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Proceso 978
November 28, 2001
ISSN 0259-9864
 
 
 
 
 
 

INDEX

Editorial:  Public Immorality
Politics:  Why did the Orthodox win?
Economy:  The government and the public transportation issue
 
 
 
 
 

EDITORIAL

    The ex commander Joaquin Villalobos, presented as an expert on conflicts and willing to teach lessons, publishes immoralities and serious mistakes in a newspaper that, contradictorily, prides itself on being a symbol of public morality. According to Villalobos, the UCA's martyrs, the state's terrorism victims, and the guerrilla would have actually been killed by some ideas. The first ones, would have been murdered by authoritarianism; and the other victims would have been murdered by the "war spirit". Therefore, who can accuse an idea before a judge? If someone speaks about the damage caused to the victims, the ex commander responds that it was a general situation, "we all caused pain to others, we were all victims here".

    Then again, nobody is innocent, and nobody is guilty. This is an old subject that can be already found in the classic literature. Actually, not everyone is guilty, because not everybody caused pain, or at least not in the same level. Not everyone committed murder, not everyone is a killer. And some are guiltier than others. On the other hand, in the case that everyone would have caused pain to others, this would not excuse him from mend it. Morals are not working well for the "future telling master", educated at Oxford.

    Villalobos has a problem with the truth. He had it when he realized that the Truth Commission would point its finger at him for several murders. It is normal that now he has his doubts about reaching the truth, and that he considers it a "useless debate". The victims think exactly the opposite. It all depends on the perspective that each person has, and there is no doubt about what side he is on. If the victims could speak and tell their truth, then the reality of what actually happened would clearly emerge. However, that is what they are afraid of, and that is why they demand silence, while they look for false justifications.

    Villalobos “discovers” that behind each crime there is a motivation, which seems attractive and introduces itself as a good reason for the criminal. The reason behind the crime of Monsignor Romero, according to the ex commander, would have been a "fear so deep inside the right-wing", that it would justify its crime and it would exempt the authors from the penal justice. Because, according to this analyst, "all the political crimes, have a collective responsibility. The one who executes them is moved by a psychological and an emotional force, and a rationality pushed by thousands who applaud the crime".

    That is why nobody is guilty, but only those unknown forces. The ideas would be the ones that actually kill, not murderers. However, ideas do not kill people. Consequentially, in the height of shamelessness, the victims of terror would have to be told that “they have to accept an amount of impunity". Therefore, a martyr is not an innocent person whose life is unfairly taken away, but he dies in impunity so his killers can go on living peacefully and keep making money.

    That is why the army members cannot be investigated. To investigate and to bring before the justice system the responsible ones of having violated human rights is to run the risk of ending with a transition process with "transcendental transformations". In other words, the democratization process does not tolerate neither justice nor truth. The tranquility of the army member has been bought with impunity. The Salvadoran society would have turned itself, this way, into the hostage of murderers and human rights' violators.

    One more reason for the ex commander is that it is humiliating to face a judge, which would have to be avoided at any cost. However, with this attitude not only the military impunity is guaranteed, but also the impunity of all the criminals, the ones of yesterday and the ones of today. If the army members feel humiliated, so are the kidnappers and the ones accused of public fraud. The present pattern of impunity is identical to the one of yesterday, with some small modifications to pretend it is not. Where does this ex commander draw the line in order not to tantalize or humiliate criminals?

    Stubbornness drives Villalobos to commit serious mistakes. The blinded one is possessed in such a way by his interests that he does not take a good look around him, he is incapable of reasoning, and he contradicts himself. It is not true that the UCA dedicates all of its energies to the Jesuit case. The UCA has a lot of more energy, and that can be easily proved. When the UCA demands justice, it places itself in the same line that demands that the amnesty laws are declared null and void in the South Cone, and that the generals go to jail without any alterations in the public order, and in the struggle for the International Penal Tribunal’s approval.

    The one who is not according with these times is Villalobos, who becomes provincial at his convenience. He is so outdated, despite his studies at Oxford, that he sees in the victim's right an obstacle "that does not allow the society's evolution in a more reflexive way, less humiliating if confronted with its past". Therefore, the progress of El Salvador, which is a right for the victims, would have to be abolished. Then again,  this progress would rest on unpunished foundations, forgetting that the victim has been humiliated first by its executioner. The ones who fell back fighting, yesterday heroes, or the martyrs of justice are simple losers.

