Http://www.vcrisis.com
In 1992 Hugo Chavez led a failed military coup in an attempt to overthrow a corrupt and unpopular government. He was imprisoned for a few years, received a presidential pardon and in 1998 Chavez ran for president on an anticorruption and social reform platform. The people so wanted a change from the 40-year unresponsive and corrupt governments that they elected him with an overwhelming majority.
But once he was elected he immediately began to cash in on his popularity with the masses by limiting any potential opposition to his rule. Chavez used this momentum to convene a constitutional convention to replace the Constitution. In a referendum he managed to get 95% of the delegates to the convention. With that majority he then:
*) Replaced the Constitution *) Combined the executive, legislative and judicial powers into one *) Abolished Congress *) Extended the President’s term to six years with the possibility of re-election *) Established a transitory regime under which all the Supreme Court justices, the Attorney General and the national electoral authorities were elected either by the convention packed with Chavez’s supporters with complete disregard for established procedures. The convention then decided to “clean up” the court system and replace the existing judges with Chavez’s appointees again disregarding constitutional procedures.
Chavez was not the first and will certainly not be the last political leader who used democratic procedures to seize power for non-democratic purposes. Some prominent examples might be remembered: In 1946 Perón in Argentina became president because he won the masses’ votes. In 1922 King Victor Emmanuel III appointed Mussolini prime minister of Italy because a majority of the voters had given his party the strongest fraction in the parliament. And in 1933 Hitler became chancellor of the Weimar Republic because different parties made possible a coalition and forced the president of the German Reich to nominate him.
After 3 years of worsening economic and social conditions, massive government corruption and complete alienation of most levels of society, the Venezuelan people finally reacted. Beginning in December 2001 huge demonstrations were staged against the President. Chavez sent in his new militia to repress and physically attack the noisy but peaceful demonstrators. Over 20 people were killed. Polls showed that more than 70% of the population wanted Chavez to resign. Business and labor leaders, the traditional political parties, the media, human rights organizations, environmentalists, and most non-government employees called for the President’s resignation and/or new elections.
In a desperate attempt to get Chavez to step down, a nationwide strike erupted in December 2002 that virtually paralyzed the economy. Chavez refused the strikers’ demands. According to him, all options presented by the opposition were subversive and unconstitutional including a previous referendum asking for his resignation. He stepped up repression by persecuting the strike leaders. By now he has fired over 12,000 oil workers, almost a third of the work force of the state-run Petroleos de Venezuela, or PDVSA as it is known internationally, whose 10-week strike plunged the world's No. 5 oil exporter into an economic crisis.
Now, please bear this is mind: Until 2 months ago PDVSA was the largest and most efficiently run corporation in Latin America with a highly qualified work force of over 40,000. With international sales exceeding 46 billion dollars in 2001 it ranked 66th in the 2002 Fortune list of largest corporations in the world. Between 1999 and 2002 it had contributed 49 billion dollars to the Venezuelan treasury accounting for 50% of government income and for 80% of the country’s foreign exchange. Chavez, as a leader, as the president of Venezuela, should have negotiated, reached an agreement when faced with such economic and social crisis. But, no. Showing irrational behavior unbecoming of an elected leader, he yells, he curses, he threatens, he fires highly qualified employees and replaces them with either friends or borrows personnel from Libya, Algiers, Indonesia who barely speak English and no Spanish at all. This has resulted in oil production at only 1/3 of pre-strike capacity, gasoline and other refined products not meeting minimum quality standards, fires, explosions, oil spills and all kind of incidents and accidents capable of keeping OSHA investigators busy for years if they would have happened in the US.