<a href=www.vheadline.com>Venezuela's Electronic News Posted: Wednesday, June 04, 2003 By: Elio Cequea

Date: Wed, 04 Jun 2003 10:46:38 -0500 From: Elio Cequea Feico57@aol.com To: Editor@VHeadline.com Subject: I still don't see your problem with Jack Kemp

Dear Editor: I still don't see Gustavo Coronel's problem with Jack Kemp. According to Marc Lifsher, Mr. Kemp seems to be helping Venezuela to get some extra business. This might help to recuperate some of the losses caused by the "experts" strike.

An extra $1 billion in business over a three-year period paying only $50 million in commissions does not sound like a bad deal to me. But, do not quote me ... Coronel is the expert on matters of petroleum.

Going back to my original point: Why is it that we in Venezuela automatically consider anything from abroad better, clever and more credible? Let's see who is Marc Lifsher and what he has to say.

Marc Lifsher is The Wall Street Journal main man in Venezuela. In his writing he tends to follow the same type of reporting as many journalists who are sympathetic towards the opposition. He starts by stating: "Deal involving Jack Kemp and the Strategic Reserve worries some in industry." This is just part of the headline ... to support his argument that "some" are worried, Lifsher quotes somebody named Susan Jagger who he says is "an independent oil consultant in Connecticut."

Yes! That will give her credibility! She is quoted saying that the process to close the deal "is not as transparent as it should be." She is also quoted asking "why are there not more open negotiations between PDVSA and the market place?"

These comments leave no doubts in my mind that she must be a genius!

Nevertheless, what I want to point out is the fact that Lifsher contradicts himself trying to make his case. He indicates that the marketing relationship between Free Market Petroleum LLC and PDVSA has "raised eyebrows among oil executives because it introduces third-party intermediaries into commercial transactions that previously took placed directly between PDVSA and its buyers."

He forgot that he wrote only two paragraphs before that the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve "doesn't buy crude directly from producers."

How does he get to write for WSJ? A third party is the only way you can do business with the Reserve! Why bother to read the rest? ...I did though.

OK, enough of that!  I also took the time to check Coronel's source "Reporte Diario de la Economia" at www.reporte.com.ve with regard to Free Market Petroleum LLC being staffed with young inexperienced brokers ... "one of them rumored to be associated with Mark Rich."

Those reports, articles, opinions or news, whatever you want to call it, are NOT even signed!

Let me ask you a non-rhetorical question, where did you get the information that Rafael Ramirez ... with the silent participation of Ali Rodriguez ... formed Free Market Petroleum LLC?

I hope it was not Marta Colomina, Mr. Coronel.

If you keep using El Nacional as a source of information, what can I tell you? Those people sometimes "report from a report reported in a report that was reported by another newspaper." Do you see my point? I apologize if I sound condescending. but I know you are smarter than that.

More than a privilege, it is a responsibility to be able to write anything and get published. People use this information to make up their own criteria ... I am sure you can do a much better job than that,

Elio Cequea Feico57@aol.com

<a href=www.vheadline.com>Venezuela's Electronic news Posted: Thursday, May 29, 2003 By: David Sheegog

Date: Wed, 28 May 2003 21:41:24 -0500 From: David Sheegog davidsheegog@hotmail.com To: Editor@VHeadline.com Subject: Re: Chavez Frias deserves credit for initiatives

Dear Editor: Chavez has instigated enough reforms in land and home ownership to make a positive economic impact on the country. The program should continue. Those new "owners" are exactly what capitalism needs to create wealth. It was done at no real expense to anyone, and, once the dispossessed are enfranchised their economic behavior changes. Much as the difference between home-renters and home-owners in caring for and holding on to what they have ... there is no substitute for the pride of ownership in a capitalist system. The country will look better too.

I admit the farm cooperatives are a long shot to work. But the spirit of them is to enfranchise and empower people who are outside the economy at present. Getting people into the market is half the problem in countries such as Venezuela.

The black market ... a squatter's market, if you will ... contributes less than half its wealth generating power to a nation's productivity. Legitimate markets come into being from inclusive economic activity. Local food markets that the government sponsors are healthy inputs to productivity as well, for only slightly different reasons. Creating jobs to sanitize and improve living conditions in the barrios is an easy decision that also has disproportionately more positive economic impact than it's cost.

• The union reforms which he (Chavez) is attempting now, have the potential to increase the share of the nation's productivity of the lower middle class and the working poor.

