Ahead of elections, Venezuela’s PSUV regime launched “Truth Commission” against opposition candidates


nsnbc : Venezuela’s socialist PSUV administration launched a “Truth Commission” tasked with investigation candidates running in gubernatorial elections in October to make sure none were involved in violent political protests this year, said the head of the new Commission.

Venezuela_Truth Commission_Aug 2017The Truth Commission panel was created on Wednesday by the highly controversial and disputed Constituent Assembly elected last month in elections boycotted by the Roundtable of Democratic Unity (MUD) coalition. The MUD held an absolute majority in the National Assembly that was suspended earlier by the Supreme Court earlier this year because it allegedly was “in contempt”. The new Constituent Assembly supersedes the National Assembly.

Members of opposition parties including leftist parties that traditionally supported the socialist PSUV, and a cohort of civil society organizations, say the “Truth Commission” is designed to sideline the opposition and to further entrench the ruling PSUV’s increasingly one-party-dictatorial position ahead of the gubernatorial elections in October.

Also before the Constituent Assembly is a bill that would impose punitive measures against those who express “hate or intolerance”. The according to the PSUV “wrong” use of freedom of speech and expression will, if the bill is adopted by the PSUV-stacked Constituent Assembly, be punishable with up to 25 years in jail.

Nicolas Maduro_Venezuela_Aug 2017Representatives of the opposition fear such a law would be used to silence criticism of a government that, according to local rights group Penal Forum is, is already holding 676 political prisoners. Last week President Nicolas Maduro promised:

“Whoever goes into the streets to express intolerance and hatred, will be captured and will be tried and punished with sentences of 15, 20, 25 years of jail.”

Earlier this month Venezuela’s PSUV-dominated Supreme Court announced that its “Constitutional Chamber” ordered the immediate arrest of Ramon Muchacho, the district mayor of Caracas’ district of Chacao. The Court also announced that the Chamber ordered the “immediate dismissal from his post as mayor” of the elected official. Muchacho was ruled to be in contempt of court for not having obeyed an order to ensure freedom of movement in his district, the epicenter of daily protests against socialist party (PSUV) President Nicolas Maduro.

Ramon Muchacho_Venezuela_Aug 2017Muchacho in an email message that he sends to subscribers each morning, wrote:

“We are being condemned for doing our job, for guaranteeing the legitimate right to peaceful protest and the right of all Venezuelans to exercise their civil and political rights,’  ‘The coming hours will be difficult for me.”

The “dissident” mayor didn’t attend the court hearings. His location was not immediately evident. In his message, Muchacho noted that his means of communications were “severely limited”. The Court’s ruling prohibited Muchacho, a member of the First Justice Party, from leaving the country.

The Supreme Court has issued injunctions against nearly a dozen mayors of opposition dominated municipalities ordering them to prevent protesters from setting up barricades and to remove them if they are put in place.

Truth Commission an Orwellian Joke?
Delcy Rodriguez (Archives).

Delcy Rodriguez (Archives).

The Constituent Assembly appointed Assembly president and Maduro loyalist Delcy Rodriguez as head of the “Truth Commission”.

Rodriguez, now also “Truth Zar”, said she would ask the country’s CNE elections authority for information about candidates running in October.

“We have decided to ask the CNE to send a complete list of gubernatorial candidates to the Truth Commission in order to determine if any of the them were involved in incidents of violence,” Rodriguez told the assembly, stressing this would have a “cleansing effect” on Venezuela. “We have seen tweets, messages on social networks and photographs of opposition leaders responsible for convening and organizing violent events in Venezuela,” Rodriguez told the commission Wednesday.

Maduro defends the all-powerful assembly as the country’s only hope for peace and prosperity. “The question is whether this is the peace he’s looking for: creating a law that gives him and his obedient Supreme Court judiciary powers to lock up dissidents for 25 years,” Tamara Taraciuk, head Venezuela researcher for Human Rights Watch, said in a Wednesday telephone interview. “The proposal includes incredibly vague language that would allow them to jail anyone for almost anything,” she added.

Attorney General Luisa Ortega_Caracas_Venezuela_Photo courtesy AFPIn its first session after being elected July 30, the assembly fired Venezuela’s top prosecutor Luisa Ortega and appointed a Maduro loyalist to replace her.

The Geneva-based International Commission of Jurists said in a report Wednesday that Ortega’s dismissal “removes one of the last remaining institutional checks on executive authority.”

The country’s new chief prosecutor, Maduro’s ex-human rights ombudsman Tarek Saab, Wednesday outlined corruption accusations against Ortega and her husband German Ferrer.

They, and members of Ortega’s former staff of prosecutors, are accused of running an “extortion gang” and funneling profits to an account in the Bahamas, the new chief prosecutor said. “The Sebin [intelligence service] is raiding my house right now as part of the government’s revenge for our fight against totalitarianism in Venezuela,” Ortega said on Twitter late Wednesday afternoon. It was not immediately possible to reach Ferrer. In the past, his wife, Ortega, has said accusations against them are politically motivated.

CH/L – nsnbc 17.08.2017



Source Article from https://nsnbc.me/2017/08/17/ahead-of-elections-venezuelas-psuv-regime-launched-truth-commission-against-opposition-candidates/

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