Posted on 04/11/2002 1:49:54 PM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) - Half a million Venezuelans clamoring for President Hugo Chavez to resign marched to the presidential palace in Caracas on Thursday in a huge protest that marked the most powerful challenge so far to his three-year-old rule.
With National Guard troops deployed to protect the palace and several thousand supporters of the president also gathered there, the country's military high command made a public appeal for calm and called on people to avoid violence.
Police fired tear gas to keep groups of the marchers away from the palace and running battles broke out as some Chavez supporters threw stones at the anti-government protesters.
At least 500,000 anti-Chavez demonstrators, beating pots and pans, chanting "Out, Out" and waving national flags, marched down Caracas' main avenues, shutting down traffic as they moved in a mass from the east to the center of the city.
Turning out to back an indefinite general strike called by labor and business foes of the president, the anti-government demonstrators had gathered earlier in eastern Caracas, where speaker after speaker demanded that the firebrand left-wing president should step down along with his Cabinet.
His critics accuse him of trying to impose a Cuban-style left-wing regime upon the world's fourth biggest oil exporter. They also criticize him for failing to deliver election promises to reduce chronic poverty, widespread unemployment and serious crime.
"Chavez, get out now, once and for all, we don't want you any more," Carlos Ortega, leader of the country's largest trades union CTV, hollered to the crowd.
March organizers called for people in other cities across the country to take to the streets to protest against Chavez.
Appearing in a national television broadcast with other members of the military high command, Venezuelan Armed Forces chief Gen. Lucas Rincon said the country's security forces were carrying out their duty to maintain law and order.
"Apart from a few spots of trouble, the situation in the country is normal," he said.
PRESIDENT IN HIS OFFICE
"I call on the Venezuelan people to stay calm ... to reject incitements to violence, disorder and anarchy," he said. Rincon denied reports the president, who has stayed out of sight during the protest, was under arrest at military headquarters.
"He's in his office (in Miraflores)," he added.
As the anti-Chavez marchers headed for the palace, aides of Chavez called on his supporters to go to Miraflores to demonstrate in his defense. "Let everyone go to Miraflores to defend the revolution," pro-Chavez National Assembly Deputy Juan Barreto said.
The huge opposition march, one of the biggest ever, went ahead hours after the embattled government offered a dialogue to its foes in a bid to ward off the threat of economic chaos caused by two days of a nationwide work stoppage.
Venezuelans protest against President Hugo Chavez in Caracas April 11, 2002. At least 300 thousand opponents of Chavez marched through Caracas pressing ahead with an indefinite general strike as his embattled government tried to start up a dialogue to ward off the threat of economic chaos. REUTERS/Chico Sanchez
The labor and business shutdown, combined with a continuing protest by staff of the state oil giant PDVSA (Petroleos de Venezuela), sapped economic activity and disrupted oil operations in Latin America's fourth biggest economy.
"The cost is immense," said Pedro Carmona, president of the leading business association Fedecamaras, which along with the CTV (Venezuela Workers' Confederation), organized the strike.
Caracas, for a third day, had fewer vehicles and pedestrians on its streets, apart from the protest. Many shops and companies remained closed and the effects of the stoppage were being felt in other cities.
Chavez has been facing mounting opposition for months from political foes, business and labor leaders, and even dissident military officers. An army general on Wednesday called him a lying traitor and urged him to quit.
"We can't carry on putting up with this madman," said one of the marchers, Aurora Hernandez.
Chavez, an ex-paratrooper who defends a self-proclaimed revolution as a campaign to help the country's poor majority, initially dismissed the strike organizers as a handful of "corrupt oligarchs and petty politicians."
But in a more conciliatory response late on Wednesday, Defense Minister Jose Vicente Rangel offered a dialogue to the government opponents, although he called the strike irresponsible and predicted it would fail.
Rangel said no state of emergency would be declared by the president and there was no threat of a military coup.
Although the defense minister insisted the armed forces were behind the president, an army general, Nestor Gonzalez, Wednesday publicly criticized Chavez and urged him to resign.
The call followed criticism from other dissident officers in February, played down at the time by the president.
Rangel sought to reassure the nation the government would not abandon democratic practices to tackle the strike conflict, and he urged opponents to make the same pledge.
OIL INDUSTRY DISRUPTION
But there was increasing concern the general strike would lead to unsustainable political and economic turmoil.
The most serious disruption has been to the state oil company PDVSA, where dissident executives and employees have staged a six-week protest to oppose management changes made by Chavez.
Despite repeated public assurances from the government that the oil industry was not being affected, industry sources said Thursday half of the 960,000 barrel per day Amuay-Cardon complex, Venezuela's largest refinery, had been shut down.
Disruptions were also reported to key oil output, refining and export operations.
Sounds like the Russian revolution. Next step, the army moves in support of the citizens.
Fascinating. Countries with book-length constitutions are usually begging for trouble.
People are learning faster these days. ;^)
Libertad!!
Y cabezas en pikaderos!(phony spanish.;^))
Good thing. =^)
Colombia, venezuela, Panama & Ecuador were all 1 country, Colombia-Until US divided them around 1900.
That's where his Bolivar movement comes in. Simon Bolivar was the great Liberator (our George Washington). Chavez's goal is to reunite these countries once again. That's why he'll be history soon. Reich will see to it.
Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez, defiant after three years in office, shut down the nation's five private television stations and dismissed calls by hundreds of thousands of protesters demanding his resignation.
``My government is tolerant and will mend its ways when it has to,'' Chavez, wearing a suit and tie, said in a televised address to the nation interrupted by static. ``The biggest problem we have now is the media, and especially private television stations.''
As the president spoke for more than an hour, the military tossed tear gas and fired shots into the air to disperse crowds near the presidential palace, from where the government said Chavez was speaking. Marchers, waving flags and singing ``Se va, se va,'' or ``He's going, he's going,'' lit fires in the street.
``The military's position is key now,'' Michael Gavin, head of Latin American research at UBS Warburg LLC in Stamford, Connecticut. ``If they go to him and say they won't protect him, it's over.''
For the full article, go HERE.
Please go to him and tell him he is all alone.
Seems like GB senior rased a good son.
I travel to Colombia often. I think the crossboarder stuff by FARC is not intentional. (if it's not just propoganda) The ELN (Colombia's other rebel army) today announced that the Occidental (al gore's) oil pipeline is now a military target.
You don't think the oil companies dirty op units are behind all this oil turmoil all of a sudden to jack up prices? Or has Russia produced more and the market is oversaturated and we are all being scammed into thinking there are shortages? Maybe Cheney cut a deal with the Ayrobs.
So much disinfo from all sides-Hard to figure who to believe, if anyone.
Chavez is another opportunistic thug who wishes he could become a multi-billionaire like his role model Fidel Castro (according to several financial publications), with vast numbers of mansions, mistresses, limos, and all the other trappings of vast wealth. The key is a studious faux populism, propaganda through control of the mass media, brutal military oppression, and neighborhood "Committees for the Defense of the Revolution" to dispense ration coupons and population control on a micromanaging level. It also helps to have similarly minded American liberals and their vermin media on your side.
Come to think about it, this is all reminiscent of how corrupt liberal scum like Terry McAuliffre and the two Clintons became multi-millionaires over the last 8 years. Chavez, like these other greedy sociopaths, will not give up power easily.
Matthews asked him who's side he was on, Frank replied "I'm on the side of freedom.". Chris said, "So your with the coup.", Franks answer was "I'm on the side of freedom Chris."
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