The unions have not always served the workers who belong to them. That, unfortunately, is true of some unions in every country in the world. More transparency in union activity has been helpful for every union that has achieved it. The great middle class of the US was built largely on the strength of union activity from the 1920s to the 1970s, plus the gigantic wealth redistribution policies of the federal government between 1935 and 1960.

And of course, these and others reforms are important for Chavez to strengthen his political base as well. If he is to be successful in wresting control of Venezuela's political system away from the rich oligarchs who have controlled and owned it for so long ... and impoverished such a huge proportion of the population ... he must serve the political base from which he derives his voting strength.

David Sheegog davidsheegog@hotmail.com

<a href=www.vheadline.com>Venezuela's Electronic News Posted: Monday, May 19, 2003 By: Gustavo Coronel

VHeadline.com commentarist Gustavo Coronel writes: I am perplexed by a most peculiar phenomenon related to my published letters. <a href=www.vheadline.com>No matter to whom I write, I get an answer from ... what the Heck.

A Canadian gentleman who travels incessantly throughout Venezuela, apparently observes, makes notes, writes about his experiences ... like a modern De Toqueville, although not with the same clarity of vision. This is great. It's also great that he loves Hugo Chavez ... he does not have many rivals left ... he's most welcome to take him back home, after the referendum, so he can advise the Canadian government on, say, economic development.

I wrote President Chavez a public letter regarding PDVSA, but the President apparently delegated upwards to Mr. Heck to answer it. I must say that the letter reads like written by Hugo Chavez himself ... the opening statement about the opposition being "without conscience, illegal, unethical, immoral and criminal" sounds like vintage Chavez, who thinks that, by using five offensive adjectives in a row, his point will be valid. On the contrary, it becomes weaker due to its lack of restraint, which suggests a fragile state of mind.

Now the nation knows why Chavez does not answer letters. A few days ago, at a public meeting, Chavez scolded a young woman for trying to present him with a letter about her problem. He rebuked her: "Muchacha," he said  over the microphone, " I'm talking about important problems here and you bring me your personal problem ... let me talk ... I have a room full of little pieces of paper like yours."

And he added, using geologic language: "The tectonic fault of my government is the poor information..." looking at his helpless Minister of Information Nora Uribe.

Chavez' outburst illustrates his true personality ... the term "Muchacha" is used in a condescending manner, as "boy" would be used in the US south. Talking about a room full of papers shows poor social sensitivity ... browbeating his ministers in public reveals his dictatorial tendencies.

But, let us go back to Heck ... as in wreck. He claims that Chavez did not fire the PDVSA employees ... he said that was "crock" because "I was in Venezuela while most of this happened." This is a non sequitur, just as if he had said "I was scratching my left foot when most of this happened" because there is no logical connection between the two events. He realized this and went bravely on: "Chavez himself did not fire the employees ... he just read the list of names on TV..."

Apart from the fact that he did not read 18,000 names on TV (since that would have taken him about 17 hours), Heck badly insults our intelligence. According to his reasoning SAddam Hussein did not kill thousands of Iraqis because he did not personally pulled the trigger ... or Hitler did not murdered millions of Jews because he did not operate Treblinka ... or Chavez is not responsible for the deaths in 1992 because all he did was to lead the failed coup.

Heck is risking a diagnosis of infantilism. His other arguments are pitiful. They could not be fired personally. Heck says, because "they were partying in Miami or Aruba." This is a clear case of "foot-and- mouth" disease. Any decent corporation has to fire an employee personally, giving the reasons for the dismissal. What took place in PDVSA was a purge, in the worst sense of the word, as in the Soviet Union of Stalin.

Heck insists ... as does Chavez ... in calling PDVSA rebel employees "saboteurs and criminals."  In doing so, he does not produce a shred of evidence to support the libelous accusation. Heck is breaking our laws by doing this ... his charges are not only lacking in grace, but potentially subject to penal action. It is unacceptable to call 18,000 Venezuelans saboteurs and criminals in the indiscriminate manner he has done. In the name of my countrymen and women I protest this fascist attitude.

As if to leave no doubt of his intentions he added "They will never work in any other petroleum company again and deserve to be selling cakes in the streets." Blackballing, Mr. Heck, is not a mechanism utilized in democracies... In fact, it does not work as some of these people are already working in Saudi Arabia and ... possibly ... Canada.

Start your witch hunt...

If you really want to help our country use your self-claimed expertise in fraud investigation to fight corruption in the Venezuelan government, I am sure you will find plenty of work.

