Chavez Foe Evades Venezuela Police at Rally

asia.reuters.com
Sat March 8, 2003 08:35 PM ET By Pascal Fletcher

CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) - Venezuelan police swooped on an anti-government rally on Saturday apparently to arrest an opposition leader wanted by the government for heading a recent strike, but the fugitive slipped away.

Protesters clashed with heavily-armed police who converged on the rally after Juan Fernandez, a sacked former executive of the state oil firm PDVSA, defied a government arrest order and addressed the demonstration against President Hugo Chavez.

Fernandez, who urged thousands at the rally to keep up a campaign of street protests against the leftist leader, and several other prominent opposition figures are being hunted by the authorities. They led a two-month strike in December and January that slashed oil production and exports in the world's No. 5 petroleum exporter.

After Fernandez's surprise appearance at the rally jamming an east Caracas highway, several yellow cars and vans of the DISIP security police, their lights flashing, drove at speed up to the edges of the demonstration apparently to nab him.

But the oil strikers' leader, escorted by supporters, had already slipped away from the speaking platform and angry protesters confronted the police, hurling stones at the heavily-armed officers who fired tear gas to disperse them.

Local television reported shots were fired but no injuries were immediately reported.

In his defiant speech, Fernandez told Chavez to "pack his bags ... We're going to get you out," he said.

As the leader of thousands of state oil employees whose walkout crippled the strategic oil sector for weeks during the strike, Fernandez has become a figurehead of resistance to Chavez in the determined but divided opposition.

Saturday's clash stoked political tensions more than a month after the strike had fizzled out after failing to force the former paratrooper to resign and hold early elections.

The grueling stoppage has triggered an economic crisis, forcing the government to introduce tough currency and price controls and launch a nationwide food distribution program. The crisis has also helped lift world oil prices.

CUBA SENDS FOOD HELP

Shouting "Killers" and "Lackeys," the protesters crowded around the DISIP vehicles, beating with their fists on their roofs and sides. The windows of at least one car were broken.

Chavez, a fiery populist who was first elected in 1998 and survived a coup last year, has condemned the strike leaders as "terrorists" and "coup mongers" trying to overthrow him. He has called for them to be arrested and jailed and has also fired more than 15,000 state oil workers.

Waving national flags, the opposition demonstrators demanded a halt to what they described as a political vendetta by the president against the leaders of the strike.

Anti-Chavez business chief Carlos Fernandez is under house arrest on charges of rebellion and criminal instigation. Other strike organizers sought by the government, such as Juan Fernandez and union boss Carlos Ortega, have eluded police.

As the protesters gathered, Chavez told a meeting of supporters in a Caracas theater that Venezuela had received donations of sugar and beans from communist Cuba to help his government fight food shortages caused by the recent strike.

Chavez thanked his political ally and friend, Cuban President Fidel Castro, for the cargoes of 10,000 tonnes of sugar and 5,000 tonnes of black beans. He said these were being sold cheaply to the poor in the government's food program.

"The Cubans gave up 10 million kilos (10,000 tonnes) of sugar from their own reserves ... they didn't want to accept payment, they said we could pay for them whenever we could," the president said. Cuba receives oil from Venezuela on preferential terms under a bilateral energy deal.

Chavez's opponents, who include private business leaders, union bosses and dissident military officers, accuse him of ruining the economy with his anti-capitalist rhetoric and left-wing, statist economic policies. They say he is trying to recreate Cuban-style communism in Venezuela.

The president condemns his opponents as a rich, resentful "oligarchy" opposed to his self-styled "revolution."

Chavez announced the creation of a state-run network of shops which would sell cheap food to the poor. The idea appeared to be a replica of a similar system existing in Cuba.