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]
The purchase of Russian fighters, according to the American military, is part of a long-term plan by the Venezuelan ministry of defense to upgrade their air forces. Venezuela plans to buy about 50 Russian MiG-29 fighters in various modifications, with 40 single-seat and 10 dual-seat models. Venezuela plans to spend about 5 billion dollars for the Russian fighters, including missiles and special aviation and airfield equipment.
Until recently the only MiG-29s in Latin America were used by Peru and Cuba. Cuba only has six MiG-29s.***
A. M. Mora y Leon
Bush snubs Venezuela's President (U.N.)
September 21st, 2004
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles.php?article_id=3860
First of all, the electronic voting machines used in the recall election were operated by a company that had connections to Chavez and his government. Next, the National Electoral Council, which would determine the sanctity of the votes, was controlled by Chavez. On the day of the referendum, there was no open audit at the polling stations to reconcile the paper ballots to the electronic voting machines. After the election, there was no inspection of the voting machines. Nor was there an impounding of the election data. The paper ballots that could have proved the results were mysteriously lost or destroyed. And on and on.
In the face of all of that, Carter found the election to be transparent, honest and fair.
After this international disgrace, in which Chavez praised Carter for his help, Carter has the nerve to say that Florida now needs "a nonpartisan electoral commission ... " and "uniformity in voting procedures ... "
Carter closes his column by saying, "With reforms unlikely at this late stage ... perhaps the only recourse will be to focus maximum public scrutiny on the suspicious process in Florida."
"Suspicious?" Does he have no shame?
Carter finds nothing "suspicious" about the outcome of what many independent observers feel was a stolen election in Venezuela — an election Carter certified to the horror of millions of Venezuelans desperate for the rule of law — but thinks nothing of questioning the integrity of Gov. Jeb Bush or the hard-working officials who will oversee the vote in Florida come Nov. 2.
While certain network anchors may endorse such thinking, I suspect most Americans will be troubled by the double standard. ***
After winning an Aug. 15 recall referendum, Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez said he would welcome warmer ties with President Bush, whom he has accused of plotting to topple him.
Publicly, the Bush administration says it is interested. Both Secretary of State Colin Powell and the new U.S. ambassador to Caracas, William Brownfield, have issued conciliatory statements.
But in private, U.S. officials are less hopeful, wary of Chávez's past anti-U.S. rhetoric, his close ties with Fidel Castro, allegations that his government helps leftist Colombian rebels and his lack of cooperation on various issues such as making his country's passports more secure.
''Words are nice,'' said a State Department official on Chávez's desire for better relations. ``Let's see what we can do in some really concrete areas.''
Many observers doubt Washington and Caracas will be warming up any time soon, given the vast ideological divide between Bush and the leftist-nationalist Chávez.
''So long as George W. Bush is in the White house we're not going to see any changes,'' said Riordan Roett, a Latin American specialist at Johns Hopkins University.
Bush administration officials are reluctant to provide a list of to-do items for Chávez's government. ''My suggestion is that they start with the easy stuff and do it,'' the State Department official said.
But they note that to improve relations Chávez must do more than continue his energy ties with the United States. Venezuela is the United States' fourth-largest supplier of oil.
Chávez could do more on a broad front, they say, from moving more aggressively to stop infiltrations by fighters from Colombia to upgrading the country's passport, a key element in U.S. efforts to make it harder for terrorists to obtain fake travel documents. ......***
State prosecutor Danilo Anderson said Monday that he hoped to complete the formal indictment of all the accused, who include prominent businessmen, lawyers, politicians and former military officers, over the next two months.
"These people are being charged with the crime of civil rebellion ... for carrying out violent changes to the constitution," he said.
The prosecutor, who had previously specialized in environmental issues, is vilified by the opposition as the chief inquisitor of Chavez's self-styled "revolution."
If convicted, the accused face jail terms of between 12 and 24 years. At least 28 have already been indicted, although all remain free.
