Posted on 04/14/2002 4:01:40 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
LINKS to Hugo Chavez's "government" June 2001 - March 2002
I'm keeping track of Hugoland formally known as Venezuela. Please LINK any stories or add what you wish to this thread. The above LINK takes you to past articles posted before the new FR format. Below I'll add what I've catalogued since that LINK no longer could take posts.
(March 1, 2002)-- Venezuela's strongman faces widespread calls to step down
By Phil Gunson | Special to The Christian Science Monitor
[Full Text] CARACAS, VENEZUELA - The man who won Venezuelan hearts three years ago as a strongman who could deliver a better life to the masses is now facing them in the streets.
More than 20,000 people turned out this week calling for the resignation of President Hugo Chávez, while some 2,000 supporters marched in a rival demonstration of support. The demonstrations come after months of building discontent with a president who has managed to alienate the labor class, the media, business groups, the church, political parties, and the military.
Four military leaders have publicly called for his resignation.
In November, Chávez introduced 49 "revolutionary" decrees. The package of laws - affecting everything from land rights and fisheries to the oil industry - unified virtually the whole of organized society in a nationwide business and labor stoppage that paralyzed the country on Dec. 10.
The protests this week have a note of irony, because they started out as a commemoration called by President Chávez. In his eyes, Feb. 27 is a milestone of his so-called revolution - "the date on which the people awoke" in 1989. That is when thousands of rioters and looters took to the streets in protest of an IMF-backed austerity plan, in which the government hiked gas prices.
In what became known as the caracazo, or noisy protest, thousands of rioters and looters were met by Venezuelan military forces, and hundreds were killed. Three years later, Chávez and his military co-conspirators failed in an attempt to overthrow the government responsible for the massacre, that of President Carlos Andres Perez. Chávez was jailed for two years.
"But the elements that brought about the caracazo are still present in Venezuela," says lawyer Liliana Ortega, who for 13 years has led the fight for justice on behalf of the victims' relatives. "Poverty, corruption, impunity ... some of them are perhaps even more deeply ingrained than before."
Chávez's supporters consist of an inchoate mass of street traders, the unemployed, and those whom the old system had marginalized. This, to Chávez, is el pueblo - the people.
"But we are 'the people' too," protests teacher Luis Leonet. "We're not oligarchs like he says. The oligarchs are people like Chávez, people with power."
On Wednesday, Leonet joined a march led by the main labor confederation, the CTV, to protest what unions say is a series of antilabor measures, including one of the 49 decrees dealing with public-sector workers.
Chávez won't talk to the CTV, whose leaders, he says, are corrupt and illegitimate. So he refuses to negotiate the annual renewal of collective contracts with the confederation, holding up deals on pay and conditions for hundreds of thousands of union members like Leonet.
Across town on Wednesday, a progovernment march sought to demonstrate that the president's popularity was as high as ever.
"For the popular classes, Chávez is an idol," says marcher Pedro Gutierrez.
Pollster Luis Vicente Leon, of the Datanalisis organization, warns that marches are no measure of relative popularity. "There is a lot of discontent among ... the really poor," Leon says, adding that so far the protests are mainly among the middle class.
But the middle class can be a dangerous enemy. It includes the bulk of the armed forces, and the management of the state oil company, PDVSA.
This month, four uniformed officers, ranging from a National Guard captain to a rear-admiral and an Air Force general, called on the president to resign, while repudiating the idea of a military coup of Chávez, himself a former Army lieutenant-colonel.
But senior "institutionalist" officers "are under severe pressure from lower ranks frustrated at the lack of impact" that these acts have had, a source close to military dissidents says. In other words, a coup cannot be ruled out, although the United States publicly denounces the idea.
Meanwhile, the president's imposition of a new board of directors on PDVSA this week sparked a virtual uprising by the company's senior management. In an unprecedented public statement, managers said the government was pushing the company "to the verge of operational and financial collapse" by imposing political, rather than commercial, criteria.
