Selling or Saving
the Soul of the OAS
- Sir Ronald Sanders, Ambassador of
Antigua and
Barbuda to the OAS -
The organization of American States (OAS), already a
broken
institution, was shattered even more April 9 at a meeting of its
permanent council. It is now an organization whose membership is
deeply divided and amongst whom mistrust, and bitterness now
predominate.
Sir Ronald Sanders, (right), at OAS meeting.
|
How this huge problem will be fixed -- if it can be
fixed
at all -- is the paramount challenge that now confronts its
33 and a half members. I will return to the half-member later in
this commentary.
Nothing that I say in this commentary is a secret. The
permanent council meeting of April 9 was played out in a live
webcast on the OAS' website.
The meeting was held, after weeks of efforts by the
United
States and most of the members of the so-called Lima group, to
secure the adoption of a resolution that would unseat the
representative of the Nicolás Maduro government and replace him
with the nominee of Juan Guaidó. Guaidó is the
self-proclaimed "interim president" of Venezuela, so recognized
by roughly 50 of the more than 200 governments in the world.
The manoeuvrings behind the scenes had a single purpose,
and
that was to procure 18 votes, constituting a simple majority of
the 34 member-states, to impose Guaidó's nominee as
Venezuela's representative.
It took some time for the core 14 countries to woo the
support
of 4 others, not least because the manner of pushing the
resolution through the permanent council defied international law
and the charter and rules of the OAS. Governments had to dig deep
to balance disregard for the integrity of the OAS as an
institution and a desire to help those countries that were
determined to seat Guaidó's representative.
The meeting was summoned for high noon April 9, and all
delegations were cautioned to be on time for a prompt start. As
it turned out delegates were forced to wait until after 1:00 pm to
start the meeting because, at the last minute, Jamaica --
one of the faithful 18 -- insisted on new language, causing
a commotion among the group and threatening to derail its entire
effort.
Even when the resolution was presented to the permanent
council meeting and was being debated, it was unclear what text
was being considered. What was before the meeting was the
original text, omitting the Jamaica language. A request from me,
as the representative of Antigua and Barbuda, for clarification,
resulted in a break in the meeting's proceedings to produce the
final text of the resolution. Its primary purpose remained to
accept the appointment of "the national assembly's designated
permanent representative."
There was much solemn and serious debate about the
entire
proceedings, but in the end, 18 countries, using their razor-thin
majority, forced the vote through.
Some self-interested governments have characterised the
April
9 meeting as a clash of support for or against the contending
forces in Venezuela. Sections of the media have followed that
line.
However, far from being about Maduro/Guaidó and
Venezuela, the meeting was about selling or saving the soul of
the OAS; it was about disregarding international norms and
ignoring the institutional framework of the organization for the
short term political purposes of a few; and it was about arguing
for the retention of the OAS' integrity.
At the end of the vote, passed by a simple majority, the
ambassador of Mexico, Jorge Lomónaco Tonda, summed-up the
meeting well. He said: "There were no winners or losers; only
losers." Moreover, the biggest loser was the OAS itself.
Nowhere in the charter of the OAS, or its rules, does
the
permanent council have the authority to decide on the recognition
of a government. Further, as was stated repeatedly at the
meeting, the recognition of a government is the sovereign right
of states and cannot be determined or imposed by a multilateral
organization. At the very least, the matter, given its high
political importance, should have been considered by a special
session of the general assembly, the highest organ of the
OAS.
What the hasty, ill-considered process succeeded in
doing is
damaging the OAS as an institution, tainting its structure and
governance, harming relations between its member states and
rendering it unfit for anything but achieving the purposes of a
willful majority of 18 countries.
The vote on recognition of the national assembly's
representative was really about the de-recognition of the Maduro
government's representative. While that may have been achieved
within the OAS, it has changed nothing in the international
community. Countries that recognize Maduro or Guaidó as
president of Venezuela continue to do so.
Nothing has changed in Venezuela either. This vote has
achieved no new negotiations and no solution to the humanitarian
situation. If anything, it has served only to harden the opposing
sides in the political conflict, closing the door to
solutions.
To return now to the 33 and a half members of the OAS.
The
national assembly's representative may be seated in front of the
Venezuelan flag, but he cannot speak for the government that is
in charge of Venezuela. A vital test of recognition of a
government, in international law and practice, is whether it
exercises effective control of the affairs of the country. The
national assembly does not have effective control of Venezuela,
and its representative cannot speak, in the OAS, for the de facto
government.
There is a further question regarding the authenticity
of the
representative's credentials which appear to have been
overlooked, deliberately or otherwise by the OAS Secretariat.
The national assembly nominated a "special"
representative to
the OAS, but there is no such category of representation.
Further, as pointed out in the meeting by the ambassador of
Guyana, Riyad Insanally, the letter to the Secretary-General from
Guaidó, signed as "interim president of Venezuela,"
designating the "permanent" representative, was dated January 22,
2019. However, his proclamation as "interim president" took place
on January 23, 2019. In other circumstances, these discrepancies
would not have been accepted.
The OAS is now in many ways a sadly compromised
organization.
The fight on April 9, 2019, to sell or save its soul defines it
now and can limit its effectiveness in the future.
Why should we care? Because it is the only hemispheric
organization in which all countries (except Cuba) sit, and which
had the mandate and the opportunity to keep the region peaceful
and to pursue cooperation that could make a difference to the
lives of all its people. All that is now corrupted.
This article was published in
Volume 49 Number
13 - April 13, 2019
Article Link:
Selling
or
Saving
the Soul of the OAS
Website: www.cpcml.ca
Email: editor@cpcml.ca
|