Cubanet, Miriam Celaya, Havana, 25 February 2106 — The crisis of the ghostly 21st Century Latin American socialism has been demonstrated once again with the negative outcome of the referendum on the reform of Bolivia’s constitution that sought to legitimize the candidature of Evo Morales in the 2019 elections. The controversial petty king aspired to remain screwed to the presidential armchair at least until 2025… but most of his countrymen, including native ethnic groups, have given him the brush-off.
So far, and despite the maneuvers that — according to what opposition sectors of the Andean country claim — the Morales government is taking advantage of to reverse its resounding defeat, everything indicates that the NO vote is irreversible.
Within a few months, the decline of the leftist leadership — which started in Argentina with the fall of Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner in the presidential elections, followed by the loss of Chavismo in last December’s parliamentary elections in Venezuela and now with the refusal to allow Evo to hijack power in Bolivia — shows plainly that the lifetime aspirations of the leaders of XXI century socialism are being left in the lurch.
With this new knockout to the Hemisphere’s progressive leaderships, it has been demonstrated that, in actuality, populism movements with Castro-Chávez-Marxist leanings are neither all that popular nor have they brought with them the changes that voters were hoping for, including the poorest sectors, the supposed “beneficiaries” of “the model.” The rejection by the majority of citizens of the new and, paradoxically, the already exhausted paradigm, makes clear a truism: the neoliberalism of the ‘90s deepened the schism between the richest and the poorest of this continent, heightening the deep social conflicts and ruptures that have historically marked relations between governments and the governed. This gave way to the emergence of socialism of the XXI century, but, before long, it became clear that it is not the holy ointment to heal all of the region’s ills. Instead, it makes them worse.
The late Hugo Chávez was the highest representative of the model he attempted to implement, and it is expected that, together with his model, another ghostly excrescence will also disappear: ALBA, the Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America, currently unmentioned, as a relative who has brought disgrace to the family. ALBA is a colossal pipedream, devised by the leader from Barinas himself in a recipe inspired by unadulterated selfishness, a mixture of leftist ideology, anti-imperialism, egotism, messianic in nature and spiced throughout with plenty of corruption. A pipedream stirred into the sea of oil taken from Venezuelans for more three decades with the sole purpose of artificially supporting allies in the region, something that has become unsustainable in the current economic crisis in Venezuela, the largest in its history, born in the shadow of the doctrine of the new socialism.
Without a doubt, the matrix of the radical left has been taking on setbacks of late, almost without pause: scandals involving corruption, drug trafficking, influence peddling, patronage and other similar bits and pieces that keep many leaders under the magnifying glass of public opinion. It’s not so easy to keep people’s eyes under wraps. It is no wonder that the effusive president of Ecuador, Rafael Correa, has discreetly lowered his profile, putting away his fervent speech for some other symbolic occasion. The Central American drunkard, Daniel Ortega, is also not being seen around much these days. It’s not a good time for the leaders of the operetta.
However, it is still too early to place the tombstone on the tragic fate of 21st century socialism. At least we Cubans know very well how not to underestimate the capacity for survival, not of populist-type ideologies, so entrenched in Latin American veins, but in its “idiocrats” (or should I say idio-rats).
Behold smart aleck octogenarians of the Palace of the Revolution in Havana, who have had so much to do with the harmful leftist regional epidemics. They have been keeping anti-imperialist trappings under their thrones to enter into friendly lobbying precisely with “the natural enemy of the people,” Yankee imperialism.
And so, while Cristina has vanished from the political scene, Maduro continues his hysterical tantrum in the swampy Venezuelan panorama, and Evo seeks solace for Sunday’s setback, ruminating one after another his coca leaves in the Palacio Quemado, [The Bolivian Government Palace], the druids of the olive green gerontocracy are decked out in their finery, ready to receive the highest representative of the brutal capitalism whose hard currencies leftist leaders are so attracted to.
Of course, we should not be suspicious. Perhaps it is not a betrayal on the part of Cuba’s General-President and his claque of Marxist and Castro-Chavista principles in Our America, as claimed by some of the ill-intentioned, but a reshuffling of the action in view of the new circumstances. Over half a century of experience as successful pedigree conspirators supports the survivors of these chameleonic “Marxists.” We’ll see how they will recycle slogans and anthems of the proletarian Internationale as soon as leaders of the Castro regime succeed in laying their hands on dollars, since, when it is all said and done, it seems that the end does justify the means.
Because, without exaggerating, the so-called “socialism” with an autocratic soul is like a disease that cannot be cured and often kills. It’s like a mutant virus that changes in appearance and succeeds in multiplying in order to continue making human societies sick. The bad news for Cubans is that such an infection is cured only with a strong dose of democracy, a medication that has been in short supply in Cuba for more than six decades.
Translated by Norma Whiting