The political opposition remains relatively weak and divided. But in the view of many analysts, a president who offends both the military and the oil industry is asking for trouble. In the bars and restaurants of Caracas, the debate is no longer over whether Chávez will finish his term, which has nearly five years to run. It is when and how he will go - and what comes next. [End]
According to the report, the Venezuelan embassy in Washington was notified on Friday that Livia Acosta Noguera, the consul general in Miami, had been declared persona non grata and had until Tuesday to leave the country..."
.....[Hugo] "Chávez supporters have also demanded to know the source of [Henrique] Capriles' campaign financing, implying pro-US interests have been backing him. The Democratic Unity candidate has responded that his books are open for all to see.
Adding to the charged atmosphere, the Venezuela's supreme court on Tuesday ordered the opposition on Tuesday not to burn voter registration books from Sunday's vote – a measure the coalition had promised to counter fears there could be retribution.
The government for years discriminated against Venezuelans whose names were on a list of people who requested a recall referendum on Chávez's rule, blocking them from jobs, state loans and in some cases even entrance to government buildings.
Opposition leaders said the court's order was issued too late and the lists of voters' names had already been burned.
Capriles has criticised one-sided coverage by state media, accusing it of routinely ignoring protests about crime and water shortages while extensively reporting "every time a mango falls on a roof" in the state of Miranda where he is governor.
Analysts say the finally united opposition – which in the past has been crippled by in-fighting and failed to dislodge Chávez via mass street protests or a string of votes – has its best chance in 13 years of unseating him in October.
But the president still appears to have the edge, thanks to high popularity among the poor, a formidable party machine and an extraordinary pre-election spending spree on welfare projects like allowances for single mothers and pensioners.".........
Consider the ongoing efforts to smear Henrique Capriles, the man who will represent the Coalition for Democratic Unity (MUD) in Venezuela’s October 2012 presidential election. Capriles, the governor of Miranda state, is a practicing Catholic, but his grandparents were European Jews who escaped Nazism, and his great grandparents were murdered at Treblinka. Immediately after he won the MUD primary vote on February 12, the pro-Chávez state-run media began attacking him with a fusillade of anti-Semitic propaganda.
[snip]
Here’s a brief list of incidents and remarks that have fostered such an “uncomfortable feeling”:
* In a speech delivered on Christmas Eve 2005, Chávez said that “the descendants of those who crucified Christ” were among the minority groups who had “seized the world’s riches.”
* In December 2007, state police raided the most important Jewish social club in Caracas (La Hebraica). Not coincidentally, they conducted this raid on the same day that Venezuelans were voting in a national referendum on presidential term limits. (“Masked and armed police piled over the walls as elementary-school children arrived for class,” writes Fishbane.)
* Roughly a year later, Chávez described Israel’s war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip (Operation Cast Lead) as a “genocidal holocaust against the Palestinian people,” and he made a big show of expelling the Israeli ambassador, Shlomo Cohen, one of the most able Israeli diplomats in Latin America.
* A few weeks after Cohen’s expulsion, armed intruders robbed and vandalized the Mariperez synagogue in Caracas, leaving behind a number anti-Semitic graffiti messages, including “Jews out of here.”
* In June 2010, after Israeli troops forcibly boarded a Turkish flotilla headed for Gaza, Chávez blasted “the terrorist and criminal nature of Israel’s government.” Speaking on Venezuelan television, he unleashed a ferocious rhetorical assault, which is quoted by Fishbane: “I take this opportunity to condemn once again, from the depth of my soul and from my guts, the state of Israel. Damn the state of Israel! Maldito sea! Terrorists and assassins!”
* That same month, Chávez met with Syrian dictator Bashar Assad in Venezuela and once again described the Israeli government as “genocidal.”
The mass emigration of Jews from Venezuela is tragically similar to what happened in the Caribbean half a century ago. According to Cuba expert Irving Louis Horowitz, a remarkable 90 percent of Cuban Jews fled the island shortly after Castro took power. For decades to come, Havana would faithfully parrot the steady stream of anti-Semitic propaganda emanating from Moscow. As Horowitz explains, “The Soviets provided Cuba with the model of attacking human rights activities and organizations as a necessary extension of the Jewish Zionist conspiracy.” For that matter, Castro hosted the 1966 Tricontinental Conference, which arguably launched the modern era of international terrorism, and he spent many years aiding Yasser Arafat’s PLO.
