Hugo Chavez's Opponent Plans Major Caracas Rally, Opposition Strength May be Growing (Translation)

El Universal ( Caracas ) ^ | October 2, 2006 | Pedro Pablo Peñaloza ( translated by self )

[StJacques]

Rosales will lead "Caracas Avalanche" Saturday

Pedro Pablo Peñaloza
El Universal (Caracas)

The director of the First Justice Party, Liliana Hernandez, member of the campaign command of Manuel Rosales, summoned the followers of the opposition candidate to concentrate themselves next Saturday in Libertador Avenue [in Caracas].

Hernandez specified that the act of support for the Governor of the State of Zulia¹ will be named the "Caracas Avalanche" and it is scheduled to begin at 10:00 in the morning.

"The idea is that, besides demonstrating in favor of the victory of the National Unity candidate [i.e. Rosales], we are calling people to support the proposal of fighting against the lack of [public] safety pointed out by Rosales," Hernandez insisted.

The campaign command strategy of the leader of the New Time Party (UNTC),² is attempting to mobilize the population stressing the electoral offer of impelling the defense of life over violence.³

Moreover, the adversaries of President Hugo Chavez are attempting to arouse the enthusiasm of the capital's inhabitants underlining the virtues of the social plan expounded by the Zulian Chief Executive and the initiative of the Mi Negra debit card.⁴

During the week, Rosales's team will determine the gathering points for sympathizers who will be mustering on Libertador Avenue. Even though they did not offer major details, it is hoped that they will set three or four meeting sites near the metro [transit] stations.

About the quantity of people who will aspire to congregate in Caracas, Hernandez pointed out: "The excitement we have had in the interior [of the country] motivates us. In Tachira I gave an estimate and I was short, here it will be the same."

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Translator's Notes:

¹ Manuel Rosales is currently Governor of the Venezuelan state of Zulia, located in the northwestern portion of the country, fronting the border with Colombia.

² The UNTC is the acronym for Rosales's Un Nuevo Tiempo Contigo Party, whose name literally translates to "A New Time With You." The party is generally referred to as either the "New Time Party" or even the "New Day Party" in the English-speaking press. The UNTC has managed to bring together numerous opposition parties, many of them splinter groups, into a unified opposition to Hugo Chavez as Venezuela approaches the December 3rd elections.

³ Rosales is making a major issue of violent crime in the campaign. See this earlier thread for his law and order platform.

⁴ Sadly; we cannot describe Manuel Rosales as either a social or economic conservative in terms which we here at Free Republic would recognize. The Mi Negra (my little black card) debit card proposal is the key part of his campaign platform, which represents a multi-pronged attack against Chavez; primarily for his twin failures to deliver the actual support he has promised to Venezuela's poor and his squandering of the country's oil wealth in various ways, including corruption at home and assistance given to leftist regimes and political movements abroad, the ideological basis of which Rosales decried in very strong terms today. Rosales proposes that a substantial portion of revenues from Venezuela's national oil production be administered by a national "Petroleum Fund of the Venezuelans," from which Venezuela's poorest citizens could receive a monthly stipend to cover their most basic necessities. The Venezuelan state would not be empowered to redirect the fund's appropriations. In defense of Rosales however; it should be pointed out that Chavez has already implemented massive and wasteful social spending over the past seven years and Rosales's plan is meant to streamline certain portions of that while providing guarantees that Venezuelans actually will benefit from oil revenues, in addition to removing the power of the Venezuelan state to direct entitlements on the basis of political favoritism. And of course, Chavez's financial support of leftists and even Islamic radicals would come to an end too. If you can read Spanish, you can learn more about this plan here.

[StJacques]

Beyond the dramatic surge of Rosales in recent public opinion polls, see this thread (especially the comments) for more, there is evidence surfacing that Rosales is beginning to attract large crowds in his campaign appearances. In a just-concluded campaign swing through the interior of the country, the crowds greeting Rosales were large enough for the El Universal newspaper in Caracas to report the statement of a Rosales campaign leader that the turnout was "truly torrential."

This is the current framework within which we are looking at the major event Rosales has scheduled to be held in Caracas, which is Hugo Chavez's center of support, this weekend. By using the term "Caracas Avalanche," the Rosales campaign is taking the risk of not performing up to expectations. But it may be that Rosales is attempting to schedule an event whose turnout cannot be kept from the news media. In his recent campaign swing in the interior, Chavez supporters violently attacked television reporters and either damaged or destroyed their video cameras, thus preventing full circulation of the visual images of the crowds meeting Rosales as he worked his way through some of the poorer sections of an interior city.

We will have to wait and see whether Rosales is able to show some political muscle on Chavez's home turf. If he succeeds this Saturday, it could potentially change the entire dynamic of the campaign.