The group of mostly civilians is accused of drawing up, witnessing or signing an April 12, 2002, decree that dissolved the constitution and parliament a day after Chavez was ousted by generals and admirals.
The prosecutions follow Chavez's resounding wins over the opposition in an Aug. 15 referendum and Oct. 31 regional elections that consolidated his political domination over the world's No. 5 oil exporter.
Since those wins, the firebrand former paratrooper has offered a peace dialogue to opponents he had previously condemned almost daily as "terrorists and coup-mongers."
But opposition leaders say this is just a smoke screen to hide a campaign of persecution.***
One is the regional arms race between Colombia and Venezuela. This week, Colombia announced that it will purchase 24 combat planes, a move that follows Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez’s announced purchase of 50 Russian MiG-29 aircraft, planes he doesn’t need for anything other than to attack another nation.
Two is the nightmare in Haiti. There’s a key Caricom (Caribbean community) meeting going on right now in Trinidad about whether to recognize the government of Haiti that insiders tell me is nothing short of a dogfight between pro- and anti-Aristide forces among the Caribbean states.
As of now, it appears that the pro-Aristide forces are winning, a diplomatic and strategic blow to the U.S. This group, led by about four states, is closely aligned with President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela who is determined to exert his Marxist influence in the region. The failed and debilitated state of Haiti, unrecognized as a state, is perfect for his designs.
Meanwhile, pro-Aristide Democrat Congresswoman Maxine Waters, always on the opposite side of U.S. interests, charges in public speeches that the U.S. intends to set up military bases in Haiti, claims that may either be true or not, but suffice it to say, are opposed by her ‘side’ along with any constructive U.S. role in Haiti, given the alternative, which is the emerging opportunity to expand Chavez’s regional influence.
Which brings us to the most difficult to believe story about this region, this one from sources close to Florida’s governor Jeb Bush: that Chavez has no intention of fighting a border war with Colombia with his new MiGs – but instead has them, and their Cuban pilots, pointed at Miami, Florida. They insist it’s not tinfoil hat. That’s right, Miami. It seems to be utterly insane.
If this is the case, the Rumsfeld visit to the small troubled Central American would make sense. And the U.S. may be facing a true territorial threat. As of now, it’s speculation. The only thing that’s not speculation is that Rumsfeld’s not going there for small reasons***
Danilo Anderson was killed by two explosions that tore through his SUV as he was driving in the capital just before midnight Thursday. The killing shook this oil-rich South American nation and raised the specter of further violence.
As authorities called for calm, hundreds of mourners, some weeping and others angrily shouting "Justice!", watched while a coffin bearing his body was brought into the attorney general's office building in Caracas.
Information Minister Andrés Izarra said the assassination of Anderson — known among Venezuelans as the "super prosecutor" — was clearly aimed at derailing his investigations and prosecutions of those who supported the coup, in which 19 people were killed and almost 300 wounded.
Izarra blamed Venezuelan exiles in Florida, echoing Chavez's earlier accusations that Cuban and Venezuelan "terrorists" were training in Florida to execute him and were using the media to call for his removal.
"We want the government of the United States to explain how it is that these terrorist groups that act with total freedom in Florida ... make these statements through the media under the government's nose," Izarra said. …………..***
Rodriguez, 66, a former communist guerrilla and a former secretary-general of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, is likely to be the lead negotiator for projects like PetroAmerica, a South American government-run oil company conceived in response to privatizations in Latin America, as well as a similar project in the Caribbean called PetroCaribe.
Rodriguez was put at the helm of Petróleos de Venezuela, known as PDVSA, in 2002 to mend the fractured company after an oil strike led to a coup that ousted Chavez for two days. Rodriguez also oversaw the dismissal of more than half the work force in 2003 after a two-month shutdown meant to force Chavez from office.
Chavez beat out the strikers and took a firm grip on the corporation, using proceeds from its sales to finance social investment while curbing the independence of the $42 billion corporation designed nearly 30 years ago with the idea of keeping oil and politics separate.