The anti-Semitism of the Bolivarian Revolution has been inspired not only by Castro, but also by Iran, which now enjoys a robust alliance with Venezuela. It is much more serious than Chávez’s ordinary propaganda. Indeed, back in February 2010, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights published a report warning that government anti-Semitism “constitutes a threat to the life and physical integrity of the Jewish community in Venezuela.” That threat deserves greater attention from the United States. As Capriles grows more and more popular, it’s only going to get worse."
Until now, anyone with a gun permit could buy arms from a private company.
Under the new law, only the army, police and certain groups like security companies will be able to buy arms from the state-owned weapons manufacturer and importer.
The ban is the latest attempt by the government to improve security and cut crime ahead of elections in October.
...Besides the health of President Chavez, security is the main concern for voters ahead of presidential elections in October.
.....Hugo Chavez's government says the ultimate aim is to disarm all civilians, but his opponents say the police and government may not have the capacity or the will to enforce the new law.........
"We are a free and independent country," Chavez said.
Army Gen. Julio Cesar Morales Prieto, president of Venezuela's state-run arms producer, said 3,000 AK-103 assault rifles have been assembled since Venezuela and Russia signed the 2005 agreement for the construction of a Kalashnikov assembly factory.
The factory has begun production, but construction of the facility has not yet been completed, Morales Prieto said.
The factory eventually will have the capacity to produce 25,000 rifles annually.
Chavez, a former paratroop commander, said that Venezuela has also started making grenades, ammunition and surveillance drones for its military. Three drones have been built so far, he said.
"We do not have any intentions of attacking anybody," he said. "These projects are for defence, for peace.".......
The former presidential candidate said she had obtained a copy of the plan, printed by an institution affiliated with the national army.
"The strategic objective is to build a new Bolivarian military doctrine" that would prepare Venezuela to be successful in a prolonged popular war against "the empire," or the United States, Machado said, citing the document.
"This is clearly a proposal with Cuban inspiration and advice."
She said the military plan also provides for strengthening the guerrilla force at the expense of the regular army.
The plan calls for "strengthening the territorial militias, in order to ensure the necessary strength for the overall defense of the nation, targeting recruitment levels of one million by 2013 and two million by 2019," Machado said, citing the document.
Venezuela's militia corps, described by firebrand leftist President Hugo Chavez as "an army of the public," was created in 2005 to protect the country against possible "imperialist" aggression. They are considered a part of the military but report directly to the president."....
The governor of the state of Carabobo,Henrique Salas Feo, said that a great part of the problems of scarcity and cost of living increases in Venezuela could be attributed to the corruption of people close to its government and Cuba’s inefficiency managing the facilities at Puerto Cabello.
“Puerto Cabello is the entry gate to Venezuela;it handles 80percent of everything that enters or leaves the country, but since the Cubans took over, things are getting worse by the day, which is affecting Venezuelans’ daily life,” Salas said in a telephone interview with El Nuevo Herald.
“The economic reality of all Venezuelans depends on the good management of the port,but imported goods are incurring in enormous delays that create scarcity and increase costs that end up transferred to the consumer,”..
According to the governor’s estimates, poor port management and corruption are provoking a 30-day delay in containers entering the country,which contrasts with the 72hours it took before Cubans took control.
The port terminal is of particular importance due to the severe deterioration of the Venezuelan productivity as a result of government policies, which has increased the dependence on imports, he said.
The situation created by expropriations, the strict currency exchange control and the system that controls pricing is leading Venezuela to go abroad to acquire basic consumer products.
The Chávez administration has also granted concessions to Cuban enterprises to acquire products abroad, a situation that lends itself to corruption.
“[The Cubans] control everything that comes in and goes out......
....“They are bleeding the country dry,”.....
It was one of the populist leader’s infamous “chain broadcasts”, in which all regular programming on public access television and radio is suspended so that he can trumpet the achievements of his “Bolivarian revolution”, often for hours on end.