[StJacques]

A Latin American Left Watch ping for you all.

Anyone wishing to be included on the ping list may either ping me from this thread or contact me via Freepmail.

[Kitten Festival]

Rosales is saying Chavez will turn Vz communist. Apparently, a lot of locals in Caracas seem to agree with him, the more he says it, the bigger the crowds grow.

[StJacques]

May I request that you edit the title of this thread? I changed it from its original title when the validation routine informed me that it was too long and I did not proofread it very well.

I would like to request the following change:

"Hugo Chavez's Opponent Plans Major Caracas Rally, Opposition Strength Growing? (Translation)

I left out the word "Rally" from the title.

Thank you.

[restornu]

Chavez - Norvegian TV Report
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6040762455054819326&q=mohammed&hl=en

[StJacques]

Thank you very much for the edit.

[Arizona Carolyn]

I worry for this man's future health.

However, any ground Chavez loses, Jimmy Carter will show up to validate the election and certify Chavez the winner. Remember one group of electronic voting machines used in our country are made in Venezuela and have no paper trail and can be programed anyway deemed necessary...

[johnthebaptistmoore]

I worry for the health of anyone and everyone that's anti-Chavez, and I'm not sure if it's really very smart to have these rallies with large numbers of people anywhere! This is extremely risky to do this.

[bill1952]

>I worry for this man's future health.

Right. There will large and violent protests enginerred against him.

[conservative in nyc]

Thanks for the ping. A little background:

Rosales claims to be ahead in the polls in his home state of Zulia, Venezuela's most populous state. Zulia is in the heart of Venezuelan oil country. The oil workers don't much like Chavez or his anti-PDVSA (Venezuelan state oil company) policies.

[StJacques]

"Rosales claims to be ahead in the polls in his home state of Zulia, Venezuela's most populous state. . . ."

And I am solidly convinced this is true. Zulia is the one Venezuelan state in which neither the state legislature nor the Governor's chair is held by Chavistas.

We actually could have something to get excited about in the near future. Saturday could change a lot of things in Venezuela.

Of course, if Arizona Carolyn is right, the big change may be that Chavez decides to take Rosales out.

[conservative in nyc]

According to Wikipedia, Zulia has a weird political system where if the governor is from one party, the other party controls municipal government, which leads to competition to do things better (or sometimes spend more on pork barrel projects). People are moving to its largest city, Maracaibo, even from Caracas.

I'd expect a fairly large turnout in Caracas for Rosales - he claims to be leading in some outlying areas of Greater Caracas.

[StJacques]

"I'd expect a fairly large turnout in Caracas for Rosales - he claims to be leading in some outlying areas of Greater Caracas."

Oh how I hope you are right conservative. I am going to make a point of watching Univision's Ultima Hora news Saturday evening. They have been paying a lot of attention to Rosales lately and if he gets a good turnout, it'll be front and center.

One way or another, I'll let the board know.

[BobS]

"...the Venezuelan state of Zulia, located in the northwestern portion of the country,...

Is that area sort of like Nordeste Brasil, which is very conservative? The folks from there start businesses here.

I heard Miss Venezuela is very cute. How about a picture?

[mjolnir]

Hey, off topic a bit, but what do you think the chances of Lula losing to Alckmin are given the corruption scandal in Brazil?

Can this Daniela Cicarelli making-love-in-the-sea video phenomenon actually affect the election by distracting Brazilians from the scandal? My impression is that it has, superceding it as "the big story".

My impression is that Alckmin would be much more forceful in fighting the Chavez aims for South America, but maybe Lula has learned that the United States really is a better friend than Chavez.

Back to the topic, thanks again for translating and posting! Rosales may not be a conservative, but he's plainly light years upon light years better than the alternative... although I wonder how much he feels like he has to cast what conservative aspects of his program it does possess in populist, even leftist terms in order to sell them to the populace.

[BobS]

Miss Venezuela.

Tell her to get you a beer during a football game. You might learn what a frying pan is:)

[HardStarboard]

We gotta find a way to do away with Mr. Chavez without doing away with him, if you catch my drift.

I hope Mr. Rosales is getting a bit of "active" encouragement from Michael Hayden and his boys.

[The South Texan]

If Chavez were to lose the election, he'd probably get Jimmy Carter to fly down to Caracas and have him certify the election as a fraud so he could retain power. How far from the truth is that possiblity?

[MadIvan]

The latest estimate from the Economist suggests 30% of Venezeulans are living below the poverty line. This is not improving, meanwhile, Chavez is giving out handouts for political reasons and not actually helping his people.

Yes, I'd say he's dancing with death.

Regards, Ivan

[PJ-Comix]

Hugo Chavez---The South American proponent of Narcissism-Leninism.