POLITICS-VENEZUELA: The New Face of “Polticial Maternalism”

By Estrella Gutiérrez Reprint | | Print |

Estrella Gutierrez

CARACAS, Dec 11 1997 (IPS) - Irene Saez, the Mayor of one of the richest municipalities in Latin America and a probable Presidential candidate for election next year, is creating a new movement in Venezuela: political maternalism.

Saez, the 1981 Miss Universe, will be 36-years-old next May and could be President if her current popularity in opinion polls continues to voting day on Dec 6, 1998.

The mayor of Chacao – one of the five municipalities that makes up the city of Caracas – told foreign correspondents this week that she will not formally announce her candidacy to succeed President Rafael Caldera until the next trimester, but that appeared only a formality.

“I am thinking it over,” Saez said, in response to her possible candidacy and other issues related to her political program and her approach to economic globalization, combatting inflation and other political and economic matters.

Running for President would be a “huge responsibility,” she said and she was taking her time before deciding, “because a cautious women is worth ten,” and because legally an official announcement cannot occur until the new year. If Saez were to be elected president, she would favour change towards a more just and human country, and she would turn Venezuela into a modern and orderly “first world” nation, in which “we would all act in union in favor of prosperity.”

Saez believed there is “too much selfishness” in Venezuela and she was in favour of “humanizing politics…I am humanizing globalization and Venezuela’s insertion into it.” In drawing up her plan for government, her system is “to listen, before anything, to the problems, in order to get a sense of reality.”

Spreading her arms in order to make reference to the plans of previous governments, she told reporters “there are big fat books, and I know them all.” But “that is not the reality of Irene Saez. I go to my people and we build a plan together,” in order to insure that the priorities are not how to manage the reserves, or whether to reach an agreement or not with the International Monetary Fund, she said.

For Saez, the most important thing is to understand why a poor child in a Caracas neighborhood “does not know whether killing is good or bad.” Her idea is to recover collective values “because the state is also a human being.”

In previous speeches, the mayor has asserted that her relationship with the military is very positive and that her presidency would not create a conflict with that institution, among other things because “they know that I value meritocracy.”

She also anticipates that formally or informally – depending whether or not the post is created – she would work with a Prime Minister, who would carry out the day-to-day task of coordinating government, while she would govern on the basis of a harmonious relationship between the different social sectors and branches of government.

Saez has benefitted from the strong anti-political sentiment in a country which is fed up with the party-centered system that has ruled since 1958. She is skillful when it comes to general statements and, while critics say that she has nothing to say, her defenders maintain she does not commit before the time is right.

Saez twice has been elected mayor – for her current term with 96 percent of the vote. She has been a fixture – as she likes to say – in opinion polls for the past two years and she currently leads by 15 and 20 percentage points, in an electoral landscape which is totally new for Venezuela.

The four main presidential hopefuls have no party, although Saez is trying to obtain the support of the old guard while maintaining an image of independence. The main parties that have ruled the country have not put forward possible candidates while they watch the polls.

Accion Democratica, for example, has a charismatic leader in Claudio Fermin who has distanced himself from the organization but he still trails Saez by 17 percent in popularity, according to a survey published this week.

Within the second-largest party in the Parliament, the Social Christian COPEI, the leadership has decided to throw in its lot with Saez. But that measure is being resisted in some party quarters and still requires the consolidation of a ticket that will not damage Saez’s anti-party image.

Third in the latest survey is Hugo Chavez, a colonel who led the failed coup against Carlos Andres Perez in 1992, and who has a following among anti-political hard liners. Fourth, with only a six percent popularity rating is entrepreneur and former governor of the industrial state of Carabobo, Henrique Salas. Political analysts say he is the only one with no chance of occupying the presidential palace after next Demeber’s election.

Squarely in the middle of this scenario, Saez doesn’t hesitate in assuming the role of a political phenomenon worthy of sociological and psychological analysis. She herself cannot explain the full reason for “what is happening to her.”

She believed her management ability and her capacity to be “tuned in” with the people were part of the attraction that she has among the majority of the electorate that has made up its mind how to vote. However the percentage of “don’t knows” in the polls is greater than the support for Saez.

She rejected the notion that she is promoting a cult of personality, yet she has used the third person to refer to herself on several occasions, saying that “being Irene Saez has cost me a lot, and that is my dignity.”

“My commitments are to my country, and the support of the people is not for me to negotiate, but rather for me to defend it,” she said. “In these times of selfishness, my mission is to unify my country for my people.”

Saez defined herself as courageous, independent and disciplined. She likes to be judged on her actions and her examples. She recently spoke to some nuns, at the school where she was educated, describing herself as “an iron structure covered with velvet” and she expects a a fight during the electoral year because politics can be “cruel and harmful.”

“All the missiles are pointing in my direction,” she said but added that “they will find themselves face to face with my dignity.”

Feminist groups and other political adversaries have criticized Saez saying that her candidacy is backed by powerful financial groups. But she dismissed these rumors as a normal part of the campaign. Saez says that her work as representative of the failed Consolidated Bank was clear and transparent.

In reference to Venezuela’s most vexing problems, she summarized these as a lack of security, including poverty, food insecurity, personal insecurity, unemployment, lack of quality of life, corruption and the crisis in education.