...Mr Chávez has been in power for more than 13 years and the opposition sees this year’s poll – due to take place on October 7 – as its best chance yet of ousting one of Latin America’s most controversial leaders. Henrique Capriles, the pro-business opposition leader, is Mr Chávez’s main rival. Now allegations of government electoral abuses have raised fears about how far will Mr Chávez go to ensure his victory.
......A major opposition gripe is Mr Chávez’s almost unlimited access to state oil revenues – Venezuela has the largest oil reserves in the world – that allows him to “buy” votes by investing heavily in his popular social programmes. Central government spending grew by 41.1 per cent in real terms last month. By contrast, Mr Capriles must raise campaign funds privately.
....Adding to the tension are opposition allegations that people fear they will lose their jobs if they fail to vote for Mr Chávez. Many Venezuelans fear their vote will not be secret. The names of signatories of a petition for a 2004 referendum that attempted to unseat Mr Chávez were made public. The signatories were later blacklisted by government ministries.....
The socialist autocrat dominates the airwaves and is tapping the state's deep oil coffers to fund his campaign and "buy" votes with a calculated explosion of investment in populist social programme in the weeks before the vote.
But despite its energy riches, the country is mired in debt and unemployment as state-imposed price and exchange rate controls shackle the economy. And violent crime is so endemic that Caracas has the unenviable ranking of the murder capital of the world.
Now, with the long-divided opposition united for the first time behind a charismatic state governor who is already a veteran of Venezuela's rough-and-tumble politics despite his youthful years, President Chavez is facing his most serious competition at the ballot box since he came to power in 1998.
At stake is the grip on power of an anti-Western firebrand who embraces Iran and China and is seeking to use the nation's oil wealth to export his dream of a socialist revolution across Latin America.
It is a "David and Goliath" battle, Mr Capriles told The Sunday Telegraph during a wide-ranging interview in which he pledged a number of radical breaks from the policies of the former paratrooper officer know by his fervent supporters as "El Comandante".
On his first day in office, he said, he would halt the "gifts" of free or heavily-subsidised oil to Mr Chavez's left-wing ideological allies in Cuba and Nicaragua. Nor would there be any more discount deals to sympathetic Western leaders such as Ken Livingstone, a Chavez admirer who as London mayor negotiated cheap oil from Caracas for the capital's buses.....
Chavez was “re-elected.”
CARACAS, Venezuela — Hugo Chavez’s fervent followers still assemble in the capital’s main public square, decked in the bright red of their leader’s movement, to chant revolutionary songs that envisage the president leading the country far into the future.
But Chavez, who has dominated public life here since the late 1990s, is nowhere to be seen. He no longer gives his trademark bombastic speeches, nor does he hold forth on television like a game-show host. On Sunday, he remained in Cuba, where he has been for nearly a month, presumably convalescing after undergoing surgery to remove what he called “some malignant cells” in his pelvic region, from which doctors have struggled to extricate a cancerous tumor.
To Venezuelans, it is becoming clear that Chavez may well not return by Thursday, a key day in the political calendar. The 58-year-old former paratrooper is supposed to be inaugurated that day for a fourth term that would extend his presidency until 2019.
Opposition leaders say that would leave a power vacuum that by law should shift authority to an interim leader of the leftist government and trigger fresh elections, a scenario that could end the socialist government that has transformed one of the world’s great oil powers. That is unlikely to happen, however, with the president’s top aides sending strong signals over the weekend that they were scrambling to postpone the inauguration.
“I am clear that the president may not be able to take the oath in five days because of his condition, but what’s the problem?” said Javier Ramirez, 54, who works on ideological training in Chavez’s Socialist party and joined the crowds over the weekend at Bolivar Plaza. “If El Comandante cannot be here, we will be the commander. We will be Chavez.”...........
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2975635/posts
CARACAS, Venezuela — As perishable foodstuffs rotted on cargo ships that had waited three weeks to unload at Venezuela’s largest port, unsettled consumers this week found shelves at Caracas’ main downtown market devoid of rice, cooking oil, sugar and other items.
