This Sunday, the journalism platform La Tabla reaffirms its fundamental proposal: any amnesty law aiming for true national reconciliation must explicitly include the key social actors of the Venezuelan structural conflict: farmers, labor activists, and urban dwellers.
The proposal argues that to “heal wounds” sustainably, the process must go beyond the framework of political confrontation and address its root causes: the historical struggle for land, dignified work, and housing. Excluding these sectors, whose legitimate struggles were systematically judicialized and criminalized, would perpetuate a reductionist view of the conflict and deny justice to its central protagonists.
Written by: La Tabla/Data Journalism Platform 9 FEB 2026
Building a stable peace recognized by the people requires that the amnesty process transcends traditional frameworks and addresses the roots of the conflict. Therefore, there is a need to develop a Special Mechanism for Recognition and Reparations, parallel and complementary to the general amnesty (for the binary political conflict), as the ideal tool to achieve deep national reconciliation.
This proposal is based on four essential points:
1) Nature of the Conflict: Suprapolitical and Class-Based
The central conflict of the country transcends political-partisan issues. It’s a structural class confrontation where farmers, workers, and urban dwellers are not secondary actors but the primary historical subjects. An amnesty that overlooks this root would be incomplete and lack historical foundation.
2) The True Conflict: Inclusion Imperative
Because the agrarian, labor, and urban conflict is truly the conflict of the social base, their exclusion would invalidate the process. Reconciliation cannot be achieved by pardoning actors in one dimension of the conflict while leaving out the structural victims of inequality. Including them means addressing the cause, not just the symptom.
3) Procedural Soundness: Auditable Records
Including these sectors is the most solid procedure. Their struggles leave a clear documentary trail in executive, administrative, and special jurisdictional instances (agricultural, labor, housing), before often leading to criminalization. This route provides objective and verifiable records that would technically support any reparative measures.
4) Popular Legitimacy: Chavista and People-Centric Character
Finally, including these sectors lends the process the essential popular legitimacy. For the amnesty to be perceived as a genuine act of national reconciliation, it must resonate with the people. Only a process that recognizes and repairs its social base can aspire to lasting peace with justice.
Conclusion and Concrete Proposal
For the reasons outlined, the formal creation of a Special Mechanism for Recognition and Reparations is proposed. The operational details, the precise scope, and the methodology of this mechanism—how it would articulate the restitution of rights, collective reparations, and guarantees of non-repetition based on existing records—will be further developed and substantiated in upcoming notes and documents related to this proposal.
This initial proposal aims to spark debate and establish the central idea: true peace requires a bold instrument that transforms initial legal exclusion into a transformative historical inclusion.