Not Understanding What Happened in the National Assembly on Jan 5th? All the Answers Here

On January 5, when it was mandated by the constitution to elect the new board of directors for the new parliamentary year 2020-2021, the international press, for the umpteenth time, repeated a lie a thousand times: “the Bolivarian National Guard did not let Guaidó into the National Assembly. “

By Orlenys Ortiz

It is very easy to be scandalized, from abroad, with any image of a hyper-mediatized deputy, “confronting” the military and police. Even worse if it is one who thinks he is president of the Republic, even if he does not govern even the slightest jurisdiction, supported by the US, the European Union and other countries compliant with the US government, and, if in addition, a photo appears with that deputy trying to jump over the fence of the National Parliament, as an extreme measure “indignant and outrageous”, to enter the AN that, according to him and the world media, belongs to him.

But what really happened?

Let us start from the very questionable recent statements of the high representative for the Foreign Policy of the European Union, Josep Borrell, about what happened, where he said “The European Union considers that the voting session that led to the election of Luis Parra is not legitimate, since it did not respect legal procedures or democratic constitutional principles.”

He also noted as “totally unacceptable,” “violations of the democratic, constitutional and transparent functioning of the National Assembly.”

Have Josep Borrell and other EU officials seen the videos that show that Guaidó was allowed access to the Legislative Palace, as well as any acting deputy? Have you even read a couple of articles of the Rules of Interior and Debate of the National Assembly?

Either it is too much cynicism frim the European Union, or they are committing the very serious mistake of not verifying the information of their sources, which is aggravated by the brutal media surrounding the whole European continent, which does not allow its people to exercise their ability to discern, research and contrast information.

Now, let’s go to the core -real and verifiable- of all this:

The National Assembly, still chaired by Juan Guaidó, convened on January 5, as established by law, the session to elect the new board of directors. This session was scheduled for 11:00 am.

Let’s take a chronological, duly detailed look at January 5:

Pay special attention to the times of each event (backed by the files registered that day on my mobile phone), and forgive me for being so detailed.

11:00 am. Already present in the chamber were the entire Parliamentary Block of the Fatherland (Chavismo) and a good part of the deputies of all the opposition political parties. Such is the case of Henry Ramos Allup (AD), Stalin González (UNT) and Edgar Zambrano (AD), both members of Guaido’s board of directors, Juan Pablo Guanipa (PJ), among many others. The images in photographs and videos prove it.

Only Guaidó and some other opposition deputies were not there.

Context:

The National Assembly is made up of 167 elected deputies and the minimum quorum required to elect a new Board of Directors is 84 deputies.

Many continue to think – confused – that since the minimum quorum is 84 deputies present, 84 votes are needed to elect the board of directors, and that is not the case. The minimum quorum is NOT equal to the votes necessary to elect the board.

Said board is elected with half plus one of those present, according to the Internal Assembly and Debate Regulations of the National Assembly (RIDAN), that is, 43 deputies, once the quorum has been announced.

Any session with 84 deputies or a larger number is perfectly valid, legal and legitimate.

The deputies who did not attend the Chamber are represented by those who were in attendence, regardless of the reasons for their absence. They cannot record the vote remotely either in writing or in any other form.

Currently, some opposition deputies are disabled by alleged commission of crimes, others, fugitives from justice, and others, self-exiled. The absence of many of those who were not present, is due to these reasons. The other part, accompanied Guaidó outside the Legislative Palace when he decided not to enter.

Within the Chamber, no quorum verification was requested from any of the parliamentary blocs because the quorum was evident. But any deputy -disregarding their political afiliation- could have requested it.

12:25 pm In the company of several authorized deputies, one disabled and dozens of media, Guaidó crosses the corner of El Chorro, where one of the two pickets of the Bolivarian National Guard was located as part of the security requested by the outgoing board of directors, days before.

