Venezuela's new UN Ambassador

This news is a few days old, but I've just come across it, thanks to the ever-helpful Latin American News Review. It's a curious nomination, to be approved today by the VZ National Assembly. One reason it is curious is that it's a "bridge-building" move. Perhaps a token one, but one nonetheless. While in Venezuela for a month last fall giving lectures and having endless meetings, I noticed that the very few people in the political middle - perhaps not philosophically, but pragmatically - often used the expression, "bridge-building," especially after a bottle of Chilean wine. The "bridge" is a symbol, I think, of good faith. The good faith exists among some of the best and brightest in Venezuela and this is promising especially in the face of the ever-present risk of a collapse into civil war (one which, I might add, the Bush administration has encouraged on the sly).

Chávez certainly knows well how to play politics. But this nomination is nevertheless a good move for the bridge-builders. One of the legitimate concerns of the opposition, when one can make it past their sensationalistic rhetoric, is a concern with know-how and professionalism in restructuring the country. As I've mentioned before, much of the opposition is comprised of the wealthy and well-educated. Whether you like the opposition in general or not (the opposition, by the way, is not a political or classist monolith), Venezuela needs that educated class to be involved in its reconstruction. The would-be bridge-builders from both sides know this. But the emotionalization of Venezuelan politics is so overblown that most attempts at communication between the political opponents come in furtive moments over bottles of wine. They're not public moments, and this is a real problem for a more inclusive public discourse on the future of the country. Yes, the majority now has a real say in the governance of their country. The sentence that got me into a bit of political trouble with the opposition there was, "I think Chávez has given the poor dignity." It's true. Yet, at the same time, this is largely a poor and uneducated majority. A major part of the Chavista program is to change this present reality, and there are successes here and there. But, until then, the ability to change it requires not only the well-meaning intentions and various good ideas of government, many of which greatly impressed me, but also the basic know-how of members of the political opposition in order to help carry out those intentions and ideas in concrete ways. This is also going to be the key to the political bridge: genuine inclusiveness.

Now, Chávez isn't the only reason for the political divide, perhaps not even the most significant one. The opposition is loud-mouthed and propagandistic itself, calling for violent revolution. But remember the bridge-builders, and remember this move here by Chávez himself.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez nominated former presidential candidate and coup leader Francisco Arias Cardenas to represent the South American country at the United Nations, Congressman Saul Ortega said.

The National Assembly, which is made up entirely of Chavez supporters, will probably approve the nomination on Thursday, Ortega said in an interview on Union Radio in Caracas. Arias, a former Army lieutenant colonel, led a failed 1992 coup with Chavez and lost to Chavez in the 2000 presidential election.

"Arias and Chavez go way back together,'' said Robert Bottome, an analyst with consulting company Veneconomy in Caracas. "I don't think Arias ever really broke from Chavez.''

Chavez defeated Arias by a 59 percent-to-37 percent margin in the 2000 election. Chavez called Arias a "traitor'' and "Judas'' during the campaign, while Arias ran television ads likening Chavez to a chicken for refusing to debate him publicly. "Chavez supports a war between the classes that terrifies investors,'' Arias said in a May 2000 interview. "He thinks he's the messiah.''

Arias was governor of western Zulia state from 1996 to 2000. "Arias has the support and trust of the president,'' said Ortega, who is president of the assembly's foreign policy commission. "Nobody can doubt Arias' nationalism and patriotism.''