VENEZUELA: Murder Sentence Removes an Obstacle in Crisis Talks

By Humberto Márquez Reprint | | Print |

Humberto Márquez

CARACAS, Apr 15 2003 (IPS) - A Venezuelan courts ordered almost 30 years of prison for the assassin who killed three people during a political rally in December, a ruling that, along with an apparently imminent accord between government and opposition, contributes towards mitigating the country’s governability crisis.

Joao de Gouveia, a taxi driver of Portuguese origin, fired from his vantage point on Dec. 6, 2002, on the crowd that had gathered in Altamira Plaza to show support for a group of military officers who had maintained a peaceful "rebellion" against the Hugo Chávez government since Oct. 22.

An elderly woman, a teacher, 53, and a 17-year-old student were killed and at least 14 other people were wounded by the bullets Gouveia fired before being subdued.

"My body fired the weapon, not my soul," he told the court and, in the final hearing, offered his apologies to the victims’ families.

Penal judge Alejandro Rebolledo sentenced him Monday evening to 29 years and 11 months of prison (the maximum in Venezuela is 30 years), taking into account the aggravated circumstances of the "social harm caused, the great number of victims and the ignoble motives" of the perpetrator.

Because Gouveia admitted his guilt, the judge could have reduced the sentence by half, but chose to cut only one month from the maximum.

The ruling came just at the negotiations between the Chávez government and the opposition are concluding on a proposed solution to Venezuela’s political polarisation: holding a referendum on whether the president should step down.

Until now, "political differences have been processed in a complex climate of violence," Lilian Ortega, of the local human rights organisation COFAVIC, told IPS.

She had previously cited the shooting at Altamira Plaza as "an example of the deepening of impunity" in Venezuela.

The political tensions have been running high since before the first major business and labour strike in December 2001, and have entailed massive street marches, work stoppages, a military upheaval and a failed two-day coup in April 2002.

The long simmering emotions associated with the political crisis were evident the night of Dec. 6 at the Altamira Plaza in an eastern, largely middle-class district of the capital.

The government-opposition negotiations, mediated by Organisation of American States secretary-general César Gaviria, have been underway since November, seeking agreements on how to resolve the Venezuelan crisis.

Last month the two sides committed to setting up a Truth Commission to investigate the events surrounding the April 2002 coup, including the street clashes between pro- and anti-Chávez demonstrators and unresolved shootings.

The draft agreement on a "revocatory" referendum regarding the Chávez presidency is based on a clause in the 1999 constitution that the president himself championed and which states that any representative elected by popular vote can be removed from office once half of his or her term has passed.

The half-way point in Chávez’s six-year term is Aug. 19, 2003, "meaning we have to put off the revocatory referendum, which should take place no later than Nov. 19 of this year," Timoteo Zambrano, one of the negotiators for the opposition coalition known as the Democratic Coordinator, said in a conversation with IPS.

The opposition leaders are basing their timeline on the idea that on Aug. 19 they will present the nearly 2.5 million signatures (20 percent of the electorate) required to petition for a referendum.

If the opposition wins, in other words, if at least 3.8 million people (the total must be more than voted for Chávez in 2000) vote in favour of removing the president from office, new elections will be called.

But if the referendum is postponed and is not held until after July 2004, and if the opposition’s initiative wins, then the vice- president, designated in Venezuela by the president, would serve out the term.

The representatives of the opposition announced that they will sign an accord in favour of the revocatory referendum, after having ruled out other formulas for removing Chávez from office that had emerged during the two-month general strike against the government in December and January.

Among the alternatives were to seek an amendment to the constitution or to create a new constituent assembly to draft a new national charter – also by popular initiative.

The government is still studying the draft agreement, reports Vice-President José Vicente Rangel.

"The route is beginning to emerge that could lead to a way out of this terrible political crisis," wrote Teodoro Petkoff, former socialist presidential candidate and editor of the opposition newspaper ‘Tal Cual’.

In the international arena, Chile’s foreign ministry announced that it is "pleased with the pre-agreement reached" in the Venezuelan negotiations, "as consensus will lead to an electoral solution to the political situation in Venezuela."

Spain’s foreign minister, Ana Palacio, applauded the draft accord because it "entails a constitutional and positive" way out of the South American country’s political crisis.

Chile and Spain, along with Brazil, Mexico, Portugal and United States, comprise the Group of Friends, supporting the OAS secretary-general in the government-opposition negotiations in Venezuela.