.
By Maria Páez Victor, PhD.
2 February 2007
This week, the parliament of Venezuela gave President Hugo Chávez, the authority to pass laws by decree for the next 18 months on 10 issues of domestic importance. This type of power has a time limit and an issue limit and is specifically allowed by Article 203 of the Venezuelan constitution.
It is not the first time President Chávez has been allowed this prerogative. Twice before he was given such powers according to this constitutional provision and he carried out the duties allowed to him by the parliament without any misstep or abuse of power.
A close look at Venezuelan history shows that this power, also enshrined in the past constitution, was given to presidents Rómulo Betancourt (1959) Carlos Andrés Pérez (1974), Lusinchi (1984) and Velázquez (1993) to carry out decisions related to finance, external debt and creation of new state institutions among others. However, since these presidents were in friendly terms with the White House, there was no decrying of an erosion of Venezuelan democracy then.
In fact, during the past 40 years, there were abundant glaring abuses of human rights being committed in the country at the time but there was not one word of protest or concern by Washington.
Filed under: Anti-War, international politics, media, Political Websites, Press Release, reform, US Politics
Leave a Reply