Critics say the designation of Ramirez represented the end of the company's autonomy.
"Instead of a regulatory system with checks and balances, we have Ramirez in charge of everything," said Alberto Quiros Corradi, a former PDVSA director who works closely with the opposition.***
President Hugo Chavez said that Moscow and Caracas had agreed on implementing contracts on joint oil extraction and refining in 2005.
The Venezuelan President also said that some of the joint projects are being implemented, particularly the extraction of bauxite at the Orinoco river for joint aluminum production.
LUKoil and the Venezuelan state company are to start work on mutual oil supplies. The issue concerns Russia's providing oil products to Venezuela and receiving oil supplies to provide for the American market.
-----
Venezuela will buy a hundred thousand Russian submachine guns, helicopters, anti-tank and air-defense weapons, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said.***
Venezuelan Congress Passes Controversial Media Bill
11-24-04 09:23 PM EST
CARACAS (AP)--Congress passed a controversial bill late Wednesday that aims to force media outlets to broadcast only socially responsible programming, slapping them with heavy fines or even shutting them down if they don't follow strict rules.
Opposition leaders say the measure will strip press freedom and muzzle anyone who opposes Venezuela's leftist President Hugo Chavez.
With the support of pro-Chavez lawmakers who have a slight majority in Congress, all 36 articles of the bill were passed Wednesday. Chavez may sign it into law in early December, lawmaker Calixto Ortega said.
Ortega said the bill, called the "gag law" by opponents and the Law for Responsibility in Radio and Television by the government, applies rules to a sector that has acted like "lawless people" for too long.
The bill defines five levels of both violence and sex and three levels of profanity. It also prohibits even moderate violence from being shown most hours of the day, which opposition lawmaker Gerardo Blyde said will make many newscasts illegal.
Blyde said Chavez is using the bill to take an important step toward installing Cuba-style media control in this oil-rich nation.
Early versions of the bill called for sending news reporters to jail if they make false statements, but these have been removed from the final bill, Blyde said.
Ping for later reference
………...If Chávez manages to extend his reach beyond Venezuela’s borders, the exodus could become a flood. Economies once poised to deliver prosperity could become basket cases, and U.S. exports to the region might fall as oil prices climb. Fortunately, few Latin leaders seem inclined to follow Chávez.
Although Secretary Powell avoided fights with Venezuela’s polemical president, his successor won’t have an easy time cooperating. For one thing, President Chávez once called Condoleezza Rice “illiterate.” For another, she could have her hands full encouraging Venezuelan democrats to keep faith, urging international human-rights monitors to protect civil liberties, and diverting Chávez’s thoughts from destabilizing neighboring countries — all the while avoiding direct confrontation.
- Like Captain Ahab in Moby Dick, Hugo Chávez wants to conquer something big. In fact, his target is U.S. influence in the Americas. It’s up to Condoleezza Rice to ensure he doesn’t succeed. ***
Ostensibly, the raid was part of the investigation into the November 18 assassination by car bombing of State Prosecutor Danilo Anderson. Anderson (who was initially appointed to prosecute environmental crimes) was handling high-profile political prosecutions — including that of the plotters of the April 2002 coup attempt against Chavez. The assassins are unknown, but the Chavez, his allies, and the state-controlled media have blamed the Venezuelan opposition, Venezuelan expatriates in Miami, and various foreign forces including the Mossad. This putative Mossad connection was the excuse for the raid on the Colegio Hebraica.
This raid is only part of Chavez's steady destruction of Venezuela's civil society and democratic institutions. The Venezuelan National Assembly recently passed a new law restricting television and radio content. Officially the law is intended to protect Venezuela's children from pornography and violence, but the vaguely worded statute could easily be used to hinder the expression of political views as well. Chavez is also packing Venezuela's supreme court.