Widespread scarcities and chaos at the nation’s main ports, including Puerto Cabello, are just some of the problems Vice President Nicolas Maduro will face as he takes the reins of power in the absence of President Hugo Chavez..........
....Alejandro Grisanti, head of Latin America research at Barclays in New York, said sharp spending cuts were necessary after an “unsustainable” 2012 budget deficit inflated by Chavez’s election year giveaways, including apartments and appliances, that helped him to a resounding reelection victory in October......
Maduro may also have to reconsider Chavez’s imposition of price controls, which won the socialist regime the support of poor voters by artificially depressing the prices of basic food items — if consumers can find them.
Price controls have also caused the shriveling of Venezuela’s domestic industries because local producers can’t afford to sell goods at the mandated low prices, according to Ismael Perez, director of the Conindustria, the nation’s leading business association of manufacturers.
Venezuela’s manufacturing sector has lost 150,000 jobs over the last decade, and the country must now import products such as sugar, rice, coffee, milk and beef, all of which Venezuela was self-sufficient in before Chavez took power.
With domestic production shrinking, the country has had to step up imports just to feed its population. ......
......In Chavez’s absence, the government continues to blame manufacturers for the shortages. Just this week, it seized products and facilities owned by PepsiCo Inc. and food conglomerate Polar, accusing the latter of hoarding........
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2977345/posts
“BOGOTA, Colombia — Annual inflation in Venezuela hit 49.4 percent in September, up from 18 percent a year ago, and basic goods became harder to find, the Central Bank reported Thursday.
The soaring consumer price index gives Venezuela the highest inflation in the hemisphere.
In September alone, inflation spiked 4.4 percent, driven by agricultural goods, transportation, education expenses and a 19.3 percent hike in electricity prices, the government said.
The new figures are ammunition for an opposition that is trying to turn December’s municipal election into a referendum on the six-month administration of President Nicolás Maduro. Inflation is a pocketbook issue as it saps consumers’ purchasing power.
The Central Bank also reported that the “scarcity index,” which measures the availability of basic goods, hit 21.2 percent in September versus 13.6 percent a year ago. The bank said that excluding auto parts, corn oil and sunflower oil, the scarcity index would be at 15.3 percent.
Maduro has blamed rising prices and chronic shortages on hoarding, speculation and an “economic war” waged by his rivals. The government raised minimum wage 20 percent in May and 10 percent in September. Wages are going up an additional 10 percent next month. But earlier this week, Maduro asked parliament for the right to rule by decree for 12 months to fight the economic battle and squash corruption. The National Assembly is expected to vote on the measure in coming weeks.....”
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3078312/posts?page=1
From “The Hill”:
US condemns ‘senseless violence’ in Venezuela
“Secretary of State John Kerry is joining officials from the United Nations, Organization of American States and European Union in condemning “senseless violence” in Venezuela.
“The United States is deeply concerned by rising tensions and violence surrounding this week’s protests in Venezuela,” Kerry said in a statement. “Our condolences go to the families of those killed as a result of this tragic violence.”
“We are particularly alarmed by reports that the Venezuelan government has arrested or detained scores of anti-government protestors and issued an arrest warrant for opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez. These actions have a chilling effect on citizens’ rights to express their grievances peacefully,” he added.
Kerry’s comments came as demonstrators and riot police faced off on Saturday in a fourth day of protests against President Nicolas Maduro.
“I’m not going to give up one millimeter of the power the Venezuelan people have given me ... nothing will stop me from building this revolution which commandant [Hugo] Chavez left us,” Maduro told supporters on Saturday, according to Reuters.
“We call on the Venezuelan government to provide the political space necessary for meaningful dialogue with the Venezuelan people and to release detained protestors,” Kerry said. “We urge all parties to work to restore calm and refrain from violence.”
“Freedoms of expression and peaceful assembly are universal human rights. They are essential to a functioning democracy, and the Venezuelan government has an obligation to protect these fundamental freedoms and the safety of its citizens,” he said.”
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/bloggers/3123590/posts?page=2#2
What we have this morning is no longer the Venezuela story you thought you understood.
