A disappointment, it' time for him to go

Carlos Alberto Montaner

Cuba should be reincorporated to the Organization of American States as the first step to its path to democracy, the hemispheric organization's secretary general said Thursday on the eve of the Fifth Summit of the Americas.

''I want to be clear: I want Cuba back in the Interamerican system,'' OAS Secretary General José Miguel Insulza said in an interview with The Miami Herald. ''I think it was a bad idea in the first place ... Cuba is a member of the OAS. Its flag is there.''

Insulza's statement came as President Barack Obama told CNN en espanol that if Cuba starts taking steps toward freedom, a îîthawing of relations'' would come next.

The lone country in the hemisphere that's not a member of the Organization of American States -- Cuba -- promises to take center stage here, as more and more Latin American nations insist that the days of the communist country's isolation should be numbered.

The Fifth Summit of the Americas appears to be just the forum hemispheric leaders have chosen to raise the contentious issue. The summit was first held in Miami 15 years ago, but this is the first time pressure has been so strong to bring Cuba back into the regional alliance.

''I want to be clear: I want Cuba back in the Interamerican system,'' OAS Secretary General José Miguel Insulza said. ``I think it was a bad idea in the first place. . . . Cuba is a member of the OAS. Its flag is there.''

The head of the Organization of American States' campaign to win reelection took a hit Tuesday from a report complaining the OAS has failed to stop elected presidents from eroding democracy in the region.

``Given the challenges described in this report, no reelection should be rushed or rubber stamped,'' the U.S. Congressional staff report said. ``Any reelection should involve a deliberative evaluation of the incumbent's first term in office.''

OAS Secretary General José Miguel Insulza, a Chilean socialist whose five-year-term ends in May, has said he wants to be relected, and so far is the only candidate. The 34-nation OAS was scheduled to vote Wednesday on holding the election in March, but the vote was postponed at the last minute.

Venezuela ''will veto'' the final declaration due to be issued by this weekend's Fifth Summit of the Americas in neighboring Trinidad and Tobago, President Hugo Chávez said Thursday.

Chávez, who was in the eastern Venezuelan city of Cumaná for a pre-summit meeting with his closest allies -- including Cuba's Raúl Castro -- said the communique had been drafted, ``as if time had not passed.''

The summit in Port of Spain is seen as an opportunity for President Barack Obama's administration to begin to repair Washington's relations with Latin America and the Caribbean, which reached a low point under former President George W Bush.

H onduran President Porfirio Lobo's inauguration was a pretty lonely affair, with most Latin American presidents shunning the ceremony because of the country's 2009 coup. But judging from what I'm told by key Latin American and U.S. officials, Lobo's isolation won't last long.

In a telephone interview earlier this week, Organization of American States Secretary General José Miguel Insulza told me that there is a ``good climate'' for lifting Honduras' suspension from the OAS ``relatively soon.'' He added, ``I hope that it won't take us more than a few months to make a decision.''

Only two Latin American heads of state -- Panama's Ricardo Martinelli and the Dominican Republic's Leonel Fernández -- attended Lobo's inauguration ceremony. The Obama administration sent State Department Latin American affairs chief Arturo Valenzuela.
BY CARLOS ALBERTO MONTANER
www.firmaspress.com

José Miguel Insulza must withdraw his candidacy for the directorship of the OAS for another term. He has not been a good official. The five years he has spent as secretary general are among the worst in the history of that institution.

He was supposed to have been elected to strengthen the functioning of democracy, in the spirit and letter of the Democratic Charter of the Organization of American States signed in Lima by all the member states on Sept. 11, 2001. On the contrary, he has contributed to its weakening.

Perhaps Insulza's original sin is owing his post to the support of Hugo Chávez, something that didn't prevent the Venezuelan president -- annoyed by some statement made by Insulza -- from calling him a pendejo, a vulgarism that roughly describes a pubescent punk.

In any case, whenever Chávez, Evo Morales, Daniel Ortega and Rafael Correa have violated the fundamental rights of their people by silencing the press, harassing the opposition or destroying the independence of the other branches of government -- the judiciary and the legislative -- Insulza has looked the other way, ignored the victims and justified his inaction by resorting to the alibi that such violations were the internal affairs of those countries.

Shortly before Insulza's election, in May 2005, the other candidate, backed by the United States and several other democracies, was former Salvadoran President Francisco Flores.

``Paco'' Flores is a man known for his integrity and decency, but, facing a virtual tie, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice gave in to the suggestions and pressures of Ricardo Lagos, then the president of Chile, a friend and socialist comrade of Insulza's, who convinced her of Insulza's suitability for the post and his democratic convictions.

It was Rice's mistake, probably provoked by the scant importance that Washington has always attributed to Latin American affairs.

To the United States, Latin America is merely a source of raw materials -- oil, copper and other trifles -- with which, for the past several years, it keeps a negative trade balance. It is not vital territory from a technological or financial point of view.

Nevertheless, geopolitically speaking, there are four basic topics that worry Washington: drug trafficking; illegal immigration; complicity with Islamic terrorists; and relations with Iran by some countries in the region (especially Venezuela) over what seems to be the development of nuclear weapons, which someday, after being produced by Iranian scientists, could be incorporated into the Venezuelan arsenal.

Who might replace José Miguel Insulza at the head of the OAS? Maybe this is the time to consider a former Central American foreign minister or president, or a prominent Caribbean figure. But that person should have the integrity to uphold the principles contained in the organization's founding documents and the Democratic Charter, even if it means a confrontation with Chávez and his satellites.

What is unacceptable is for the enemies of democracy to use the OAS for purposes contrary to the reasons that give the organization its form and sense.

A recent Washington Post article suggested that some U.S. legislators should freeze all payments and subsidies made to the OAS if the institution maintains the course that Insulza has set.

That's not a good idea. It is possible for Chávez to buy the institution with his petrodollars, at bargain prices, if the United States allows him to do so.

However, should the OAS persist on its current path, blind and deaf to the violations of democratic rules and the victims' clamor, perhaps the sensible thing to do is to create a parallel organization of the nations that are willing to defend freedoms and the rule of law.

What makes no sense is to maintain in Washington an expensive apparatus that, far from serving the people of the Americas, contributes to their harm.

February 16, 2010

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