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“One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship.” 1984, George Orwell.

Carlos Patiño / Whenever some spokesperson of the bolivarian revolutions talks about peace, they speak in the sense of that phrase “peaceful, but armed revolution”. By defining things to their opposite, their newspeak logic becomes identical to the slogan of Insoc, or English Socialism, described by Orwell in his dystopian novel 1984.

WAR IS PEACE

LIBERTY IS SLAVERY

IGNORANCE IS STRENGHT

Their offer of “dialogue for peace”, including the secretive round of negotiations in Barbados with mediation from the norweigan government, obeys the same logic. Similar to guerrilla tactics, on one side they attack their enemy and in parallel they sit on a Caribbean island, not to make any actual deal, but to prolong the agony; That is, to buy time and retain power. That is why they announce that they will not walk away from the talks “Not even if a thousand Donald Trumps” pressure them to, and then a few hours later they withdraw from them and freeze the process.

The Maduro-Guaidó dialog cannot be qualified as peaceful if it helps maintains the persecution to dissidence, the manipulation and dismantling of institutionality promoted by the government. Peace is not only the absence of war and the venezuelan political conflict is multidimensional and complex. The inability to resolve it through institutional means resulted in four negotiation rounds with international participation, from 2002 to 2018. Even though these managed to at least reduce tensions, none of these solved the underlying issues. The 2019 peace talks do not seem to be the exception.

To date, the dialogue hasn’t achieved any tangible or sustainable mid-to-long term solutions, and it’s only managed to quell protests. That being said, it is not a matter to flipping the table over. As has been said before, we must play on all boards, and the Barbados negotiations are just one of those. But this one’s a wobbly table, since it’s missing a leg: The social net, and the participation of civil society (NGOs, associations, guilds and unions). Transcending the monopoly of political parties in the face of our grave situation. High-level peace talks, on this current juncture, always end up in missed penalties or a suspended game due to rain.

The dialogue strategy is eroding. The dictatorship walks a tightrope, but it doesn’t mean it will fall immediately. The voice of the civil society deserves to be heard, which at the same time would strengthen street protests. The country is fragmented. We’re losing citizens who migrate forcefully, leaving behind a land pillaged by chinese and russian transnationals, criminals, gangs and paramilitary forces. Institutions vanish as if by the snap of the fingers from Thanos. We’re undergoing a process of the dissolution of our republic, and to stop it we all need to act.

To counter the totalitarian plan, it is necessary that we avoid the same pitfalls. Going back to Orwell’s work, the monologue from O’Brien, as Winston, the protagonist, receives electrical shocks in a torture bed, presents itself as a ideological x-ray to understand the motives of the bolivarian revolution:

“Now tell me why we cling to power. What is our motive? Why should we want power? (…) The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power. (…) There will be no loyalty, except loyalty towards the Party. There will be no love, except the love of Big Brother. There will be no laughter, except the laugh of triumph over a defeated enemy. There will be no art, no literature, no science. (…) All competing pleasures will be destroyed.

If you want a picture of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face — for ever.”