Throughout last night, panicked people told their stories of state-sponsored paramilitaries on motorcycles roaming middle class neighborhoods, shooting at people and storming into apartment buildings, shooting at anyone who seemed like he might be protesting.
People continue to be arrested merely for protesting, and a long established local Human Rights NGO makes an urgent plea for an investigation into widespread reports of torture of detainees. There are now dozens of serious human right abuses: National Guardsmen shooting tear gas canisters directly into residential buildings. We have videos of soldiers shooting civilians on the street.
And that’s just what came out in real time, over Twitter and YouTube, before any real investigation is carried out. Online media is next, a city of 645,000 inhabitants has been taken off the internet amid mounting repression, and this blog itself has been the object of a Facebook “block” campaign.
What we saw were not “street clashes”, what we saw is a state-hatched offensive to suppress and terrorize its opponents.
Here at Caracas Chronicles we’re doing what it can to document the crisis, but there’s only so much one tiny, zero-budget blog can do.
After the major crackdown on the streets of large (and small) Venezuelan cities last night, I expected some kind of response in the major international news outlets this morning. I understand that with an even bigger and more photogenic freakout ongoing in an even more strategically important country, we weren’t going to be front-page-above-the-fold, but I’m staggered this morning to wake up, scan the press and find…
Nothing.
As of 11 a.m. this morning, the New York Times World Section has…nothing."
".......Lisandro Barazarte, a photographer with the local newspaper, Notitarde, caught images of several of the men shooting into the crowd while steadying their firearms on their palms.
"They were practiced shooters," Barazarte said. "More were armed, but didn't fire."
When it was over, two La Isabelica men were dead: a 22-year-old student, Jesus Enrique Acosta, and a little league baseball coach, Guillermo Sanchez. Witnesses told the AP the first was shot in the head, the second in the back. They said neither was at the barricades when he was killed....
....."They put a pistol in my face and said they were going to kill me," said Jhonny Medrano, a 21-year-old student, describing how he and several classmates were beaten with sticks, pipes and pistols by the attackers, whom he quoted as saying, "We are the ones who are defending the government. We are Chavez. We are Maduro."
The students said they were made to walk through a line of attackers, some of whom wore university firefighters uniforms, while they were beaten. As they left, the attackers filled the building with tear gas.
"This can't keep happening," architecture professor Hernan Zamora told the AP, crying inconsolably as he recalled the terror he felt. "This can't keep happening."
March 27, 2014: Lawsuit filed in Miami accuses Venezuela top official, Diosdado Cabello, of bribery “A lawsuit filed in Miami accuses the president of Venezuela’s National Assembly of receiving at least $50 million in bribes from a company doing business in that country....
Joe DeMaria, the companies’ attorney, said Halvorssen’s allegations are absolutely false.
“My clients build power plants. They supply electricity to millions of Venezuelans,” DeMaria, of the firm Tew-Cardenas, said in an email.
....The payment of bribes to high-ranking government officials has become common practice in Venezuela, according to Transparency International, an NGO that ranks Venezuela as the most corrupt country in the hemisphere, second only to Haiti.
And Cabello, one of the most influential officials in the Nicolás Maduro administration, has been accused more than once of being involved in kickbacks.
According to reports by the U.S. embassy in Caracas, made public in 2012 by WikiLeaks, Cabello is the central figure of “one of the three main centers of corruption”
March 26, 2014: 3 Venezuelan generals arrested, accused of coup plot “(CNN) — Venezuela’s President says his country has arrested three air force generals accused of plotting a coup.
“Last night we captured three generals, who we had been investigating...three generals who were trying to turn the air force against the legitimately constituted government,” President Nicolas Maduro said in remarks broadcast Tuesday on state-run VTV. “They were organizing a coup. This captured group has direct ties with sectors of the opposition, and they said that this week was the decisive week.”
The generals, whom he did not name, will be charged in military court, he said.
Maduro revealed the arrests as he spoke to a commission of South American foreign ministers who are visiting his country as part of efforts to facilitate dialogue as political tensions mount........”
