To the Greens family:
Venezuela is experiencing a social, political and environmental crisis. The country which was once the largest petroleum producer in the world and which had possessed the strongest currency in Latin America, today lacks staple foods and medicines, after depleting the over 900 billion dollar national budget surplus from oil exports.
The social and economic crises are caused by wrong policies and worsened by corruption in the national government led by the President Nicolas Maduro Moros. The government used its control of monetary exchange to access foreign currency for personal and political gain rather than regulating for national well-being. The government has disrespected law at all levels including constitutional and international agreements.
The Venezuelan government is also responsible for the destruction of its domestic food production, medicine equipment and many more basic needs of a society. As a result, 70% of Venezuela’s economy now relies on imports. Through this method of economic contraction, the government has sought to control the few foods and medicines remaining for its political gain by intentionally denying their opponents access to basic resources, and thereby violating Article 7 of the Rome Statutes of which Venezuela is a signatory, which recognises the deprivation of access to food and medicine as a crime against humanity.
In recent months protests against the lack of food and medicine have incrased to the point of communities across the country’s twenty-three states have resorted to pillaging local food shops and trucks. The National Guard has responded with firearms to repress hungry citizens, causing the deaths of dozens and leaving hundreds injured, and in so doing increasing the Venezuelan government’s violation of human rights on a massive scale.
In the case of protests that we can see in hospitals and public clinics, every day children, adults and the elderly suffer and die from treatable conditions, such as epilepsy, due to lack of access to medicines.
It is unfortunate knowing that in a population of 30 million inhabitants, last year approximately 27,500 Venezuelans have been lost to the hands of crime, in which the government has been totally ineffective in managing and has allowed criminals from within prisons to continue to participate in illicit drug business, extortion, kidnapping and hired killing among other violent crimes.
The political crisis in which we currently live is a scenario of contamination of the free exercise of democracy has been contaminated and criminalisation of peaceful protests. During the 17 years of Chávez & Maduro government, they have taken control of the state's powers of executive, legislative, judicial and electoral to the point of eliminating public funding for political parties and the representation of minorities, to minise organised opposition to the government.
Through the "frontmen" of senior government officials, Chávez & Maduro have bought dozens of national and regional television channels, hundreds of radio stations and newspapers. Given the government's hegemony of more than 90% of the media in the country and subjecting the remaining media to CONATEL (a bureaucratic state agency controlling media concessions) is preventing the media from conveying truthful and timely information as enshrined in the Venezuelan constitution.
On January 5, 2016, the National Assembly for the first time was installed in the hands of the opposition who received nearly 70% of the national vote and gained a qualified majority of 112 Members of Parliament. The Maduro government responded by removing the National Assembly’s power to make laws and used the Supreme Tribunal of Justice (TSJ), public authorities which should be autonomous but are loyal to the political project of the President of the Republic, used falsified evidence to divest three deputies, which reduced the opposition to 109 MPs (absolute majority). As a result, in just six months the TSJ cancelled seventeen projects which has been approved by the National Assembly. In recent days the President of the Republic and the TSJ have threatened the National Assembly with their autonomous power to dissolve the Assembly’s leadership and its ability to legislate. The government's hostile position promoted has motivated physical attacks on opposition MPs by a group armed and financed by the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), including wounding Julio Borges, the Head of the opposition bloc the Democratic Unity Roundtable (Mesa de la Unidad Democrática, MUD).
The crackdown on protests and political leaders over these 17 years has amounted to hundreds dead and thousands wounded and imprisoned (see videos in Annex 5). Today we see more than 94 political prisoners, including three former presidential candidates such as Leopoldo Lopez (party leader Voluntad Popular), Manuel Rosales (leader of the party Un Nuevo Tiempo) and Antonio Ledezma (current mayor and leader of the party Alianza al Bravo Pueblo) in addition to thousands of citizens who are facing trial for participating in peaceful protests, a right enshrined in our constitution and all international agreements.
The environmental crisis we face today is caused in large part by Maduro’s government as well. Emblematic cases include:
Manuel Díaz Alejandro Aguilera
Secretario General Nacional MOVEV Sub Secretario General Nacional MOVEV
Delegado por Venezuela ante FPVA Delegado por Venezuela ante FPVA
Móvil: +58 4149421970 Móvil: +58 4140935203
[email protected] [email protected]
C/c: President of the National Assembly of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Dip. Henry Ramos.
Chairman of the Foreign Policy Committee of the National Assembly, Dip. Luis Florido.
Member of the ParlaSur Ramón López.
Annex 1
Annex 3
Annex 4
Annex 5
Links about the social crisis
Violation human rights in Venezuela (subtitulado): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtcEmKWrk4M
Venezuela: Images of a country on the brink of collapse: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQlQlLU2Tew
Why is Venezuela in crisis: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A3WsC-NJW-8
You can also view Upcoming Events Past Events