The treatment of Jewish communities has always been a crucial indicator of a government's commitment to freedom and rule of law. In the words of prominent Venezuelan journalist Carlos Blanco:
When a Jew is attacked for being such, we enter a zone of total and absolute risk for the free thinking and existence of all, Jews and non Jews alike. Do not believe the official apologies, they are part of the same set up. ..........***
The most interesting element of Venezuela's public-relations campaign may be its advertising blitz in the top-drawer media, such as The Economist, The New Yorker, and Roll Call. Instead of emphasizing pristine beaches for tourists or favorable business opportunities for investors — the normal messages in ads sponsored by foreign governments — the Chávez regime is trying to demonstrate its commitment to social uplift. "In the past, Venezuela's oil wealth benefited a few. Today, it benefits a few million," says one of these ads, which also encourages readers to visit the VIO website. The campaign was developed by Underground Advertising, a San Francisco-based firm boasting a left-wing clientele that includes the ACLU of Northern California, Friends of the Earth, and the Rainforest Action Network. ....***
A third Chávez announcement, that Venezuela will purchase 100,000 Russian assault rifles and 33 military helicopters, suggested to some observers that Chávez is investing his oil wealth in a different kind of muscle. The announcement followed reports, denied by Venezuelan authorities, that Venezuela is negotiating the purchase of 50 Russian MiG-29 fighter jets.
The arms purchases generated concerns in both Washington and Colombia. An unidentified Bush administration official accompanying the president in Canada recently told reporters: "Millions of dollars are going to be spent on Russian weapons for ill-defined purposes," and added: "We shoot down MiGs." …….***
A further 40,000 farms are yet to be inspected, the state's National Land Institute has told Associated Press.
Vice president Jose Vicente Rangel has said farmers and ranchers with their titles in order and their lands productive have "nothing to fear."
Critics of the land reform policy claim president Hugo Chavez is trying to enforce a communist-style economic programme that ignores property rights and will damage the country.
Land owners claim the National Land Institute has made mistakes in classifying lands as public or private….***
Venezuela's Zimbabwe Road ***The government of Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez will expropriate its first farm, taking Venezuela straight down Zimbabwe road. The grab was announced this morning and will happen Saturday. The chavistas' first target is a British-owned cattle ranch. The move is a bold beginning for the chavista communists who will roll out both military and police forces for the seizure, beginning the first in a series.
The communists' mendacious rationale is that a British company, Vestey Group, did not have proper title to 3000 hectares of its 13,000-hectare cattle ranch. So they are taking it all. But the owners of the land are fighting this action and maintain that the land has a clear title and deed since 1830. Two previous governments reafirmed ownership in the 1970's after two previous expropriation attempts.
Clearly, in a land without much history of title deed, this is going to be an easy strategy for seizing land, anyone's land, in the name of 'the people.' Property rights have been officially killed off this week in Venezuela…..***
Hugo Chavez has made a point of praising, visiting, and embracing the most totalitarian regimes in the world. He was the first head of state to visit Saddam Hussein in Iraq after the Gulf War. He has allied himself closely with Red China, Russia, Iran, Libya, Algeria, Syria, and, of course, Cuba. His administration praises the Communist regime of North Korean madman Kim Jong Il — leader of an economic basket case, as well as a human rights hellhole — as a model for Venezuela’s development. On October 12, 1999, during a state visit to China, President Chavez proudly announced: “I have been very Maoist all my life.” He praised Mao Zedong, one of the greatest mass murderers in history, and let it be known that he viewed Chairman Mao’s program as a model for his own Venezuelan revolution.
Chavez calls his program a “Bolivarian revolution,” claiming inspiration from the popular 19th-century South American independence fighter Simon Bolivar. But it is clearly more Marxist and Maoist than Bolivarian. Recognizing that his hold on power was tenuous, Chavez imported thousands of Cuban agents masquerading as teachers, health professionals, scientists, and sports instructors. Their job is to organize his Bolivarian Circles — the Communist mobs patterned after Castro’s Committees in Defense of the Revolution. At the same time, Chavez has brought in hundreds of intelligence agents from Castro’s DGI (Cuba’s version of the KGB) to help take over and purge the Venezuelan military and police of counter-revolutionary elements that pose a threat to his total consolidation of power.