12:31 pm The group in question reaches the second GNB picket. At this point, due to security measures, only deputies with valid credentials were allowed in. Some deputies and the media that had preferred to stay with Guaidó and company, caused a stampede that sought to break the security fence, in order to sell the supposed prohibition of entry to deputies to the world.

The videos show who the violent ones were.

Despite the disturbance, the situation is controlled and a single entry is enabled for the entry of accredited deputies. Each deputy who was showing his credential passed without problem. The problem was caused by those who from behind (journalists, other deputies and companions), pushed towards the entrance where they had to enter.

12:39 pm Guaidó arrives at the access door, but stops and refuses to enter if they do not allow him to enter with, the only disabled deputy present, Gilberto Sojo, recently released from jail.

RELATED CONTENT: “Where are the US Dollars?” – Suspected Corruption Divides the Opposition Over Guaido in Venezuela

The strategy of Guaidó was evident: knowing that he did not have enough votes to be reelected president of the National Assembly, he clings to a disabled deputy, who is not authorized to enter the Legislative Palace, and thus, offers the corporate press and world media, the first ideal image for the big lie: “They won’t let me in.”

But that situation lasted less than 2 minutes.

12:40 pm Moment in which the GNB allows the passage to Juan Guaidó, in the company of the disabled deputy, Gilberto Sojo (last picket).

12:53 pm All accredited deputies pass the last GNB picket. They walk calmly towards the Legislative Palace, which was a few meters away.

12:55 pm Guaidó and company arrive at the entrance of the Legislative Palace (AN headquarters), where in absolute tranquility, we proceeded with the [attendance] check, verifying one by one, the list of accredited deputies. Several deputies were entering to show their credential, without problem.

After 4 minutes, Guaidó approaches the edge of the fence next to Gilberto Sojo.

01:02 pm The search for Gilberto Sojo (disqualified deputy) on the official list begins. Seconds later, Guaidó begins video recording because he knew that Gilberto Sojo was not authorized to enter the Assembly, so he turned on the camera of his phone waiting for the moment when the GNB official would not allow the passage of the deputy in question. This moment was also recorded.

However, the GNB does not say what Guaidó expected. That is, it does not prohibit the entry of Gilberto Sojo at once, but asks him to wait on one side and that Guaidó and the other deputies could enter first while the authorization for Gilberto Sojo’s entry was verified. This is why Guaidó does not publish that video, which, fortunately, was recorded from other angles, where it is shown that Guaidó refused to enter Parliament when he is allowed to pass. Once this video was published, it went viral, reaching and exceeding 454 thousand views only in the original tweet.

The lie collapsed.

While this was happening, deputies supportive of Guaidó, who had already entered the National Assembly, went out to the Guaidó location to keep him abreast of what was happening inside the Chamber, where tempers were warming up by the delay of more than two hours of the start of the session.

01:15 pm Within the Chamber, in view of the unsustainable delay, Deputy José Antonio España (from the opposition), requests that a commission be formed in order to take the necessary measures to initiate the Installation Session as established by the Constitution and the Regulations of Interior and Debate.

Then, in view of the absence of Guaidó (who was responsible for leading the debate), both the outgoing First Vice President, Edgar Zambrano, and the outgoing Second Vice President, Stalin González, are requested to lead the debate, but both refuse to said petition, which is why it was decided, by analogy (and following the Regulations of Interior and Debate), to proceed with the first session of the constitutional period, with the most senior deputy chairing the debate.

A procedure that is part of the Regulation, which the European Union and the global corporate press probably did not read.

What does the Internal Assembly and Debate Regulations of the National Assembly say about this?

Article 3: “In the Installation Session of the National Assembly, at the beginning of the constitutional period, on the established date, the deputies will be constituted in Commission, under the leadership of the deputy or deputy of greater age, for the sole purpose of leading the debate for the election of the Board of Directors”.

Once this was known, Deputy Héctor Agüero (the oldest) was appointed, who appointed as Deputy Secretary, Deputy Nosliw Rodríguez.