    The ex guerrilla member does not know well the catechism, since he confuses sacramental confession with judicial investigation. The first one is private and strictly personal, without a doubt. However, even during the first centuries of Christianity, it was public and indispensable to be admitted again inside the community. Murder was a sin that had to be confessed in order to be accepted once again. Nowadays, those who refuse to publicly confess a murder, and to repair the damages caused with it should be accused before the public Ministry, in order that an investigation either confirms its innocence or proves its guilt.

    If the accused one would turn out to be guilty, then a judicial process should begin. To demand justice is not the same as asking for revenge. The law of “an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth”, which origins are obviously ignored by the ex guerrilla member, was established to reduce personal violence acts. It was a way to equivalently compare harm with punishment.

    There are quite a lot of false statements about Ignacio Ellacuria. It is not true that he had adopted a neutral position between two extremes. He was objectively partial in favor of the majorities and that is why he was murdered. His writings prove it in over 4,500 pages already published. Without a doubt, Ellacuria contributed to peace, but he gave more importance to justice. That is why he took the side of both the ones being exploited and the oppressed ones; and therefore, against the wealthy. It is silly that the ex revolutionary asserts that it was ridiculous for him to think, when he was young,  that the businessmen were exploitative, since he contradicts himself. In fact, throughout his statements he repeats that the wealthy "have their eyes on what is profitable at a short term", and it is clear that they cannot do that without exploitation.

    In his conception about the rich and their wealth, the difference between Ellacuria and the ex commander is abysmal. It is not true either that Ellacuria said that "Cristiani's economic program would be successful", if  "success" means to resolve the most serious problem of the country, which in the words of the UCA's former rector, were the impoverished majorities. What Ellacuria meant, and this can be verified in his writings, is that Cristiani had enough power to impose the right-wing's economic program. Ellacuria never approved it. A proof of that is his criticism heritage about the wealth's civilization, which he contrasted with the poverty civilization, before the boundless capitalist ambition he placed the working society and solidarity.

    Following Evangelism, Ellacuria not only distrusts, but he also condemns with very strong terms the wealth and the capitalists system that the ex commander now defends. Ellacuria was not pragmatic, as this last minute disciple wants to make it look like. Ellacuria was a prophet and he had utopian ideals, he was a philosopher and a liberation theologian. How pragmatic the ex commander is, is nobody's business. This is understandable though, since he lives well on the capitalist system's account, which has given him free higher education and the means to live in the first world with his family.

    It is not difficult to explain so much immorality together. It is a personal and a public justification of his past, and the crimes on his account. It is also an attempt to seem acceptable before the eyes of the Salvadoran circles of power. His justification has several sources. The first one is that the ex commander has no responsibility for his past as a guerrilla member, because, according to him,  "conflicts are not a responsibility of the generation who fights, but a responsibility of those who do not prevent them"; but that would mean that it is necessary to go back to the past in order to explain the present of his youth, when he has formerly declared that "it is a serious mistake to explain the conflict through history itself".

    His second source is his fear that some judicial process might be opened, and that he could become one of the accused. It is a fear shared with ARENA, and it is rejected with the excuse that it would cause chaos and blood. Actually, it is an excuse to protect those who are guilty. The last one is to defend the project of the government's party. Just like him, President Flores "is standing on the future agenda and getting over the agenda of the past". That is why it is a disapproving attitude when "suddenly someone shows up with a problem from 1989".

    These are immoral assertions, because they vindicate the murderers' impunity and defend "their right to live peacefully, regardless of what they did". According to Villalobos, we would have to accept "everyone who sinned with words and actions", because "we are here and we are all in both sides". Instead, the victims should be content with being peace monuments, of a peacefulness constructed over impunity, by the immoral surviving actors of the armed conflict.

    The question about why the "Orthodox" won with such forcefulness the FMLN's internal elections seems like an enigma that not even the "renovators", nor the most enthusiastic right-wing analysts seem to find an explanation for. The renovators' General Coordinator candidate —more accessible, according to ARENA's governmental authorities—  imagined, without a doubt, a better luck. The preliminary electoral results place him, on the contrary, in an uncomfortable third position, far away from the wining candidate. However, if the electoral propaganda is remembered, they were presented as the diaphanous expression of the farabundista militancy's renovation wishes.

    That is why some important questions might appear before the eyes of the observer. The renovating leaders are simply a creation of the "right-wing" press, obsessed with magnifying the natural differences inside a left-wing political party? Or, instead, the left-wing party's renovation is an aspiration of most of the FMLN members  —as diffuse as it can be—, but that it was not properly delivered and interpreted in the best way possible?

