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Marcos Pérez Jiménez | |
|---|---|
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| President of Venezuela | |
| In office 2 December 1952 – 23 January 1958 Provisional: 2 December 1952 – 19 April 1953 | |
| Preceded by | Germán Suárez Flamerich |
| Succeeded by | Wolfgang Larrazábal |
| 30th Commander-in-Chief of the Venezuelan Army | |
| In office November 1948 – August 1954 | |
| Preceded by | Carlos Delgado Chalbaud |
| Succeeded by | Hugo Fuentes |
| Minister of Defense | |
| In office 18 October 1948 – 1 January 1952 | |
| Preceded by | Carlos Delgado Chalbaud |
| Succeeded by | Jesús M. Castro León |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Marcos Evangelista Pérez Jiménez (1914-04-25)25 April 1914 |
| Died | 20 September 2001(2001-09-20) (aged 87) Alcobendas, Spain |
| Nationality | Venezuelan |
| Political party | Independent Electoral Front (1951–1958) |
| Spouse | |
| Children |
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| Alma mater | Military academy of Venezuela |
| Profession | Military officer |
| Signature |  |
| Military service | |
| Allegiance |  Venezuela |
| Branch/service | Venezuelan Army |
| Years of service | 1931–1958 |
| Rank |  Divisional General |
Marcos Evangelista Pérez Jiménez (25 April 1914 – 20 September 2001) was aVenezuelan military officer and the dictator ofVenezuela from 1950 to 1958, ruling as member of themilitary junta from 1950 to 1952 and aspresident from 1952 to 1958. He took part in the1948 Venezuelan coup d'état, becoming part of the ruling junta. He ran in the1952 election. However, the junta cancelled the election when early results indicated that the opposition was ahead and declared Jiménez provisional president. He became president in 1953 and instituted a constitution that granted himdictatorial powers.
Under Pérez's rule, the rise ofoil prices facilitated manypublic works projects, including roads, bridges, government buildings and public housing, as well as the rapid development of industries such ashydroelectricity,mining andsteel. He also enriched himself considerably, as well as many of his political allies.[1] Theeconomy of Venezuela developed rapidly while Pérez was in power. On the other hand, Pérez presided over one of the mostrepressive governments in Venezuela. His government'ssecret police, theDirección de Seguridad Nacional (National Security Service), suppressed criticism and imprisoned those who opposed his rule.
Following massive public demonstrations in support of democratic reforms, Pérez was deposed in acoup perpetrated by disgruntled sectors within the Armed Forces of Venezuela on 23 January 1958. Pérez was then exiled to theDominican Republic, later Miami, United States and afterwards went on to settle in Spain under theFranco regime's protection.
Marcos Evangelista Pérez Jiménez was born inMichelena,Táchira State. His father, Juan Pérez Bustamante, was a farmer; his mother, Adela Jiménez, a schoolteacher fromCucuta, Colombia. Pérez Jiménez attended school in his home town and in Colombia, and in 1934, he graduated from theMilitary academy of Venezuela, at the top of his class. He subsequently studied atChorrillos Military School inPeru.
In 1945, Pérez Jiménez participated in a coup that helped install the founder of theDemocratic Action,Rómulo Betancourt, as President of the Revolutionary GovernmentJunta. The government would later become known asEl Trienio Adeco. After a constitutional change providing universal suffrage,elections were held in 1947 that resulted in the election of a party member,Rómulo Gallegos.
Fears of cuts in pay for soldiers and a lack of modernized army equipment led Pérez Jiménez andCarlos Delgado Chalbaud to stage another coup in 1948. Betancourt and Gallegos were exiled, political parties were suppressed and the Communist Party was once again banished by the military junta headed by Delgado Chalbaud, Luis Felipe Llovera Páez and Pérez Jiménez.
After a clumsily arranged kidnapping that ended in the murder of Delgado Chalbaud, the Military Junta changed its name to a Government Junta and reorganized itself with Pérez Jiménez pulling the strings of puppet president,Germán Suárez Flamerich.
