Posted on 01/09/2002 12:25:43 PM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) - A leading Venezuelan newspaper whose offices were besieged by militant supporters of President Hugo Chavez called the president a dictator on Tuesday and accused him of inciting mob violence against opponents.
In a scathing editorial entitled ``Dictator Without a Mask,'' the daily El Nacional blamed Chavez for a noisy demonstration staged on Monday night outside its Caracas offices by about 100 followers of the president yelling chants and banging pots.
El Nacional said Chavez was employing the same strong-arm tactics of ``political blackmail ... corruption and open use of violence'' that he had criticized in previous governments.
``What a poor and tragic destiny awaits us if we don't stop this apprentice dictator in time,'' the newspaper said.
Cilia Flores, a close Chavez ally and leader of the MVR parliamentary group, denied the president was responsible for the protest. She described the demonstrators as ``some ladies who went with their pots and pans to protest against false, manipulated information published by the newspaper.''
However, Defense Minister Jose Vicente Rangel, a former leftist journalist and moderate government spokesman, said the incident was ``negative from every point of view,'' and expressed ''the government's desire to respect the media and journalists.''
The United States, which has had a series of widely publicized disagreements with Chavez, was critical of the protests, with State Department spokesman Richard Boucher saying Washington was ``concerned about the attempts by Chavez supporters to intimidate both opposition politicians and the press.''
``Democratic opposition and the free press are essential to the healthy functioning of the democratic process. We urge all Venezuelans to foster the democratic process through a constructive, peaceful engagement and to refrain from statements and actions that create an environment conducive to intimidation,'' he told a daily briefing.
Boucher said U.S. Ambassador Donna Hrinak would visit the offices of El Nacional to express U.S. support for a free press in Venezuela.
The protest on Monday came a day after the outspoken, left-leaning Chavez accused the national newspaper of misrepresenting his self-proclaimed ``revolution for the poor'' in the oil-rich South American country.
RIOT POLICE DEPLOYED
Beating pots and waving placards with slogans such as ``El Nacional Lies,'' the angry demonstrators prevented the newspaper's workers from leaving their offices for several hours. Riot police were deployed to protect the building.
EL Nacional said Chavez was turning to increasingly authoritarian methods to silence critics, shore up his government and force through disputed reform policies at a time when opinion polls showed his popularity plummeting.
``President Chavez has removed the democrat's mask and is now showing us his true authoritarian face,'' it said.
``This is real fascism,'' Miguel Angel Moyetones, an opposition Social Democrat who heads the Media Commission of Venezuela's National Assembly, told local radio on Tuesday.
Opponents of the firebrand paratrooper-turned-president accuse him and his aides of deliberately organizing groups of militant followers to openly harass and intimidate critics.
The protest against El Nacional followed scuffles outside the National Assembly on Saturday in which opposition deputies, dissident members of Chavez' ruling Fifth Republic Movement (MVR) and journalists were attacked by government supporters.
Sergio Dahbar, assistant editor at El Nacional, said one employee was hit on the head by stones.
``This is a government which doesn't like being told the truth,'' Dahbar said. He said he believed the protest against El Nacional was motivated by its reports indicating Chavez' popularity among Venezuelans was at an all-time low.
The tough-talking populist president, who won a landslide election in 1998 with promises to eliminate poverty, corruption and unemployment, has been waging a bitter war of words with Venezuela's largely opposition-dominated media.
International press watchdog groups have censured the president for his verbal attacks against media critics. They say his diatribes are a threat to freedom of expression.
On Tuesday, Venezuela's National College of Journalists lambasted the government's behavior in a statement, saying: ''This type of attitude has only been displayed by Nazi regimes, fascists and dictatorships where fundamentalist groups have tried to silence the informative task of the media.''
Government officials hotly reject these charges, arguing there is more press freedom now than under previous governments and that no journalists or political opponents have been jailed for their activities during Chavez' three-year rule.
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