1:21 pm Once the accidental secretariat announces the obvious existence of the regulatory quorum, the session is declared open.

The opposition deputies allied to Guaidó, remained in the chamber, some, waiting and watching the session’s progress, and others, executing the embarrassing act of fighting (among anti-Chavistas) in the full gallery.

Subsequently, the debate director granted the right of speech to Deputy José Brito (opposition), who nominated Deputy Luis Parra Rivero (opposition) to the position of President of the National Assembly for the 2020-2021 parliamentary period. He also nominated Deputy Franklin Duarte (opposition) as First Vice President, Deputy José Gregorio Noriega (opposition) as Second Vice President and citizens Negal Morales and Alexis Vivenes as Secretary and Assistant Secretary, respectively.

1:27 pm The nomination process concludes and the only proposal submitted ( Luis Parra’s) is submitted for consideration.

Immediately, the election of Deputy Luis Parra as the new President of the National Assembly for the 2020-2021 regular session is submitted to a vote (by show of hands of the required quorum), and is approved, by an evident majority of deputies and deputies present, as established by the Regulation. Thus it happened with the rest of the postulates for the new board of directors (one by one).

RELATED CONTENT: Elliott Abrams: “Military Option for Venezuela Does Not Depend on Guaido but on Trump”

1:29 pm The swearing-in of Parra is carried out. The director of debate, Héctor Agüero, takes an oath, while Deputy William Barrientos (whom the Guaidó team calls him “diablito” and who was expelled from the UNT party for corruption), climbed on to the rostrum, shouting, in an act desperate and useless, trying to hinder the oath.

1:30 pm Just before climbing on the rostrum to shout, deputy Barrientos instructed another deputy, to warn Guaidó about the swearing in of a new board of directors.

After all this, the show starts on the outskirts of the Legislative Palace, where after generating struggles with the GNB on the outskirts of the west end of the enclosure, Guaidó, in a desperate action ideal for international media and the plan to portray himself as a victim , tries – now he does – to enter by force, climbing on the fence and producing the famous photo.

At that time, the new board of directors chaired by Parra was already sworn. The presidency of Guaidó in the National Assembly had been null and void, and that was his manifest despair.

2:23 pm Once the Installation Session is concluded, the new president of the board of directors, Luis Parra, invites all the deputies to “the official taking of the office” of the Presidential Office of the Legislative Palace, as indeed corresponds to him.

2:31 pm Opposition deputies begin to leave the premises. Videos show how many and who stayed until the end, among them, Henry Ramos Allup, Stalin González, Edgar Zambrano, Juan Pablo Guanipa, -main deputies among Guaido’s supporters) among many others …

2:45 pm The Session Chamber is completely empty.

2:52 pm After having obtained the necessary photo, Guaidó was still with his wife, Fabiana Rosales, with a large part of the deputies who accompanied him and several journalists, in the corner of El Chorro in the Ave. Universidad, very close to the Legislative Palace. They were disoriented, until they boarded the armored motorcade leaving the site.

5:17 pm . They announce via Twitter, that Guaidó and company would hold a “session” at the headquarters of the newspaper El Nacional.

How do you understand this?

Article 1 of the Internal Assembly and Debate Regulations of the National Assembly states: “The National Legislative Power is exercised by the National Assembly, spokesperson of the Venezuelan people. Its headquarters is the city of Caracas, capital of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, and will meet in the Session Chamber of the Federal Legislative Palace, being able to meet in a different place or in another city, by agreement of the majority of its members or by decision of the Board of Directors ”.

Guaidó appeals to this article, taking advantage of the international ignorance about the legal and legitimate proceeding that was carried out earlier in the chamber for the election of the new board of directors.

That is, Guaidó and company, no longer had (at that time) any legal power to convene a session outside the Legislative Palace.