Thejunta calledan election for 1952 in order to elect a Constituent Assembly that would elect a president and draft a new constitution. When early results showed that the opposition was well on its way to victory, the junta halted the count. On 2 December 1952, it released "final" results that showed the pro-junta "Independent Electoral Front" (FEI) winning a majority of assembly seats. On the same day, the junta dissolved itself and turned over power to the military, who then made Pérez provisional president. The Constitutional Assembly, comprising only FEI delegates after an opposition boycott, formally elected him president on 19 April 1953. Soon afterward, it enacted a constitution that gave the president virtually unlimited powers to take measures he deemed necessary to protect national security, peace and order.[2] For all intents and purposes, it transformed Pérez Jiménez' presidency into a legal dictatorship.
Pérez Jiménez (widely known as "P.J.") changed the name of the country, which had been "United States of Venezuela" since 1864, to the "Republic of Venezuela". This name remained until 1999, when it was changed to theBolivarian Republic of Venezuela by a constitutional referendum. (Spanish:República Bolivariana de Venezuela)
During his government, Pérez Jiménez undertook manyinfrastructure projects, including construction of roads, bridges, government buildings, large public housing complexes and the symbolicHumboldt Hotel & Tramway overlooking Caracas. Theeconomy of Venezuela developed rapidly during his term.
The price for this development was high, however. Pérez was not tolerant of criticism, and his government ruthlessly pursued and suppressed the opposition. Opponents of his regime were painted as communists[3] and often treated brutally and tortured.[4][5]
Pérez Jiménez's government pursued a policy offorced assimilation ofIndigenous peoples in Venezuela and the elimination of indigenous culture, with the help of Catholic missionaries.[6] The government adopted thePátzcuaro Convention, which established the pro-forced assimilationist Inter-American Indian Institute, for the purpose of collaborating with Latin American governments to help force the assimilation of indigenous peoples in the nations of the region.
On 12 November 1954, Pérez was awarded theLegion of Merit by the government of the United States.[7][8] Foreign capital and immigration were also highly promoted during his presidency, especially fromEuropean communities such as those ofSpanish,Italian andPortuguese origin. Perez also pushed for vast and ambitiousinfrastructure programs, based on the policy ofreinforced concrete, with construction of buildings, large and modernhighways, which linked and renewed ties betweenstates and other major works which greatly modernized the country.
Pérez Jiménez was up for reelection in 1957. By this time, the opposition had been so cowed that Pérez Jiménez could not possibly have been defeated. However, he dispensed with even those formalities. Instead, he held a plebiscite in which voters could only choose between voting "yes" or "no" to another term for the president. Predictably, Pérez Jiménez won by a large margin, though by all accounts the count was blatantly rigged.
| Ministries[9] | ||
|---|---|---|
| Office | Name | Term |
| President | Marcos Pérez Jiménez | 1952–1958 |
| Home Affairs | Laureano Vallenilla Planchart | 1952–1958 |
| Luis Felipe Llovera Páez | 1958 | |
| Antonio Pérez Vivas | 1958 | |
| Foreign Relations | Aureliano Otañez | 1952–1956 |
| José Loreto Arismendi | 1956–1958 | |
| Carlos Felice Cardot | 1958 | |
| Finance | Aurelio Arreaza Arreaza | 1952–1953 |
| Pedro Guzmán Rivera | 1953–1958 | |
| José Giacopini Zárraga | 1958 | |
| Defense | Marcos Pérez Jiménez | 1952–1953 |
| Oscar Mazzei Carta | 1953–1958 | |
| Rómulo Fernández | 1958 | |
| Marcos Pérez Jiménez | 1958 | |
| Development | Silvio Gutiérrez | 1952–1958 |
| Carlos Larrazábal Ugueto | 1958 | |
| Public Works | Luis Eduardo Chataing | 1952–1953 |
| Julio Bacalao Lara | 1953–1956 | |
| Oscar Rodríguez Gragirena | 1956–1958 | |
| Oscar Mazzei | 1958 | |
| Education | Simón Becerra | 1952–1953 |
| José Loreto Arismendi | 1953–1956 | |
| Darío Parra | 1956–1958 | |
| Nestor Prato Chacón | 1958 | |
| Humberto Fernández-Morán | 1958 | |
| Labor | Carlos Tinoco Rodil | 1952–1958 |
| Communications | Oscar Mazzei Carta | 1952–1953 |