March 29, 2014: “Venezuela’s neighbors watch as it spirals downward “VENEZUELANS DESPAIR at the lack of international interest in the political crisis that is rocking their country. Since anti-government protests began early last month, at least 34 people have been killed, most of them opposition supporters gunned down by security forces or government-backed gangs. Some 1,600 people have been arrested, and many say they were beaten or tortured. One of the opposition’s top leaders has been jailed for more than a month.
............A delegation from the UNASUR group — promoted by Venezuela as an alternative to the OAS — subsequently visited Caracas and won a commitment from President Nicolás Maduro to accept a “good-faith witness,” possibly from the Vatican, to mediate talks with the opposition. But there’s not much reason to believe that Mr. Maduro — who refers to opposition leaders as “Chucky,” in a bizarre reference to the horror movie — is ready to compromise, or that the UNASUR group will pressure him to do so.
The problem with this fecklessness is that Venezuela desperately needs outside help. With one of the world’s highest inflation rates and one of its highest murder rates, severe shortages of basic goods, chronic power outages and now daily street confrontations, the country is in danger of collapse............”
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3138909/posts#1
“.....An attacker shot Luis Manuel Diaz dead on Wednesday evening in the central Guarico region at a campaign rally for the December 6 legislative elections, party officials said, ratcheting up fears that violence could erupt in the lead-up to the polls.
.......................The event was also attended by Lilian Tintori, the wife of a jailed opposition leader and a high-profile critic of Maduro.
“They want to kill me,” Tintori told a news conference later. “I hold Nicolas Maduro directly responsible.”
The European Union expressed concern about rising violence linked to the elections.
“Yesterday’s assassination of Mr Luis Manuel Diaz, the regional secretary of the Accion Democratica party, marks a further deterioration of an already tense situation in the run up to the parliamentary elections on 6 December 2015,” the EU said in a statement.
It called for a swift investigation and said those responsible must be brought to justice.
Polls have indicated Maduro’s socialist government could lose its majority in the National Assembly in next month’s vote, potentially weakening his grip on power.
Maduro has warned that if the opposition wins, his side is “politically and militarily prepared to deal with it” and would “take to the streets.”
Diaz was regional coordinator of the Democratic Action party, part of an opposition coalition against Maduro, though Diaz was not running for office.
The United States condemned the killing, calling it the “deadliest of several recent attacks and acts of intimidation” against the opposition.
Observers have warned the elections could spark unrest in the Latin American nation of 30 million people, already wracked by violence and an economic crisis with many families short of basic supplies.
Maduro said authorities were investigating the “regrettable” killing and “the interior ministry has evidence that suggests it was a contract killing to settle a score between rival gangs.”
In a speech to supporters, he rejected a claim by the chairman of Democratic Action, Henry Ramos Allup, that the shooter was a member of an armed gang linked to the ruling United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV).
“Forensic investigations and testimonies from people who were there show that is totally false and is a reckless accusation,” he said.
Tintori’s husband Leopoldo Lopez is in prison for incitement to violence in 2014 anti-government protests, though a fugitive prosecutor in the case has cast doubt on his conviction................................
“... Venezuela is the true end point of socialism and the politics of class warfare. Not hope and peace, but misery and violence. Socialism in Venezuela was not successful,just propped up by massive oil reserves.
In order to be elected in the first place, the Chavista Maduro resorted to widespread intimidation, shackling of independent media and outright voter fraud. He has resolutely continued the failed socialist policies of Hugo Chavez,resulting in 200 percent inflation,massive shortages of basic goods,skyrocketing violence and a general descent into a de facto police state.
Chavez used oil to build political ties with the small nations of the Caribbean basin,in particular Cuba. In partnership with the Castros,Chavez allowed Cuban intelligence services to penetrate his own nation and help expand the oppressive police state......
Maduro may not be able to steal enough votes to keep his ill-gotten majorities in the Venezuelan parliament....then again he may not need to. This is a man and a regime that has had no problem arresting its opponents on trumped-up charges. As long as the bureaucracy and the security services are in his control,policies are unlikely to change. Losses at the ballot box could be easily followed by mass arrests of the legitimate victors......
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3368891/posts
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