OPINION: Peace pact, pawning for peace, or peace puzzle

Last Updated on Sunday, 17 December 2023, 8:43 by Denis Chabrol

By GHK Lall

In a December 16th article titled “Opposition Leader welcomes Guyana-Venezuela peace deal, but criticizes government for lack of preparation for Ali-Maduro meeting.”  I recognize the first part of that caption.  Mr. Norton’s criticism has its place, absorbed with some understanding.  If it sounds as though I am trying to have it both ways, or taking two sides, (guess what?) I am.  My focus, however, is on how Demerara Waves described the Declaration of Argyle for Dialogue and Peace.

From different sources I gather that it is hailed as a ‘peace pact’ and a ‘peace deal’.  It is a strange approach to peace.  Peace at any cost.  Peace by much of the other man’s conditions.  As much as there is need to de-escalate, and for peace in our time, there is wariness about how much peace and tranquility there could be between Guyana and Venezuela.  It has always been an on and off proposition, with heat followed by some limited cooling.  Today and tomorrow look decent, encouraging, calming.  Guyanese can return to the routines of December bustling and shopping, as well as the traditional revelry.  My hope is that the Guyana Police Force will have a quiet weekend coming up, the whole four days.  But with an eye to Venezuelan ideas and visions, the issue is how much peace is to be expected on this side of the map.  The peace of mind that there is national leadership in Venezuela that can be trusted to stick to the letter of their commitments.  The comforting peace that today’s Venezuelan government (Maduro), and any other one coming up beyond tomorrow (think expansively), will take the greatest care to honor what was agreed to before witnesses and the whole shebang.  Today there is applause for peace, which has its merits.  I am guarded about this peace puzzle.  Remember this was said.

Fellow Guyanese, think of this: the lures of Guyana and Essequibo are not going away.  Depleting, indeed; but there should still be plenty more.  Also, land doesn’t disappear.  By my abacus it is three quarters (60,000 plus square miles) of Guyana creating torments in the heads of Venezuelan politicians, Venezuelan generals, and Venezuelan society.  Relative to the first group, it would be the membership of both government and opposition, and those of today, and some other time.  Next time, they are sure to play their cards through a more circumspect, possibly more effective, approach.  Then again, as Maduro has just shown, saber-rattling and bellicose language have their usefulness.

Returning to that full-mouthed declaration (dialogue and peace), let us be careful, and be wise in managing ourselves.  Despite the deep bench of witnesses to the signatures of Presidents Ali and Maduro, I harbor a less than robust attitude as to its power.  That is, full binding power and, here is where all roads meet, staying power.  For, in considering the stormy runup to St Vincent and the Argyle piece of paper, I think that Nicolas Maduro set a bar for his peers and other aspirants to his office to follow (at least), or much better in the future.  No Venezuelan politician or schemer with aspirations to high office could afford to be below what he has set.  Perhaps, it may stand as his redeeming legacy.  Now with the Argyle Declaration, there is sure to be ideas dancing in the heads of the ambitious and covetous in Venezuela, outside of Maduro’s circle, of what could be wrung from Guyana, if the proper combination of intensity is applied.  One never knows what could be had, and with shaded verbiage that could always be interpreted by any Venezuelan visionary (according to he or his people) for their own purposes.  It is why I think that as much as I am with coming down from the equivalent of a Defcon level three tensions in the local environment, that government and citizens of Guyana must never fully down their guard.  Ongoing vigilance is the best course of action.  Hope springs eternal in the human breast.  But so also do ambition and greed.  They do not go away too easily.  Over there it is known how much peace is prized, and the scales measure between the two countries.  Not unreasonably, peace means more to Guyana, and this country showed that it wants it more.  Hence, the outcomes of Argyle.

After all, it is an agreement, and not a treaty.  And, on too many occasions for comfort, even treaties have been violated, or abandoned altogether.  The most prominent scrapping of which had been by a man with a funny moustache.  If anyone thinks I am too hard on Venezuelans, there is this for them to consider:  Guyana has not put a single man in unform beyond where they usually are.  Guyana has not sent a single covert operator into Venezuela.  And Guyana has not claimed one millimeter of Venezuelan territory.  Instead of a good neighbor, Guyana has a troubled one, and delusions should be expected.  Be watchful.  Be sensible.  Declaration of Dialogue and Peace, or none to bolster.