantation estate. 

However, some consider it to be Leftist

A shop with goods priced in dollars. There is the systematic destruction of the salary, keeping it in bolivars while the economy is completely dollarised (today, it is equivalent to 4 dollars a month).

There is no basis whatsoever to say that this is a progressive government, much less a leftist one. There is a strong liberalisation of the economy, with the promotion and protection of transnational capital, large tax exemptions, low-profile privatisations, promotion of special economic zones, and the creation of a VIP Venezuela (tourism, restaurants, bars, trips, luxury vehicles) only for foreigners, business people, and high-level government officials. There is the systematic destruction of the salary, keeping it in bolivars while the economy is completely dollarised (today, it is equivalent to 4 dollars a month). There is the abandonment of the public sector. 

Fedecámaras, the country’s main business association, which was always seen as the great enemy of Chávez, is now a friend of the Maduro regime. We are facing one of the most aggressive neoliberal restructurings in the region, although it is certainly not a conventional neoliberalism. The development of an authoritarian system and the neoliberalisation of the economy are two parts of the same process of regime change in Venezuela. One is a function of the other.

In addition to business people, the Maduro regime has made a new alliance with the evangelical churches, as Bolsonaro did. In these days of popular protest, forced labour prisons for “terrorists” and “coup perpetrators” are being promoted. The two governments that have most promoted the destruction of rights in Latin America today have been precisely those of Milei and Maduro.

I believe that some groups on the Left that continue to support this have not even managed to understand the level of decadence, conservatism and mafiasation of this regime. And they get bogged down supporting this disaster and undermining their own credibility. This is a symptom of a historical loss of direction that must lead us back to the question, what is the left in this crisis, which is a global crisis? Who does it represent? How does it understand the relationship between ethics and politics? How does it respond to this changing and violent world? 

But as far as Venezuela is concerned, we reach a point where there is no nuance whatsoever.

The second conclusion is that this regime of corruption, abuses, making life precarious, and repressive violence is understood and felt by the vast majority of Venezuelans as a nightmare. A nightmare they wish to see come to an end. It is a level of disgust never seen in the 25 years of the Bolivarian process. And this created the critical mass of irrefutable generalised discontent that was overwhelmingly reflected in the elections. 

Every sector of Venezuelans voted massively against Maduro, be it rural, urban, young people, adults, the most precarious, the middle classes, in Caracas, in the Andes, in the Llanos, in the Amazon, various sectors of the Left, centre, right, religious, atheists, all of them, with a forcefulness never seen before in Venezuelan electoral history.

This does not seem to be understood by some parts of the Left, who sadly have criminalised the popular protests in the most impoverished neighbourhoods of the country, calling them “ultra-right”. This reinforces the mechanisms of repression and persecution that are underway. At other times, they treat the population like children and underestimate people’s capacities, alleging that they are confused, manipulated, lacking sound judgment, and handing the country over to the United States. They have no self-criticism or the least understanding of the magnitude of failure that this Chavista political project has had to reach for people to flee across the borders. For these leftists, the people do not have the right to rebel and should remain silent, supporting the government until the end of time.

Where is the regime going?

What we are probably witnessing is a new, more radical, more extremist political reorganisation of the regime to control the population. Constitutional guarantees are de facto suspended. Government spokespersons have reported more than 2,200 arrests in a few days, without any legal procedure, affecting the entire social and political spectrum of the country. Security forces stop passers-by to check their phones to see if they have any content against the government in order to arrest them. Mechanisms of informing or social denunciation have been established to report opponents. An app has even been created to enter their names, addresses and photos. Houses of those who protest or oppose the government have been marked.

Also, from official speeches and security agencies, content is circulated to frighten the population, announcing that “they are coming for you”. And uniformed prisoners are exposed, Bukele style, shouting slogans in favour of the government. There is strict surveillance of social networks, with a “National Council of Cybersecurity” created to formalise it. A law was passed to control NGOs.

As you can imagine, the Venezuelan population today is terrified and in shock. This is what the Maduro government has called a new “civic-military-police” alliance. We live in a totally policed, quasi-Orwellian society. The regime seeks to control every sphere and expression of Venezuelan society.