He could do it before the Installation Session was held where Parra was elected, but unarmed by not having the necessary votes to be reelected, without real knowledge of how Parliament works and immersed in pride, he did not. Any action intended to be executed on behalf of the National Assembly, was invalid, was void.

It is important to reiterate that members of the outgoing board of directors and other deputies of the pro-Guaidó opposition bloc, remained until the end of the Session, endorsing the regulatory quorum.

Key moment that confirms the existence of quorum in the hemicycle:

5:35 pm. In full development of the false session installed in the newspaper El Nacional, Guaidó asks Stalin González to report on the quorum at both events (the legal session and the improvised one). Against all odds, Stalin González explains to the cameras of dozens of digital media, such as VPI, that, in the Session Chamber (earlier), there were 127 deputies.

This is said based on the list of attendance that was taken arbitrarily from the Chamber, a fact that was denounced by opposition deputies and the Parliamentary Bloque de la Patria (PSUV).

On the other hand, the deputy José Brito, affirmed the existence of a quorum of 151 deputies.

Recall that the minimum quorum required for the election of the new board of directors is 84 deputies and to elect it, half plus one is needed, that is, 43 votes.

Both the figure given by Stalin González and the figure given by the new legal board of directors chaired by Parra, in addition to the dozens of photos and videos on the number of deputies present in the Hemicycle, exceed the minimum quorum required of 84 deputies. This is undeniable.

8:03 pm They announce via Twitter, the election of an alleged board of directors chaired by Guaidó.

An action that, in addition to being a shameless scam of the people of Venezuela and the world, because of its illegal nature, is based on another great lie: “they were (allegedly) elected by 100 votes.”

FALSE. The truth is that, in that false session, they made substitute deputies vote in addition to the main deputies and other non-sworn persons, to “replace” the missing votes, and with this, they sold another Fake News full of cynicism and fantasy to the world.

This image of January 7, where only 38 deputies are evident, demonstrates the lie of the 100 votes, but on January 7 we will dedicate another article to this issue.

They can continue to say any infamy that stimulates the sensationalism of international media and allows them to fool their allies to continue using and financing them, but any journalist attached to rigor and ethics and any politician or common citizen who is interested in the truth and respects the legal frameworks will recognize that what Guaidó has done is a farce.

What could the opposition deputies do, of those who were in the Chamber session?

1. Request nominal verification of the quorum, count one by one. A proceeding that was also unnecessary because the existence of the minimum quorum required was evident.

2. Register the Guaidó plate.

3. Request nominal vote (vote counting one by one). As this was not done, the vote is by show of hands and is approved by an obvious majority, as established by the Regulation.

4. Leave, leave the Chamber of Sessions.

Guaidó spent more than 2 hours outside the Legislative Palace, trying to gather his majority, which he did not achieve and therefore, by his own decision, he did not enter the premises.

The Installation Session, which could not sustain its delay, began, developed in accordance with the Regulations and concluded, and today the National Assembly has a new board of directors, chaired by the opposition deputy, Luis Parra.

Then, returning to Borrell’s statements:

It is a LIE that the election of the new board of directors of the National Assembly “did not respect legal procedures or democratic constitutional principles.” The vote reflects the reality of the moment and it is legal and legitimate, as long as it complies with the Regulation that also has the character of an Organic Law, and so it was done.

It is not true that they did not let Guaidó in, nor is it true that he was reelected president of the National Assembly. He doesn’t even run his own theater, because he only fulfills orders, but that’s another matter.

They played their cards very badly, as usual, and they had no choice but to extend the fantasy because they did not know what to do in the situation: they neither asked for a quorum verification nor presented an alternative proposal to Parra for the new National Assembly Board or they could have asked for a nominal vote or left the Chamber of Sessions, and, above, they publicly acknowledged that there was a quorum for the Installation Session. They were screwed for being “Guaidiotas” (no translation).

Source URL: La IguanaTV

Translated by JRE/EF

Ornelys Ortiz

Venezuelan Chavista influencer

This author does not have any more posts.