| Félix Román Moreno | 1953–1956 | |
| Luis Felipe Llovera Páez | 1956–1958 | |
| José Saúl Guerrero Rosales | 1958 | |
| Luis Felipe Llovera Páez | 1958 | |
| Agriculture | Alberto Arvelo Torrealba | 1952–1953 |
| Armando Tamayo Suárez | 1953–1958 | |
| Luis Sánchez Mogollón | 1958 | |
| Health and Social Assistance | Pedro A. Gutiérrez Alfaro | 1952–1958 |
| Justice | Luis Felipe Urbaneja | 1952–1958 |
| Héctor Parra Márquez | 1958 | |
| Mines and Hydrocarbons | Edmundo Luongo Cabello | 1952–1958 |
| Secretary of Presidency | Raúl Soulés Baldó | 1952–1958 |
One of the first public demonstrations against the Pérez Jiménez regime occurred on 1952, after the assassination of opposition leaderLeonardo Ruiz Pineda. During a commemorative ceremony in Nuevo Circo, Caracas, hundreds of people wavedhandkerchiefs during aminute of silence asked in his honor.[10]
On 27 March 1957,Aaron Copland had come to Caracas to conduct the first Venezuelan performance of hisLincoln Portrait. ANew York Times reviewer said it had a "magical effect" on the audience. As Copland recalled, "To everyone's surprise, the reigning dictator, who had rarely dared to be seen in public, arrived at the last possible moment." On that evening actressJuana Sujo performed the spoken-word parts of the piece. When she spoke the final words, "...that government of the people, by the people, for the people (del pueblo, por el pueblo y para el pueblo) shall not perish from the earth", the audience rose and began cheering and shouting so loudly that Copland could not hear the remainder of the music."[11][12]
In January 1958 there was a general uprising, leading to the1958 Venezuelan coup d'état that deposed Pérez; with rioting in the streets, he left the country, paving the way for the establishment ofdemocracy in Venezuela.[1]
Pèrez fled to the United States, where he lived until 1963, when he was extradited to Venezuela on charges of embezzling $200 million during his presidential tenure. The 1959–63 extradition of Pérez, related toFinanciadora Administradora Inmobiliaria, S.A., one of the largest development companies in South America, and other business connections, is considered by scholars to be a classic study in the precedent for enforcement of administrative honesty in Latin American countries.[13]
Upon arrival in Venezuela he was imprisoned until his trial, which did not take place for another five years. Convicted of embezzlement and sentenced to four years in prison, he was released as he had already spent more time in jail while he awaited trial. He was then exiled to Spain. In 1968, he was elected to theSenate of Venezuela for theNationalist Civic Crusade, but his election was contested, and he was kept from taking office. A quick law was passed whereby former prisoners were excluded from participating in the governmental process.
He died inAlcobendas, Madrid, Spain, at the age of 87 on 20 September 2001.
The period of Pérez Jiménez in power is remembered historically as a government ofnationalist roots. His government was based on an ideological pragmatism characterized by theDoctrine of National Wellbeing, that the regime expressed in theNew National Ideal would be the philosophical beacon to guide the actions of the government.
His political legacy knownperezjimenismo was upheld by theCruzada Cívica Nacionalista (CCN; Nationalist Civic Crusade) party, which held seats in Congress from 1968 to 1978. In recent years there has been a revival ofperezjimenismo and the New National Ideal, with numerous groups revising and upholding the legacy of Marcos Pérez Jiménez.[14][15] In Venezuelan politics, he symbolizes forms a right-wingcaudillo mentality together withJuan Vicente Gómez.
The documentary filmTiempos de dictadura (English:Times of dictatorship), directed byCarlos Oteyza [es], focuses on his dictatorship, from the1948 coup d'état against PresidentRómulo Gallegos and the human rights violations committed by theSeguridad Nacional (including censorship, arrests, torture and extrajudicial killings) to the public works and lavish carnivals promoted by theoil boom.[16]
On 4 February 1945, Pérez marriedFlor María Chalbaud, daughter of Antonio Chalbaud Cardona and Angelina Castro Tejera. The couple had four daughters together.[17]
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by | President of Venezuela 1952–1958 | Succeeded by |
