Crisis in Venezuela: past factors that produced it and the possible future to come (part II)
Past time and origins of the problem
Venezuela, being the first country in Latin America to gain its independence from the Spanish empire and the third from the European powers in the entire American continent, followed by the United States of America and then Haiti, has suffered from social and political instability ever since. To begin with, it is said that the war of independence was the bloodiest of all the American continent, so much so that a third of its population perished and its cities and agricultural production were devastated; then came the civil war that involved a good part of the population, in which this time a tenth of the population disappeared. Peace and stability were only achieved at the end of the 19th century thanks to the military warlords, which ironically became an institutional legacy of the last century. The first half of the new century was governed in this way until the 1960's, when the democratic era began with civilians in power and the newly created political parties, whose challenge was to take care of and present the democratic system, reduce the high rates of illiteracy and poverty, and modernize Venezuelan society, and the modernization of the Venezuelan society through the Venezuelan state, something that could be achieved thanks to the important factor that was given from the 70's after the nationalization of the oil industry, which will give a big boost to the national economy with the help of the newly created company P. D.V.S.A. (Petróleos de Venezuela Sociedad Anónima), adding the conflict in the Middle East such as the Iranian Revolution and the war of the Arab countries against Israel, which caused the value of oil to soar to unthinkable levels, so that public spending suffered an unbridled increase under the government of Carlos Andres Perez, transforming the Venezuelan State into the maximum generator of jobs and having the private sector below it.
Already at the beginning of the 80's, Venezuela entered into an economic crisis due to the debacle of the prices of its most important export product, oil; This, together with the crisis of the political parties, the lack of renewal of new offices, and even proclaimed "semi-democracy", in which such denomination is due to the fact that under this system only the President of the Republic and members of the Congress were elected, but not the regional governors and their respective mayors, so that the population became discontent and apathetic towards the prevailing political system. That is why when Carlos Andres Perez appeared again for reelection as President of the Republic, it was thought that everything was going to improve, which was not the case since his economic measures for this new administration were contrary to what was the first one because he privatized the assets of the Nation, as well as raising the cost of basic services, something that affected mainly the people of scarce economic resources. All this caused serious problems, which gave rise to a social revolt called "El Caracaso", in which many civilians died at the hands of security agencies, also two coup attempts, until he was removed from office by the National Congress.
Already during the presidency of Rafael Caldera, being this his second mandate, a certain social stability is achieved, but in spite of everything, Hugo Chavez appears as a candidate for the Presidency, taking advantage of his popularity due to the coup attempt against Carlos Andres Perez, winning the contest with the majority of votes in the face of a great abstention.
Possible future
Regarding the future of the Venezuelan people and their situation, it is somewhat uncertain so far, given that the current political leadership of the opposition has been involved in major corruption cases that have generated a discredit within the Venezuelan population, and that in turn they are accused of having very close relations with the government. In addition, Donald Trump is no longer in power in the presidency of the United States, and he was one of the most supportive presidents of the Venezuelan opposition. On the other hand, the political leader Maria Corina Machado has been one who still maintains a good reputation and still persists in defeating the Venezuelan government. Just a few months ago she launched a proposal to create a new opposition in which everyone should first go to an electoral contest to then create a proposal that would pose a new battle to the government.
At this moment there are only a few weeks left until the end of the year 2021, so it seems that 2022 will be promising to continue fighting against Maduro and his government, otherwise, there is no other proposal in sight or that may arise in the near future, if so, Venezuela would become the new Cuba by having a government with the same trend that would last for many decades more.
Link to the first part:
https://read.cash/@mc5punk/crisis-in-venezuela-current-scenario-part-i-ed8363a1
Image source:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d1/We_Are_Millions_march_Venezuela.jpg
