Editorial illustration for Refounding Venezuela: Memory, Institutions, and Citizenship

Recover the ability to live free

The reconstruction of Venezuela has a test that is simple to formulate and difficult to meet: that each citizen has more capacity to decide their life without depending on a ruler, a party or an intermediary. Roads, currency, security, schools and justice matter because they make that autonomy possible. Oil revenue can help finance them; It does not replace the rules that must support them.

MVGA interprets the national deterioration as a crisis that encompasses the post-1958 system and its Chavista transformation. Concentration and dependence acquired different forms and scales. The refoundation proposal studies these continuities to prevent the departure of Chavismo from being limited to a rotation of administrators.

Authority with responsibility

The first objective is to restore public capacity: protect the population, enforce judicial decisions, maintain infrastructure and manage services. That authority must have verifiable controls. MVGA proposes to register arrests, ensure defense, delimit emergencies and publish appointment and removal rules. An institution works when it can act and when it must explain its actions.

Justice needs a transparent selection process and stability compatible with responsibility for proven misconduct. The State audit must have access to documents and publish results. Contracts must show purpose, price, term, beneficiaries and modifications. Publicity of this data should not depend on whether it favors the government.

The budget as a visible pact

Oil revenue introduces volatility and makes it tempting to finance permanent commitments with extraordinary income. The historical studies cited describe the tensions that this dynamic produced in Venezuela. MVGA proposes budgeting with scenarios, publishing risks, subjecting debt to controls and discussing savings rules whose use can be monitored.

A fiscal rule should not be a decorative advertisement. You must identify the assumptions, the exceptions, the authority to activate them and the obligation to return to your limits. Public investment needs evaluation and maintenance. Social protection must distinguish sustainable benefits from favors that are delivered based on loyalty.

Production and public service

The economy requires protected property, predictable contracts, access to markets, energy and training. The initiative of companies, workers and communities must have space to produce without each activity depending on political authorization. The powers of the State must concentrate on defined public tasks and be measured by their operation.

Access to the administration must respond to competitions, skills and evaluation. Renny Ottolina's critique of partisanship offers a reference for this discussion. MVGA maintains that multiplying parties is not a sufficient response: organizations must accept limits and society needs avenues for participation that do not belong to a leadership.

A memory that teaches

The MVGA library studies pacification, state building, modernization, liberal ideas, education, and political crises. It recognizes the value of authors such as Uslar, Rangel, Ottolina and Yanes, and examines the governments of Gómez and Pérez Jiménez in their contexts. Memory must preserve capabilities and learn from abuse and ruptures; not fabricate a perfect age.

The school has a central role in this task. Reading, reasoning, knowing history and acquiring a job allow citizens to participate autonomously. Cultural reconstruction requires institutions that transmit this knowledge and allow it to be discussed. Venezuelanity will be stronger if it leaves space to think, create and dissent.

A transition that can end

MVGA proposes a transition with a public mandate, measurable objectives and transfer of authority to legitimate Venezuelan institutions. The recovery of rights and the investigation of responsibilities must begin during this process, with defense and impartial judges. Kinship or affiliation is not enough to convict someone; Nor should they protect it from a well-founded investigation.

The proposal does not require unlimited trust in its promoters. It requires rules that allow them to be reviewed and replaced. Its success will be measured in the citizen who works without a license, the official who must respond, the judge who decides without instructions and the government that leaves office when appropriate. That is the refoundation that MVGA submits for discussion.

Sources and references

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