The silence of the culprits. The Venezuelan Programme of Education-Action in Human Rights (PROVEA) requested on March 24, 2003 to the then Minister of Defence, José Luis Prieto, a copy of the Plan Avila, and received no response. Two years later, the Constitutional Chamber of the Supreme Court responded, but only to justify and maintain this silence.
With a presentation by Justice Jesús Cabrera, the Supreme Court rejected the amparo filed by Provea against Prieto and determined that “there was no violation of the right to request and obtain timely response.” Thus, Article 51 of the Constitution was ignored, which states: “Everyone has the right to petition or make representations before any authority, public official on matters within their competence and to obtain timely and appropriate response. Whoever violates this right shall be punished according to law, and are liable to be dismissed from office.”
Provea requested that document to complete their investigation on the situation of human rights in the country. In the text of the petition filed before the highest court, the NGO recalled that in a judgment dated August 29, 2002, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights had ordered the Venezuelan State to “adjust operational plans aimed to address public disturbances to the respect and protection” of human rights, “adopting to this end, among other measures, those aimed at controlling the actions of all members of the security forces on the field, in order to avoid excessive use of force.”
Based on the premise that Plan Avila is used by the Armed Forces to control public disturbances or threats to institutions, Provea stressed that the official text needed to be publicly known, so it could be “subject to social control.”
“For us human rights organisations, one of our goals is to make policy recommendations to the various bodies and agencies of the State to promote and respect human rights, so it is vital to know the critical content of the so-called Plan Avila,” argued the NGO. However, Lady Justice removed her blindfold and put it on her mouth to keep the mystery.
Extract of the judgment
the administration is obliged to settle the case or indicate the reasons why it refrains from such action. Thus, the only rational objective of the action for constitutional protection against the violation of the right to request and obtain timely response, is to force the alleged offender to comply with a request made and issue a statement, which does not necessarily imply a favourable response. In the opinion of this Court, (…) the petitioner cannot, in any case, use the recourse of amparo on the grounds of violation of the right to request and obtain timely response, to achieve other objectives, such as those intended, when the request which has been filed is outside the scope of powers and authority of the agency to which the petition was made.”