In 2003, General Marcos Ferreira resigned as head of Venezuela’s border control agency, DIEX, and presented documents and his own eyewitness accounts of the Chavez government’s close cooperation with global terrorist groups. According to Gen. Ferreira, thousands of fraudulent Venezuelan identities were issued to members of known terrorist groups, including al-Qaeda, on orders from top officials in Chavez’s government. …***
Colombian Defense Minister Jorge Alberto Uribe, who admitted making the payment, was a ''participant in a crime which may have international implications,'' said Venezuelan Vice President José Vicente Rangel.
The recall of Ambassador Carlos Santiago Ramírez was the latest and harshest step in the increasingly bizarre dispute over Rodrigo Granda, a senior member of the guerrilla Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC.
The clash could affect relations between the two main countries in northern South America -- with oil-rich Venezuela ruled by leftist President Hugo Chávez and Colombia ruled by U.S.-backed conservative President Alvaro Uribe -- although their relations have seen previous ups and downs.
Venezuelan investigators allege that Granda was snatched near a cafe in central Caracas on Dec. 13 and smuggled into neighboring Colombia, where he was officially arrested in the border city of Cúcuta. He is now charged with terrorism and rebellion. For several days, Colombia had remained silent on the details of Granda's capture.
The case has brought to light evidence that Granda obtained Venezuelan citizenship last year and traveled repeatedly to Ecuador on a valid Colombian passport in his own name -- and that Bogotá did not issue a warrant for his arrest until 2004.
Chávez has said Granda obtained his Venezuelan citizenship with ''false documents.'' And President Uribe has denied that his government did anything wrong in Granda's capture. But on Wednesday, Defense Minister Uribe -- no relation to the president -- acknowledged that his government paid money to the persons he said had delivered Granda to Colombia. He refused to identify them or their nationalities.
VENEZUELANS CHARGED
Late Thursday, Jesse Chacón, Venezuela's interior minister, said five members of the Venezuelan national guard's anti-kidnapping unit have been charged with carrying out the kidnapping. Chacón also said there might be Venezuelan police involved.
The various Venezuelan and Colombian government statements have done little to shed light on Granda's surprising ability to obtain Venezuelan citizenship and an Ecuadorean visa and ID card, all under his own name.
Chávez acknowledged Sunday that Granda won citizenship during a swift government operation last year that naturalized some 300,000 foreigners living in Venezuela.
His opponents charged at the time that the move was designed to allow the foreigners to vote for Chávez in an Aug. 15 recall referendum, which he won handily………***
Yet, for two years before his capture last month in Caracas, Venezuela's capital, he lived comfortably in a two-story house in this picturesque mountain community that is a weekend retreat for Venezuelan Army generals, Caracas businessmen and well-off retirees. He came and went freely, ordering construction supplies for his home and frolicking in his pool while still serving as the "foreign minister" for the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, the authorities in Bogotá, Colombia, say. In fact, he had enjoyed the privileges of Venezuelan citizenship and had voted in a recent election.
The revelations about Mr. Granda's apparently breezy day-to-day life in Venezuela and the murky operation that led to his capture in Caracas have led to the most serious diplomatic crisis between neighbors who are ideological opposites: the leftist Venezuelan government of President Hugo Chávez and the conservative Colombian administration of President Álvaro Uribe.
The dispute has drawn in the Bush administration, which on Jan. 15 vocally threw its support behind Mr. Uribe, Washington's closest ally in Latin America. Then on Tuesday in her Senate confirmation hearing, Condoleezza Rice, the secretary of state-designate, said that Venezuela's government had been a "negative" force in the region while stifling the opposition at home.
"We are very concerned about a democratically elected leader who governs in an illiberal way, and some of the steps he's taken against the media, against the opposition, I think are really very deeply troubling," Ms. Rice said at the hearing. ….***
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