Uncensored news from Venezuela

posted 12/11, by Donald Grbac (viewed 119 times) | Scope : National Popularity : 5 (5 encourage, 0 discourage) The following comes from a political analyst in Venezuela (Hans Dieterich). An [English translation of his commentary] was made available by Z Communications and is dated December 09, 2002. The constitutional government of Hugo Chavez faces its fourth assault in eight months. The April 11th coup d'etat launched a chain of mob acts that were repeated under the banner of "civic" or "labor strikes", all of them programmed with high levels of physical violence and media manipulation. Note that the media in Venezuela is mostly controlled by the upper classes and is "openly prejudiced" (in their favor) as reported in [the Znet article] I previously referenced. This high pro-coup intensity against Venezuelan democracy enters a new paradox. The Bolivarian Constitution of 1999, born from the breast of a Constituent Assembly and approved by referendum of the citizens is, without a doubt, the most democratic in Latin America. As such, it provides for removal of elected public officials. Its Article 72 stipulates that "all posts and magistrates that are popularly elected are revocable", as of halfway though the term for which they are elected. Applying this Article to President Chavez, the possibility of removing him by recall referendum opens up in August 2003, under the terms of the Magna Carta. That is to say, there is an institutional path to change leadership - that, according to opposition members is the goal of their street actions - whose utilization would protect the life of citizens, strengthen the democratic government and civic exercise of power and improve the national economic situation. Skipping through the Dieterich article for key points: The question that this situation raises is the following: Why don't the "strikers" wait eight months to reach their goal through peaceful and institutional routes? What is the urgency that makes them act desperately fomenting chaos, ungovernable situations and military coup instead of working toward August? The reasons for this behavior are obvious and can be summed up by three points: Since the April 11th coup d'etat, which was their maximum point of power, the conspirators have been weakened in two key ways. A. They have lost internal unity and fight among themselves for power, and, more importantly, B. They have lost a fundamental part of their social base in the middle classes. During the 24 hours they were in power, during the April 11th coup d'etat, it became clear that the middle classes had been used as cannon fodder in a transnational dictatorial project. And the previous mob actions via "civic strikes" only deepened the erosion of the pro-coup clique's legitimacy, supported from foreign lands by Otto "Third" Reich and recycled Spanish Franco fascism. Mr. Dieterich reports that a number of laws will change as of January 1, 2003, that will "touch vital interests of the economic elite". The Hydrocarbon law "will permit the dismantling of the meta-State of the petroleum business PdVSA, the corrupt oil group that controls the economic life of the country and that is an integral part of the New World Energy Order of George Bush." Today, only 20 percent of the income of this mega-company goes to the State. Eighty percent goes to "operating costs" that enrich secret accounts of the beneficiaries of this economic cancer. The third reason the pro-coup forces are in a hurry is found in their doubts about being able to win a recall referendum. So, it is obvious that it is not "the people of Venezuela" who are trying to remove President Chavez from power. The "free press" of the USA does not seem to get that point.