The last time Delcy Rodríguez attended the United Nations General Assembly, in 2019, she began her speech by saying that she came in the name of "the only Venezuela, the dignified Venezuela, the brave one, the one that does not kneel before any imperial power. With the greetings of President Nicolás Maduro Moros and the Venezuelan people. A Bolivarian greeting, also in the name of the spirit of our commander Hugo Chávez Frías." In his speech, he attacked Donald Trump, defined US actions as "state terrorism that is imposed on people and no longer uses bombs, but banks and insurance companies", and described the Treasury Department as "the Economic Pentagon, which militarizes international relations and punishes millions of innocent people to apply doctrines of regime change and blatantly steal the resources of nations."
Seven years later, Delcy and post-Chavism continue to control Venezuela, there is no democracy and millions of people have left the country. But something has changed, it has changed. In her speech before a half-empty Assembly this Wednesday, without renowned figures already in the room, the interim president has personally thanked Donald Trump, has spoken of the magnificent relations with the United States, has ignored her boss and friend, imprisoned a few minutes away in a federal prison, and has bowed to the same "empire" that she denounced for decades. Rodríguez has also promised that there will be elections, but in his own way, without saying when or explaining how: "the Venezuelan people with their ancestral wisdom will determine the correct moment."
It has undoubtedly been one of the most anticipated interventions of the week. And it has not disappointed, but it has outraged. "Today Venezuela is reborn, reborn (...) today Venezuela aspires with the United States, with its neighbors, with all the countries of our continent and the international community, to rebuild and sustain relations of cooperation, respect and equality. I want to thank President Donald Trump and his Government for their willingness to resume the path of diplomatic relations and cooperation with Venezuela. Today we work seriously to resolve existing differences through dialogue, but mainly to pave the way for energy relations, the promotion of security, the common struggle against transnational crime and cooperation for the economic benefit of both peoples and our continent," he stated.
The most important message, however, was another. "I want to say very clearly in this general assembly that there will be elections in Venezuela and in that direction we have initiated a political dialogue with sectors of the opposition that leads to a process on equal terms for all," he promised. "Venezuela will guarantee real conditions of participation for all the country's political forces, but democracy is not measured by the existence of elections, democracy is measured by the quality of the competition that precedes those elections. An election must be a solution, not a generator of irreconcilable conflicts," he immediately qualified with extraordinary cynicism after having been one of those responsible for the theft of the last elections.
The change in tone, submission and dedication have been spectacular in the speech, as is his ability to fill his message with euphemisms, in which by the way there has been no direct allusion to Nicolás Maduro.
Rodríguez has deliberately not set a date for those elections. "The Venezuelan people with their ancestral wisdom will determine the right moment and their institutions will be prepared to guarantee that inclusive and transparent process, a country that is not subject to economic restrictions of any kind, so that the rest's right to development is guaranteed and the spasmodic reactions from inside and outside are part of the spectacle that they no longer want to see," he added, speaking of an upcoming national convention. "Venezuelans will be consulted so that you can say when, where and under what terms you want to celebrate the great national convention. There the people will freely exercise their omnipotence. There they will decree their fundamental laws, only they know their good and are masters of their fate."
He has shamelessly presented himself as a figure of consensus and transition, capable of healing the broken soul of a nation, asking the US, in a very subtle and non-frontal way, for no interference.