    Whether if the renovator’s movement is a creation of the national press or not, a definitive answer cannot be given. All that can be said about it is that this country's largest press media have turned this issue into the FMLN's presentation card. Just like it has been frequently reported in this weekly publication, the national press, in its news coverage, presents the FMLN as the disorders' party, as a party with numerous internal disputes. As for the renovators, they are seen as the most sensible ones, compromised with democracy and, however, also as the victims of the orthodox conspiracy. It is enough to examine the publications related to the Nation's General Budget approval discussions, to realize all the support this movement counts with inside the most important national media.

    The Renovator's candidate, Francisco Jovel, defeated at the internal elections on November 25th, and conscious of this "detail" of the pro-governmental press, usually leads his battles for the control of the left-wing party's structures in this field. Generally, a week does not goes by without him sharing with the press his discontent inside the party, as well as his concern about what he considers the irreversible motion towards the electoral defeat. However, to judge by the results in the last party elections, the strategy did not operate the desired effects. The media support or the electoral defeat threat has never been a strong menace to convince the left-wing party's militants that they are the best option.

    Before this reality, the basic conclusion the renovators should reach is that they cannot aspire to govern the FMLN, selecting their political adversaries as alliances, or brandishing the electoral challenge. Regardless of the amount of control that the right-wing can have over the country's communication media, these ones have a negative conception of the left-wing party that goes precisely against its political identity. When someone knows how the political parties usually work, it is hard to dream about wining the followers simply with external pressures, since that means to trust too much in the external elements over the internal forces correlation. From the perspective of a political sociology, the discussions about this issue are willing to identify the variables that affect the relation between the organization and its surroundings.

    Angelo Panebianco (1993) sustains that in the relation between an organization and its surroundings, the environmental characteristic factors have to be distinguished from the factors related to the party's institutionalization level. If he accepts that the environment demands flexibility and adaptation capability from the party, the institutionalization level of the party, its institutional structure, it plays an important role when it comes to evaluate its answers to the environmental demands.

    Therefore, it is about digging deeper into the answer of a party to a certain environmental demand, that is, to examine its internal dynamics. The main thesis of this approach sustains that "the relations between the organization and its environment must be considered as mutually dependent relations, the party and the environments throughout which it operates are reciprocally influenced, although in different ways according to the party and the environment's characteristics" (Panebianco).

    In any case, in this party-environment relation, the identity of the first one is involved here. And the changes that are pursued must not leave behind this piece of organizational information. The parties, it is true, are political instruments that intend to win the electoral competition, but they are also conservative structures that tend to resist themselves to change, defending its own identity. Therefore, any renovation effort should consider this piece of information. Otherwise, it would by digging its own grave.

    Something like this can be observed in the renovators' strategy —its leaders' personal motivations are not discussed here— who do not seem to realize the internal challenges, related with the structure and the identity of the FMLN. Consequentially, they are frequently invited to abandon the left wing party, because they no longer share its ideological criteria. This can explain the recent expulsion of Facundo Guardado, the head of the renovators' movement. This is the way they pay for their rejection to the party's internal dynamics. Just like this issues’ bibliography   can explain, when it comes to make transformations inside of the organizations, it is important to add to the external elements a good doses of control and understanding, its internal dynamics and the aspects that shape its followers’ identities.

    From this perspective, the renovators will not be a viable electoral choice in the left-wing, until they decide to change their strategy. They do not only have to get closer to the aspirations of the FMLN’s foundations, to understand what kind of renovation they are demanding; they would also have to understand that that the FMLN's identity is a very important aspect at any battle inside the organization. The strategy to take advantage of ARENA's critics to discredit its orthodox adversaries drives them further away from the party's foundations.

    At least that is what the left-wing party's last internal elections' results have shown. If they do not consider necessary to read this message, the most evident result will be an expulsion or a voluntary resignation. Facundo Guardado's case should be taken as an example to understand what will surely come next. While there are no mutual forces that provide stability to the party, the organization will tend to give more importance to the search for that stability over the interests of a small group of discontent people.

    In some cases, crisis creates the conditions to adopt improvised public policies, generated in the heat of the emergency and in the haste of the emerging needs. In other circumstances, the crisis turn into occasions to launch ideas and projects that have not been able to be implemented in normal conditions. The most recent evidence has flourished with the early 2001 earthquakes, and also with the recent "strike" of the public transportation sector, where improvisation and opportunism have been clearly displayed to implement deep changes at the economic regulation.

    This situation is not new. In the recent case of the crisis generated by the earthquakes, the government made rushed decisions that did not help to reduce the crisis, and that also had a negative social and environmental impact. For instance the creation of the National Commission of Solidarity (CONASOL) as an entity in charge of centralizing the reception and the distribution of the aid. The CONASOL latter accepted the social pressures to decentralize the process. Another example is the construction of a concrete road at the skirts of the San Salvador Volcano (an active volcano), which is already generating floods, problems and urban pressures in a fragile and high risk zone.

