The Organization of American States: The Forum of Despair and Economic Interests

Founded in 1948, the Organization of American States (OAS) is billed as the premier political multilateral forum of the western hemisphere with 34 member states. At its core, the raison d’être of the OAS rests on the promotion and safeguarding of four pillars: democracy, human rights, security and development.

While the OAS mission statement is instrumental to the region’s peace and development, the organization’s recent record on upholding these principles can arguably be described as deficient. At the recent OAS Annual Plenary in Mexico, the OAS failed to reach consensus on a resolution condemning the political, economic and humanitarian crisis taking place in Venezuela.

In theory, the OAS has the mechanism in place to collectively hold member states accountable for serious breaches in human and democratic rights by invoking the “Inter-American Democratic Charter” adopted by all members in 2001. In particular, Article 3 of the Charter states that “essential elements of representative democracy include respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms, access to and the exercise of power in accordance with the rule of law, the holding of periodic, free, and fair elections based on secret balloting and universal suffrage as an expression of the sovereignty of the people, the pluralistic system of political parties and organizations, and the separation of powers and independence of the branches of government”. What is more, Article 4 comprehensively outlines the essential components that member countries committed to uphold, including: government transparency, accountable public administration, and respect for freedom of expression and of the press. Admittedly, apart from the most ardent regime apologists, the regime in Venezuela (and others such in Nicaragua) openly disregard these values. If OAS members were truly committed to upholding the forum’s mandate as stated in Articles 3 and 4 of the Democratic Charter, these regimes would have been suspended or at the very least condemned a long time ago, regardless of whether the country in question is led by a so-called right-wing or left-wing government.

So far, however, the OAS has only been able to voice its concern through the various condemnations coming from the Secretary General, Luis Almagro – a Socialist Democrat and former Uruguayan foreign minister. The large number of deaths of protesters over the past two months and the severe shortages of food and medicine, in addition to the serious human rights and constitutional abuse over the past two years, have not been enough for some OAS members to take a principled position and state the obvious: Venezuela is a nation undergoing a severe political crisis. No one can say this crisis has taken us by surprise. This humanitarian disaster is unfolding right in the heart of the Americas and has been in the making for years. Instead of condemning the crisis and mobilizing all avenues for a political solution, certain countries from across the Americas and Caribbean have placed their economic interests above their legal and moral obligation to at the very least acknowledge the political, economic and humanitarian crisis rocking Venezuela.

Granted, Mexico, Peru, the United States and other countries lobbied OAS member states to adopt a diluted resolution after seeing resistance from some of the Socialist Caribbean allies. At the end, they failed: 20 states voted to pass the draft resolution, falling short of three votes to approve the statement. Eight countries abstained from voting, while five rejected the draft.

To understand how some OAS member states are unwilling to condemn the blatant human right violations, it is important to understand the political and economic interests that some countries in the region place above their duty to uphold the democratic principles entrusted upon them by the people of the Americas. While Venezuela –one of the fastest-shrinking economy in the Americas – cannot feed its own population, guarantee electricity supply, or even ensure basic medical supplies to its hospitals, it continues to spend its limited resources to subsided oil exports to its Caribbean and Central American neighbours through Venezuela’s Petrocaribe energy pact; a key component of Venezuela’s foreign policy to buy support from its neighbours and counter “US imperialism”. Established in 2005 by the late President Hugo Chávez to share the wealth of the oil-rich nation, Petrocaribe supplies crude and refined products to countries from Belize to Haiti, with Nicaragua and Cuba having separate, but similar accords. President Nicolás Maduro has continued the program even as oil prices fall, cutting into Venezuela’s principal source of foreign income.

Following the failed OAS vote in Mexico, Secretary General Almagro stated the obvious: “Venezuela needs an international humanitarian channel that provides medicine and food for the Venezuelan population”. He then continued to call for an election timetable, political prisoners to be freed, an independent judiciary and respect for the autonomy of the National Assembly legislature. As a final show of displeasure with any international criticism of its human rights violations, the regime in Venezuela has recently decided to leave the OAS, a process that will take at least two years to be finalized.

Within Venezuela, the government’s chief prosecutor, Luisa Ortega Díaz (appointed by the late Chávez), has had a high-profile break with the government after she accused security forces of excessive violence; holding them responsible for the deaths of several protestors. In addition, she has openly stated that President Maduro’s plan to hold a citizens assembly to rewrite the constitution – and thereby bypassing the opposition-held National Assembly – is illegal and threatens democracy. In the same vain, a top military general, Alexis López Ramírez, recently resigned over the legality of President’s Maduro plan to bypass the current National Assembly. His criticism of the regime is dismissed as treason.

Would consensus at the OAS to condemn the violations taking place in Venezuela made any difference? According to the Democratic Charter, after a long and arduous process, the member state in violation would be suspended from the OAS. That has only taken place twice: Cuba in 1962 (before the adoption of the Democratic Charter) and Honduras in 2009. While in these two instances, the regimes in question continued in power (and has continued in the case of Cuba), invoking the Democratic Charter isolates the suspended member and elevates the crisis in the eyes of the international community. More importantly, by upholding its democratic mandate, the moral authority of the OAS to ensure basic democratic values in the Americas is upheld and its position as the premier political forum in the Americas respected.

The views expressed here are solely those of the author.