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Chavez raises ire of Washington
By Neville Spencer

Over the last decade, neoliberal regimes compliant to the needs of Washington have been established in almost all the countries of Latin America with exception of Cuba. However, the election of left-populist Hugo Chavez in Venezuela, while not creating another Cuba, has created an independent, anti-imperialist regime which already has Washington thinking up schemes to bring about its downfall.

Chavez first became known to the world when, as an army lieutenant colonel, he led an unsuccessful coup against the government of President Carlos Andres Perez in 1992. After serving a jail term, he won a landslide victory in elections in December 1998 and again in July 2000 in elections he called after a radically revamped constitution was voted into force.

In both his coup attempt and his election campaign he opposed the government's neoliberal agenda and its submission to the needs of imperialist governments and corporations. The new constitution which he sponsored includes measures which cut the working week from 48 to 44 hours, provides guarantees for indigenous rights and women's rights, free health care and education to university level, and increases the minimum wage. One article forbids investors from seeking international arbitration in disputes with Venezuela, presumably through institutions such as the World Trade Organisation.

Chavez and Castro
Among the numerous actions which have disturbed Washington, it is probably Chavez's development of a close political and personal relationship with Cuban president Fidel Castro that has caused the most alarm.

Chavez has frequently held up Cuba as a model and his inclusion of free health care and education in the constitution illustrates his desire to follow the Cuban model, even though he hasn't indicated that he will do any more than reform rather than abolish Venezuelan capitalism.

Castro and Chavez have exchanged several visits, always displaying a relationship that goes beyond diplomatic formalities. During Castro's October visit to Venezuela they both participated in a baseball match between their national teams and jointly hosted Chavez's weekly talkback radio program. They ended the program by singing a duet of the popular ballad “Venezuela”.

Castro also backed Chavez's call to form an “axis of power”, using Venezuela's oil wealth to help form a bloc against the power of the wealthier nations. Venezuela is one of the world's largest oil producers and the US's largest supplier. “This country is in the best of conditions to fight for the unity of Latin America ... so that the giant from the north does not swallow us one by one,” he said.

The visit also produced some very significant concrete solidarity. A deal was signed with Cuba worth over US$500 million per year at current prices which would provide 53,000 barrels of oil per day with favourable financing conditions. Preventing Cuba obtaining significant quantities of oil has been one of the most economically damaging aspects of the US blockade of Cuba. The deal will punch a significant hole in the blockade.

Part of the arrangement will be by barter, in which Cuba will use its skilled human resources to provide medical treatment to Venezuelans, supplying doctors, medical equipment and help in producing medicines. It will also provide expertise in agriculture, tourism, sport, computer technology and scientific research.

Third World solidarity
Another issue in which Chavez takes something of a lead from Castro is his championing of Third World solidarity against imperialism. Castro has often been a lone voice among heads of state in his strident condemnations of the global economic system and the exploitation of Third World countries by imperialist countries and corporations. While he has had support from other heads of state, they have usually been too timid and their interests too compromised to genuinely oppose the international economic order and its institutions like the IMF and World Bank.

Chavez is now taking some of the running on these issues. Through the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), of which Venezuela is an important member, he has encouraged cut backs in oil production which have raised the price of oil from a low approaching the US$10 per barrel mark when he took the presidency to over US$30 per barrel. He has encouraged the, generally Third World, oil producing countries to face down cries from the oil consuming First World countries that their actions threaten to bring on an economic crisis.

In his 10-day tour of OPEC countries in August, he created international headlines by pointedly including Iraq and Libya on his itinerary. On his stop in Jakarta, two days after visiting Iraq, he denounced the economic sanctions against Iraq which have killed hundreds of thousands of children. “Who has the right to make an innocent child die there?” he asked.

He also encouraged Indonesian president Abdurrahman Wahid to back his stance. Wahid stated his intention to visit Iraq himself and said: “I share President Chavez's sentiments about the Iraqi people ... for this reason, Indonesia would wish for the blockade of Iraq to be lifted.”

Also in keeping with his stance on Third World solidarity, Chavez has been a champion of Latin American unity and in October signed an oil deal giving favourable terms to other Third World countries in the region.

Venezuela and the region
The US is very concerned about the role that Chavez will play in regional politics. Venezuela borders Colombia, where the US is sponsoring, with US$1.3 billion, a counterinsurgency operation against Colombia's strong leftist guerrilla movements. Although he has tried to remain diplomatically correct on the issue, he has been accused by US and Colombian officials of being supportive of the guerrillas.

When the US drafted plans to set up a military base on the Caribbean island of Aruba from which it could launch surveillance flights over Colombia, the plan was scuttled by Chavez's refusal to allow the US to use Venezuelan airspace.

More recently, in November, a diplomatic spat emerged between Colombia and Venezuela after Olga Marin, a leader of the Colombia's largest guerrilla army, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia-People's Army (FARC-EP), spoke at a Latin American parliamentary conference hosted by the Venezuelan Congress. Both countries temporarily withdrew their ambassadors.

It is reasonable to speculate that the recent emergence of left-nationalist currents within Latin American military forces may owe something to the influence of Chavez. The most significant example was in Ecuador in January 2000, where the military backed indigenous demonstrations to oust the government and form a short-lived junta which included the leader of the indigenous movement. A smaller, leftist military rebellion also occurred in Peru in October less than three weeks before the downfall of President Fujimori.

Elements in the US are trying to play up Chavez's role as a conspirator in regional destabilisation, in order to justify moves against his government. An article in the Miami Herald on December 5 claimed that the Bolivian and Ecuadoran governments had privately complained to Chavez about his support for opposition movements in their countries.

The article quoted Peter Romero, US under-secretary of state for inter-American affairs: “There are indications of Chavez government support for violent indigenous movements in Bolivia <@133> In the case of Ecuador, it included support for rebellious army officers.” It said that Bolivia had complained about a meeting Chavez had with a leader of the Only Union Confederation of Bolivian Campesino Workers (CSUTCB) a month before it led some of the most serious nationwide protests Bolivia has seen. It also said that he had given US$500,000 to Colonel Lucio Gutierrez after his role in leading the Ecuadoran coup.

Chavez responded by denying the claims in the article, labeling the Miami Herald a part of the “Cuban-American mafia”.

Roger Noriega, a senior staffer at the US Senate foreign relations committee has said that the new Bush administration should make “a cold-blooded assessment of where Chavez is headed”. He suggested “It will have to take measures, such as buying oil elsewhere, to prevent any US oil crunch if Chavez decides to act irresponsibly.”

Foreign investment is already harder to come by for Venezuela as it is not considered investor-friendly anymore. The tactic of trying to destroy the Venezuelan economy by not buying its oil and discouraging investment would probably be the lowest political risk schema for getting rid of Chavez out of the range of options which have undoubtedly already been drawn up.

However, it is also well-known that sections of the military dislike Chavez and are agitating for a coup. This could provide Washington with the option it has traditionally exercised when faced with Latin American governments that it finds politically distasteful.