    Now, before the eyes of a new crisis generated by public demonstrations, made by the public transportation's owners because of the governmental attempts to reform the sector, the government announced extreme measures such as: the elimination of the subsidy to the public transportation prices, the freezing of the prices, and the creation of an  "incentives’ package" for the public transportation business' owners.

    It must be clear that this governmental reaction does not exclusively emerge from the present situation of protest and disagreements with the public transportation owners. It already has an important record of suspensions for the transportation service, frustrated negotiations, routes' rearrangement proposals, technical regulations for the vehicles used for public transportation (specially the elimination of the units with over 15 years of use), and mutual accusations of corruption among the government and the transportation business' owners. In fact, the government has pointed out that one of the reasons that motivates the elimination of the subsidy from the public transportation sector, is that this one has created "generalized corruption practices" (which is an implicit acceptance of the ARENA governments' responsibility inside that "generalized corruption").

    The option to eliminate the subsidy from the diesel of the public transportation and, generally, the governmental strategy about the public transportation, deserve a more detailed analysis of its impact, beyond the frequently advertised reductive effects in the gasoline prices. It is said that the subsidy elimination will only bring positive effects for the population, specially for the "special" gasoline brand consumers. When this measure was announced, President Flores underlined that the special and the regular gasoline prices would be reduced in the following amounts: 4.22 and 1.12 colones, respectively. This would suggest a reduction of the combustibles' prices in 22.9% and 7.9%. According to Flores, this reduction would involve a reduction on the combustible expense by the order of $40 million, which represents a little more than a 0.3% from the GNP.

    Flores added that the users of the public transportation would not suffer an increase on the prices, since the rearrangement plan that will be implemented will create the mechanisms to keep the prices steady.  780 transportation units will go out of circulation (25% from the total units), because they already have over 15 years of use. According to the same analysis, this will allow that the remaining 2,500 buses circulate with a higher amount of passengers, and generate higher profits with the same amount of operative expenses.

    Curiously, and according to the Transportation Vice Minister, Ricardo Yudice, a "package of incentives" has been created for the public transportation sector, and it includes, among other things, the purchase of the unities that will be removed from circulation, and the creation of soft credit lines to acquire buses of a more recent model. This would be a very evident contradiction between the governmental officials, since if some attention is paid to Yudice's assertions, the removed buses would be replaced and the amount would not vary.

    Accepting the governmental scheme, which pretends to keep the prices steady by removing a certain amount of unities (something that also contradicts the market's logic, where a reduction of the offer increases the prices), a question emerges: will a 25% reduction of the total of unities cover the demand for transportation that is usually generated during the rush hours, when the already existing unities are not enough to transport the passengers?

    What the governmental officials have not talked about is the fact that the governmental proposal has no viability, unless that the government militarizes or nationalizes the public transportation service. The prices will eventually increase because of the subsidy's elimination, affecting the pocket of the most vulnerable sectors, more vulnerable than the special or regular gasoline consumers.

    Another aspect that must not be kept out of site, during the present crisis, is the fact that the issue is not the subsidy itself; what is actually being discussed here is the way to handle this situation, and the necessary reform of the public transportation. The government itself implicitly accepts that its intention is not to cause an increase on the prices, and most people should be sure about the need to subsidy certain services, and even certain economic activities.

    A good amount of the economic and social success of the developed countries rests on the fact that they have subsidized their agriculture, their social security system, and, in some cases, even the rendering of environmental services. Even in the present, most developed countries subsidize and practice protectionism policies to keep their agriculture working, and they even offer unemployment subsidies.

    Obviously, this activities need to count with a productive sector that can generate the necessary income to finance the subsidy. However, in the case of the subsidy for the public transportation prices  —which has been confused with a "diesel subsidy for the bus owners"—,  its elimination has been unnecessary. In addition, the sector that had it was already used to it. The point was to actually improve the efficiency and the effectiveness of its administration and use.

    Unfortunately, the governmental decision will not contribute to create appropriate scenery for the rearrangement of the public transportation. On the contrary, the sector's business guilds immediately reacted with protests, such as the present indefinite strike, which is evidently causing economic loses that are difficult to calculate.

    In summary, the government has incurred in unnecessary costs, and has left the vulnerable sectors unprotected, because it does not count with the necessary institutional organization to implement its plans, and because it also seems to take advantage from any critical situation to propel projects that should be discussed with more sensibility and social responsibility.