Apparently, a special committee of the Venezuelan National Assembly was working diligently behind closed doors over Columbus Day weekend to sneak in an additional article* to the list of proposed amendments:Article 337
The President of the Republic, at a meeting of the Cabinet of Ministers, shall have the power to decree states of exception. Expressly defined as such are circumstances of a social, economic, political, natural or ecological nature which seriously affect the security of the Nation, institutions and citizens, in the face of which the powers available to cope with such events are insufficient. In such case, the guarantees contained in this Constitution may be temporarily restricted, with the exception of those relating to the right to life, prohibition of incommunicative detention or torture, the right to due process, the right to information and other intangible human rights.**
The proposed change conveniently removes the highlighted part of Article 337, preparing the ground for things to come...
* Actually, they sneaked in 25 additional articles
** Translation taken from the web site of the Ministerio del Poder Popular para la Ciencia y Tecnología
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