Cuban-style chokehold strangles Venezuela*** Outside the Cuban Embassy in Caracas, dozens of Venezuelans carried placards calling Fidel Castro an "assassin" and voicing their concern about the "Cubanization" of a nation once held up as one of Latin America's most long-lived democracies.
By Venezuelan standards, the protest Friday was small, but Castro's imprints on Venezuela continue to loom large. Clearly, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez prefers a Marxist dictatorship cloaked in a constitution that puts him in control of the economy, the courts, the news media and the legislative branch. "We voted for change, but we didn't vote for a revolution," Juan Fernandez told me recently. Fernandez was a key player in the nation's petroleum industry until Chavez fired him to put a political hack in charge. Fernandez's firing, and that of others, led to the failed coup against Chavez a year ago.
About 200 Venezuelans living in the Orlando area came out to hear Fernandez speak earlier this month about his blueprint for peaceful change. He is among those Venezuelans who are leading the charge for new, democratic elections, just recently meeting with Bush administration officials in Washington. But because Fernandez was among those who participated in the national strike against Chavez's government late last year, he's now a wanted man in Venezuela. Fernandez is among several prominent Venezuelans in the growing opposition movement whom Chavez wants to send to prison. His case remains pending. Fernandez's "crime" was simply to offer an opposing point of view. No guns, no secret plots, but a very public national strike seeking new presidential elections.
Since the strike ended, Chavez has moved aggressively to squeeze out businesses, big and small. Chavez has made it illegal, for instance, for Venezuelan businesses to pay in U.S. dollars for goods imported into the country or to get paid in dollars for exports even as the country's currency plunges downward. Venezuela watchers note that of the $1.3 billion that Venezuelans have sought in U.S. currency, the Chavez regime has released only about $30,000, mostly to cover living expenses for students studying abroad.
Chavez has used the failed strike as a pretext to clamp down -- not unlike Castro's move to nationalize foreign enterprises, seize all U.S. dollars and quash any dissent on the island in the early 1960s. Castro argued then that the revolution was under attack from Uncle Sam. Chavez, too, has tried to make that argument, even though polls continue to show that most Venezuelans want new presidential elections.***
Hooray for Chavez's Peaceful Revolution!
A supporter of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez cheers near a military police line during a ceremony to open a new state food store in Caracas April 22, 2003. Chavez has fired Planning Minister Felipe Perez after public disagreements over foreign exchange controls and other economic policies in the world's No. 5 oil exporter. REUTERS/Chico Sanchez
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Hooray for Castro's Revolution………………..
Cuban citizens celebrate in Havana April 16, 2003 on the 42nd anniversary of a rally where Fidel Castro declared that Cuba would be socialist. Communist-run Cuba has imposed lengthy prison terms on 75 dissidents accused of collaborating with arch-enemy the United States, triggering a storm of international protest. Last Friday it executed three men who hijacked a ferry in a bid to reach Florida. REUTERS/Rafael Perez