Venezuela's Chavez suffers first-ever defeat in legislature

AP, Thursday, Jun 12, 2003, Page 6

In their first-ever defeat, pro-government legislators narrowly lost a vote that would have ratified new parliamentary procedures aimed at speeding up passage of legislation backed by President Hugo Chavez.

The vote was over the legality of an outdoor session held Friday in a poor Caracas neighborhood considered a bastion of support for Chavez. Pro-Chavez lawmakers convened there to approve the new parliamentary debate rules two days after ruling party and opposition legislators ended up in a shoving match inside the legislative palace. They argued the session was necessary to prevent the opposition from "sabotaging" the National Assembly.

The 79 opposition legislators boycotted the session, saying they feared being attacked by Chavez sympathizers.

After a five-hour debate, Tuesday's vote ended with 82 in favor of the legality of Friday's session, 79 against and three abstentions. It was one vote short of the 50 percent plus one needed for approval. One member of the 165-member unicameral National Assembly didn't attend the debate.

It was the first defeat for Chavez's multiparty ruling coalition since the 2000 general elections that gave the president an almost two-thirds congressional majority. That majority has eroded to a handful of seats over the past three years after several allies defected to the opposition.

The government's loss Tuesday is another headache for a president facing calls for a referendum on his rule later this year. The opposition is trying to organize the vote under a pact brokered by the Organization of American States designed to bring stability to a country convulsed in the past year by a failed coup and a ruinous general strike.

Chavez 's opponents accuse the former army paratroop commander of trying to install an authoritarian regime modeled after Cuba's. Chavez says that a resentful "oligarchy" is sabotaging his efforts to bring social equality to Venezuela.

The vote Tuesday could mean that Chavez may have trouble passing several key laws, including one to tighten restrictions on the media. That law would require that 60 percent of programming be produced within Venezuela, half of which would have to be created by "independent producers" approved by the government. Broadcasters say the law would give too much influence to censors hand-picked by Chavez to crack down on the mostly opposition news media.

A shouting match erupted Tuesday after ruling party legislators demanded a third recount, which the opposition said would be illegal under both the new and old rules. National Assembly President Francisco Ameliach refused to accept the defeat and suspended the session until Thursday.

"We've been tolerating your majority for four years and you for the first time are incapable of accepting a defeat gracefully," opposition lawmaker Cesar Perez Vivas shouted in Ameliach's face. "Get used to it. It's the first of many."

Opposition legislators have also challenged the legality of Friday's session in the Supreme Court.