Venezuela condemns EU Parliament stand on corruption

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Venezuela condemns EU Parliament stand on corruption

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Caracas, Venezuela, 23 October 2008. Venezuelan Government quickly rejected an European Parliament resolution issued today on democracy. The Vice Minister for European Affairs, Ambassador Alejandro Fleming (in photo), stated that such resolution wrongly promoted corruption and an undue interference in the domestic affairs of his country. The  resolution was promoted at the European Parliament by the European People's Party (EPP)- a Christian democratic and liberal conservative European political party. However, it only received the backing of 55 of the 785 MPs at the Europen Parliament.

The EPP resolution expressed "concern about the list of electoral disqualifications issued by the authorities, pointing to a long series of measures taken by the government with a view to intimidating opposition members, dissidents and international observers in the country".  It also called on the Venezuelan government to clear up the "murder of Mr Julio Soto, the student leader of the Copei party and President of the Students Union at Zulia State. Finally, the resolution regarded "the recent expulsion of two senior officials of Human Rights Watch, Mr José Miguel Vivanco and Mr Daniel Wilkinson, as an extremely serious precedent as regards respect for freedom of expression and the right to criticise".  

Despite such wording, the EPP resolution missed the fact that the Chief of the Office of the Comptroller General -Clodosbaldo Russian-  had barred both opposition and official candidates from participating in the elections due to their involvement in embezzlement or administrative mismanagement. Such EPP backing of corruption has allowed the Chavez´s administration to easily reject yet another attempt of the local opposition -and its international allies- to taint its democratic performance.

Despite having members of the Chavez government included in the corruption lists, it is only the opposition that has tried to cover the embezzlement and mismanagement of public moneys. Thus, the local opposition has linked an administrative punishment of corruption to political exclusion. In recent months, it  has also tried to have such interpretation promoted at both regional and international organizations such as the European Union, Mercosur and Andean Pact and Human Rights Watch. Its efforts were successful when German NGO Transparency International granted an award to one prominent opposition politician, Major of Chacao Leopoldo Lopez, who is also confronting a corruption suspension.

Fighting corruption has been a major concern for Venezuelan wishing for a change in a sometimes permissive political culture. No wonder, the legal and temporary suspension of the political right of members of both local opposition and Chavez´s administration has been upheld by the Venezuelan Supreme Court.  Sadly, such administrative suspensions are only political as they do not force corrup officials to serve jail terms or refund public money.

Sources: EU, YVKE, VTV, Unionradio, El Universal, Globovision,

Related stories: Corruption and Venezuelan opposition: a dangerous liaison, Venezuelan opposition demonstrated for corruption..pardon political exclusion, Venezuelan Supreme Tribunal backs disqualification of corrupt candidates (Updated II), HRW Report Accuses Chavez of Abusing Rights to Tighten Hold on Venezuela (updated II), Venezuela: Opposition student leader Julio Soto killed at Maracaibo (Updated)