The conditions for the permanent overthrow of the Correa government will remain. Three wagers, three clashing sectors. Will matter more popular masses
The Golpista Wager
Government cuts to the public sector, immediately accompanied by an attack on the media, and the radical TeleSur network in particular. Opposition leader Pablo Guerrero was spotted by eyewitnesses participating in a physical attack on public TV reporters attempting simply to report on the coup.
Correa’s Wager
Pointing the finger of guilt squarely at ex-president Lucio Gutiérrez, who came to power in 2003 with the support of Ecuador’s poorest masses, his right-wing populism call for early elections. Correa due to serve until 2013). Foreign minister Ricardo Patiño urged the gathered crowds to descend on the hospital to rescue their leader... soldiers finally rushing in to rescue the president. Correa was betting on the Ecuadorean people
The Radical Wager?
Some ostensibly radical sectors of the Ecuadorean population, not journalist turned political activist Carlos Vera, nor clearly irrelevant Communist Party of Ecuador (MLM). The radicals in question come from what is ostensibly his support base. The Pachacutik Movement, a leftist electoral alliance bringing together indigenous and non-indigenous Ecuadoreans declaring its “frontal opposition to Rafael Correa’s government and its fake revolution. Cléver Jiménez accusing the president of having a “dictatorial attitude” and “violating the rights of public servants and the society as a whole.” Pachacutik Movement called for the formation of a broad Popular Resistance Front to demand Correa’s resignation through a constitutional motion. What occurred, a justifiable response to the neoliberal policies of the Correa government, the police in fact represented popular demands against a neoliberal state. An open secret, Correa’s government is the weakest among the radical leftist projects in the region. There is a tense character of the relations with the social movements that brought him to power.
ex-president Lucio Gutiérrez was supported by Pachacutik), their willingness to remove leaders as quickly as they bring them to power. Without this powerful foundation, Correa is and has been in danger. Those radicals on the left who are demanding Correa’s resignation are making a wager of their own: that it will be they, rather than the far right, who will control the outcome of the chain of events sparked by the police strike
A statement released by the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador (CONAIE).
Losing the Masses, Losing the Revolution
In The Black Jacobins, C.L.R. James seeks to explain the tragic fate of Toussaint L’Ouverture. He lost the support of the masses. “Toussaint destroyed his own Left-wing, and with it sealed his doom.” Without the masses, Hugo Chávez would never have been returned to power on April 14th 2002. Honduran president Manuel Zelaya’s lack of support from an established and organized mass movement that facilitated his removal in 2009. Chávez’s return guaranteed by the existence of revolutionary networks of armed militants which predated his presidency, emerging from a history of nearly 50 years of struggle against corrupt democracy and neoliberalism.
Popular masses are not behind the coup despite analogy between the salary demands of the police involved and popular struggles against neoliberal structural adjustment. The danger is not that Ecuadoreans might join a coup but that they might not resist it vigorously enough... Correa’s luck seems to have held. But then again, this is not a question of luck at all.
No comments:
Post a Comment