What characterisation do you offer of the opposition led by María Corina Machado?

Machado has an orthodox neoliberal, political-economic programme of massive privatisations and alliances with international capitals and a geopolitical closeness with the United States and what these sectors call the “free world”. She is a woman who comes from the powerful economic classes, from a family of important business people. Her position towards the Bolivarian process has always been classist and confrontational, though, in order to make herself more palatable and broaden the scope of alliances, she has been moving towards more moderate positions recently. 

This shows us the kind of dilemma in which the Venezuelan people have been and will continue to be for the time being and the great need to gradually build a political alternative to this. There is a need of a path of popular, sovereign struggle that also seeks to change the model of society, and that seriously begins to think beyond oil and extractivism.

But there are nuances about the opposition that must be mentioned, to have an up-to-date understanding. This is not 2017. Although the huge majority of the population rejects the government, we are not facing two strong, equal political blocs. Maduro’s government controls everything: the armed and security forces, the judiciary, the electoral authority, the national assembly, the vast majority of regional and municipal governments, the national media, the oil industry, everything. 

 The opposition that Machado leads today is not homogeneous. She does not have total control and has had many political adversaries within that sector. For the elections, she managed to build unity with the other actors of the coalition, but it is difficult to know if such unity can be maintained, given their history of conflicts. To date there has been no consensus on her orthodox economic programme; for example, not all agree on privatising PDVSA, the state-owned oil and gas company. If it were to assume power, chavismo would still control the Supreme Court of Justice, the National Assembly, the electoral body, and the other powers I mentioned. Even in power, it might have chavismo as the opposition. 

The Venezuelan population has not been historically inclined to neoliberal ideas but rather to an anti-oligarchic political culture. There is also the question of what the level of military support for Machado would be, as there have been mutual antipathies for a long time. The Venezuelan context is very unstable and fragmented. This is probably what part of the Left and several social movements calculated when they decided that they preferred to face a government of Machado to Maduro.

Finally, how do you see the future? Do you think a civil war is possible?

Maduro praying with evangelical pastors on national TV. In addition to business people, the Maduro regime has made a new alliance with the evangelical churches, as Bolsonaro did.

One scenario is that Maduro’s government remains in power through three mechanisms: first, a regime of brutal repression that prevents the emergence of a significant dissident force or a strong political alternative. Second, a regime that already knows how to govern in a context of collapse and chaos and does not care much about international criticisms and isolation. And third, a regime that manages to consolidate some international trade channels for its natural resources through the support of China, Iran, Turkey, and Russia, among others. It could also sell other commodities and wait for the waters to calm down so that it can again more openly invite new international investors. It’s not the first time that the cruelty of extractivism has sustained and legitimised dictatorships.

It would be difficult for a scenario of rupture not to break out sooner or later, though we do not know when it will happen or what form it would take. Another possibility is the unravelling of the governmental bloc, which has also been happening gradually. There have recently been manifestations of public discontent, such as that of Francisco Arias Cárdenas or the Minister of Culture Ernesto Villegas. Clearly, at the core of the questions that have arisen are questions about internal ruptures, even amongst the military, which would indeed play a defining role in the crisis.

It will be the ability to mobilise that will give these possibilities shape and dynamism. It remains to be seen how social resistance will develop and how the discontent, fear and terror that people are experiencing will be channelled. Social creativity and persistence will be crucial for popular recomposition in times of iron dictatorship. The international response will be important, although it will vary and probably depend on how the alternatives for change move internally.

Finally, the domestic economic situation will be very decisive. The so-called economic recovery is based on very weak foundations. The distribution of wealth continues to be extremely unequal. And we cannot forget that we are coming from a long economic crisis brought about by the exhaustion of the oil rentier model.

Could there be more violent confrontations?

It is a possible scenario if all channels for a peaceful solution are finally closed. Although a civil war requires two armed sides, and in Venezuela that monopoly is essentially held by the national government.

Amandla! has published two other articles recently on Venezuela on its website, from the Tempest Collective and from the Brazilian group Resistencia. The question of Venezuela remains contested.