INTI president Adan Chavez categorically denies promotion of land evasions
<a href=www.vheadline.com>Venezuela's Electronic News Posted: Friday, May 30, 2003 By: David Coleman
President Hugo Chavez Frias' brother, National Lands Institute (INTI) president Adan Chavez is categorically denying spurious opposition claims that the National Executive and/or his department is promoting or facilitating the invasion of productive lands by peasant squatters.
Chavez points out that government efforts under "Plan Zamora" are wholly directed towards promoting proper and productive land use and to put unproductive lands into the hands of poor peasants and small- to medium-sized agricultural producers through land registration, a system of agricultural credits, farm machinery and technical assistance towards increased production on state-owned land which has hitherto not fulfilled any social function whatsoever.
- Under the new plan, more than 739,000 hectares and more than 20 billion bolivares in finance and machinery have been contributed and it is expected that Venezuelan farms will in the short term begin to produce sufficiently to guarantee national food production.
Under Presidential Decree No.2,292 issued on February 4 and an INTI Resolution No.177 of the same date, permanent land registrations and rights of occupancies (Deeds) are extended to peasant cooperatives to organize and put unused land into fruitful production ... Adan Chavez says that land deeds groups are most definitely not extended to the detriment of private property in favor of peasant squatters as the opposition media has been screaming. "The Law on Lands & Agricultural Development (article 24) extends certificates of land registry in accordance with the Constitution and the requirements of national food production. We are using hitherto unregistered public lands, with full respect for private properties ... yes, we are promoting and protecting agricultural use of the land as a social function in national food production but we are also promoting national sovereignty and independence with our own (Venezuelan) food production and the rational use of land, natural resources and biodiversity to reduce the necessity of importing foodstuffs.
The law also establishes a total rejection of land invasions and squatting ... "the only thing that remains excluded under the law is any right to registration and land certifications where those who claim rights have opted for violent and illegal means to occupy agricultural land since October 1, 2001 when the law came into effect."
Title deeds to agricultural land allotments are extended only on uncultivated but otherwise productive farmlands in Venezuelan state ownership. Further down the line the Venezuelan government will examine the use (or lack of it) of land in private ownership, to determine if the land should be subject to compensated expropriation to be put into the hands of those who will make productive use of it ... "it is all being done in the best interests of the nation's economy, but against a backdrop of violent regional warlords who are determined to oppose the government in every way to preserve their ill-gotten privileges."
Venezuela's opposition dominated print & broadcast media has recently cited cases of alleged land invasion in Barinas State ... Adan Chavez says "they have made spurious claims without the slightest shred of evidence, claiming that where squatters have taken over some land, it has been done with the direct complicity of the National Executive ... they are playing to the gallery but the facts speak for themselves, the squatters do not have any backing of the government whatsoever."
Former Barinas Mayor Rogelio Pena says that his Santa Rita farmland has been invaded recently with the support of INTI officials and the National Guard (GN) ... Chavez, however, says that the land does not belong to Mayor Pena and that some 31,000 hectares of previously uncultivated terrain was allotted 400+ peasants belonging to the Brisas del Pasparro Cooperative. He explains that Mayor Pena is currently under investigation for alleged corruption in the appropriation of 7,000 hectares of land he claims he acquired, but cannot substantiate, whilst holding mayoral office from 1996 to 2000. "Pena is suspected of being one in a list of the most corrupt officials from previous governments who took advantage of their positions to steal lands that rightfully belong to the State."