The coronavirus pandemic exacerbates the Complex Humanitarian Emergency affecting Venezuela. An exceptional time of crisis within the crisis forces us to take extraordinary measures in many fields, including politics.
The seriousness of the problem currently affecting Venezuela compels an institutional agreement that brings together all the capacities of the State in taking the necessary measures as efficiently as possible.
Precisely, the de facto power requires cooperation from the National Assembly, opposition governors, and mayors. The opposition led by Juan Guaidó must understand that without the institutional framework of the current state it is not possible to give an urgent, massive, and effective response in favor of the population.
Even under a State of Alarm, the Constitution remains our maximum norm and everything must be done within its parameters and mandates.
Seeking resources at the international level is essential, and one way might be through loans. According to the Constitution, the National Assembly must approve any debt. Maduro and his government team must channel the request, and the parliamentarians must approve it with urgency and with the greatest breadth and flexibility to access the much-needed resources in the shortest possible time.
To generate public trust in the use of these resources, it is necessary to create a Special Commission constituted by mutual agreement to oversee their management while remaining accountable before the institutions and the population.
An Interdisciplinary Health Team under the coordination of the Ministry of Health can be created to summon professionals, regardless of their political positions, and work alongside health directors of the regional and local governments as well as with the medical schools of our universities, to advance a National Plan of Attention to coronavirus that draws together all national capabilities. This Task Force would assume the leadership of everything related to the measures to be taken and the communication of the results to the public.
Without giving up their legitimate positions and aspirations, current times require politicians to seek minimal consensus so that this critical situation can be dealt with in the best way. Lives are at stake. Many lives will depend on the capacity of these agreements. This is no small deed. If there have been conversations to seek solutions to the political confrontation and an institutional answer to the crisis in the past, that openness to debate and seek minimum agreements must now prevail, at the pace the emergency imposes.
Perhaps by advancing these agreements amid the current emergency, better conditions can be achieved so that progress is made in a dialogue leading us to the re-institutionalization and the rescue of democracy and justice.
