The Venezuelan anti-terrorist law penalizes “anarchy” with 1 to 3 years in prison

The draft of the Anti-terrorist Law resembles imperialist proclamations written by a unilateral power for the rest of humanity, and in particular for Uncle Sam’s backyard. After September 11, 2001, the United States have used the events of that day to put forth initiatives that are intended to persecute the terrorism that they themselves created during the Cold War, and which later turned against them with Osama Bin Laden and Saddam Hussein. In the context of the anti-terrorist movement, Washington has made a priority of instantly pursuing every global manifestation of their enemy -
the Al Qaeda network and other groups. The nations south of the Rio Grande
read the order and carried it out from various directions, among them the legislative. The Chavez administration, to be consistent in their collaboration with the North, has agreed to do its duty, and is doing it by means of the drafting of this law.
The statement of motives provides a complete explanation for the necessity in ratifying this legal instrument, based on all the usual, clichéd reasons.
Nevertheless, they were very careful to obviate State terrorism, which is as dangerous as the terrorism of Islamic fundamentalists. But such a belief is rejected by the world leaders and the leader Sabaneta acted accordingly.

Besides this, they are doing this in the name of the supposed “libertarian” tradition of the Venezuelan people, when even they themselves know perfectly well that the direction of contemporary history is a distinctly authoritarian one, because modern-day power has its roots in the Gomez dictatorship to centralise the State, form a (Prussian) armed forces, and destroy all signs of federalism.
The content of the draft gives a definition of terrorism in Article 3 which is conspicuous for its absence of terrorism by the State, and because of this omission, this system can produce it. Section 11 states “Anyone with the intention to terrify and cause anarchy...” will be penalised with one to three years of prison. The term “anarchy” is used in a conveniently broad sense, and the meaning is disorder. Regardless, sense it is a term with many meanings it could be interpreted as “anarchist,” and a fortiori, anyone who upholds or sympathises with libertarian ideas can be the active subject
of the crime. Titanic writing.

Article 12 punishes with 10 to 15 years anyone who in the name of terrorism encourages desertion in the practitioners of State violence. This is very
dangerous because it takes into consideration the principal factor of internal power and protects it excessively.
Article 13 penalises with 15 to 25 years the use of administration and the provision of financial resources for terrorism. This punishment is inspired by the Islamic networks that used secret finances and fiscal paradises in order to face their western masters. Section 21 grants the Public Ministry wide digression in allowing them to use any entity as an auxiliary medium.
Article 23 permits the suspension of regular legal procedures in the case of an accusation. This is a modus operandi typical of the American praxis in punitive matters. It permits the immediate expropriation of goods and services employed by terrorists by the oppressive judicial body, to the point of confiscation if there is verified imputability. (article 24).
Section 27 of this text allows the interception of communications when there is a suspicion of terrorist acts. There is a name for this kind of legislative expression: Al Qaeda. Finally, article 28 offers a compensation of a thousand bolivars as a reward for fighting terrorism. This is the mercenary justice we have come to expect of the Americans. We can conclude that this project perfectly fulfils the gringos’ goals in regards to terrorism. And Hugo Chavez’s regime takes special care not to affect the
international balance of power, because he is aware that this is the way to guarantee his permanence in the government.

In consonance with this behaviour, let us remember the payment of the external debt in its most rigid form, the Treaty of No Double Taxation with Washington and some European States; the contract to supply oil to the yankees which has turned Venezuela into a paradise for foreign investors which yields them a high profit but is not good for the country; it does not create jobs and drains the local economy into foreign markets.

Traducción: Erin



> Editorial of El Libertario # 34_ (Venezuela, Sept.-Oct. 2003)
[This editorial expresses the views of the Comision de Relaciones Anarquistas
(CRA) of Venezuela concerning the possible Revocatory Referendum on the mandate
of Hugo Chavez, promoted by his Social-democrats and right wingers opponents]

Michael Bakunin, big because of his height but also of his ideas, said in 1874 that it was impossible to carry out any type of social emancipation via centralist and authoritarian systems. The Russian thinker, one of the basis of the libertarian thought, led an intransigent polemic against Marx's ideas. Even though they both agreed on the suppression of inequalities taking the anti-capitalist struggle until the very end, the bearded anarchist opposed the idea that the only source of power was private ownership, contrary to what Marxists claimed. Bakunin went further in the understanding of human nature by introducing social and psychological elements in the revolutionary struggle.

The setting up of forms of domination are not only found in the private property over the means of production, but also in the monopoly of information and the taking over of social life by the State. Marxists thought that a transition period was needed, the "dictatorship of the proletariat", to create their promised ideal society. Bakunin, decades before their negative results, declared: "It is a lie that hides a leading minority more dangerous because it claims to be the expression of the so-called will of the people.
But this minority, according to Marxists, will be made up of workers. Yes, surely, of ex-workers that, as soon as they become leaders or representatives of the workers, will stop being such and will look down at the world of manual workers from the heights of the State; they will no longer, from now on, represent the people but themselves and their pretensions to govern the people.
Whoever doubts this knows nothing about human nature. The "revolutions" carried
out under the influence of those ideas have brought to power a new oligarchy that monopolizes directive functions of social life, thanks to the control of intellectual and
technical resources.

We, the anarchists, are convinced that the struggle against injustices demands a
fight against any kind of incontestable power. The State is not the product of society nor the result of class confrontations, it is rather its cause. If the Capital is confronted as the centre of the economical power, us, libertarians, fight with the same energy the
State as the epicentre of the political monopoly. "Wherever there is a State - quoting once more Bakunin - there is inevitably domination and, as a consequence, slavery; the State without slavery, public or hidden, is unconceivable: because of this we are
enemies of the State."

Therefore, after each election we observe the re-composition of a managing bureaucracy that leaves untouched the basis of the State and the unjust economical relations. Power is the goal of those who claim that account votes is the magical solution to a crisis whose roots are to be found in the system and the structures. A new political and cultural matrix is never born spontaneously in the ballot boxes,
it has got to bring with it a complex and coherent project for society. The lack of this was the reason why the Fifth Republic (the Chavez' regime) has been the exact copy of the Fourth (the old parties' system). For this reason: ¡Que se Vayan tod@s! (Let them all go!)... with their populisms, exclusions and demagogies. We are many that stay, organizing wills and affinities from below to truly revolutionize our surroundings.

As anarchists we support any process where the people participates and where it
is consulted. But, the revocatory referendums would be a more fertile and interesting process if it did not have the present limitations. Those who write the questions, limit beforehand the possible answers. "Yes" or "No" do not resolve anything. Both sides only want that the discussion ends with these irrelevant possibilities. Presently, the undeniable lack of truth opens up an array of all possible answers (ecological, feminists, anti-militarist, farmers.) are necessary to build, horizontally and from below, a tomorrow based on solidarity and freedom. This construction depends greatly on the destruction of the old structures. For now, here and in the rest of the world, we have to
confront lies and black mailing of, as Bakunin wrote in one of his letters, "the most disgusting and scary shit of our century: the red bureaucracy." We do not think any less of those on the other side. QUE SE VAYAN TOD@S...