You mix some of the paragraphs of my article to give the impression that I advocate sabotage as a "value" of real managers. This is a childish maneuver, because anyone who read my editorial knows that I defined "Meritocracy," "apoliticism" and "professional management" as the values which guided the real PDVSA. Meritocracy, by the way, has to do with performance and personal behavior, not directly connected with academic excellence.

Although I always welcome a dignified and civilized discussion, Mr. Heck's piece fell short of these standards. I suggest that he reads <a href=www.vheadline.com>commentaries by Burnett or the <a href=www.vheadline.com classy Dauphin-Gloire to inspire him ... he seemed to be improving but suddenly had a regression...

Keep trying ... do not give up hope.

Gustavo Coronel is the founder and president of Agrupacion Pro Calidad de Vida (The Pro-Quality of Life Alliance), a Caracas-based organization devoted to fighting corruption and the promotion of civic education in Latin America, primarily Venezuela. A member of the first board of directors (1975-1979) of Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA), following nationalization of Venezuela's oil industry, Coronel has worked in the oil industry for 28 years in the United States, Holland, Indonesia, Algiers and in Venezuela. He is a Distinguished alumnus of the University of Tulsa (USA) where he was a Trustee from 1987 to 1999. Coronel led the Hydrocarbons Division of the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) in Washington DC for 5 years. The author of three books and many articles on Venezuela ("Curbing Corruption in Venezuela." Journal of Democracy, Vol. 7, No. 3, July, 1996, pp. 157-163), he is a fellow of Harvard University and a member of the Harvard faculty from 1981 to 1983.  In 1998, he was presidential election campaign manager for Henrique Salas Romer and now lives in retirement on the Caribbean island of Margarita where he runs a leading Hotel-Resort.  You may contact Gustavo Coronel at email gustavo@vheadline.com

<a href=www.vheadline.com>Venezuela's Electronic News Posted: Sunday, May 18, 2003 By: Elio Cequea

Date: Fri, 16 May 2003 19:04:57 -0500 From: Elio Cequea Feico57@aol.com To: Editor@VHeadline.com Subject: In his open letter to the President Hugo Chavez

Dear Editor: In his <a href=www.vheadline.com>open letter to the President Hugo Chavez, Gustavo Coronel forgets about basic moral principles and continues to play politics. I am with the President. These people should not be hired back. They decided to play the game and lost.

The PDVSA managers went on strike convinced that the government and the authorities of the oil company would fall in less than a week. The decision was based on two known assumptions. The first one was that Venezuela's economy could not survive without PDVSA. The second was that the company could not operate without them.

At this moment, one of the conjectures has been proven: Venezuela cannot survive without PDVSA. However, on the other hand, the fallacy of the second conjecture has been exposed. As some sympathizers of the government call it, the MERITocracy resulted in a true MYTHocracy.

PDVSA operations have been almost fully normalized. Now these people are asking the same authorities they tried to expel to reinstate them. Their argument is the same argument they used when they decided to go on strike: the company cannot operate without them ... it is just amazing!

Venezuela needs people with principles ... especially at that level!

We need people that choose to play and win or lose with dignity.

Let's not waste this opportunity to teach ourselves a historical lesson as a nation ... we have to learn to assume responsibility for our decisions.

We have to learn also to live with the consequences.

They played it. They lost it. Accept the consequences!

Grow up Gustavo ... it is a matter of principles!

Elio Cequea Feico57@aol.com

Forbes Steve Forbes, 05.26.03, 12:00 AM ET

Theres another foreign policy problem brewing, this time in our own hemisphere--an attempt to make Venezuela a second Cuba. Strongman Hugo Chávez, who led an unsuccessful coup attempt in 1992, was elected president in 1998 in a popular vote of revulsion against the embedded corruption of the existing political elites. Since then, Chávez has been doing everything he can to turn his "presidency" into a dictatorship like Fidel Castro's. He used his initial popularity to gut constitutional checks on his power. Regime opponents now face arrest and even outright murder. Chávez is setting up vigilante committees in neighborhoods to inform on people. These committees also serve as an armed militia to back Chávez. 

Venezuela has been a democracy since 1958, when a courageous leader, Rómulo Betancourt established representative government following a dictatorship. In the early 1960s Betancourt beat back Castro's efforts to overthrow Venezuela's democracy. Now Chávez wants to turn back the clock. He's cozied up to terrorist groups around the world, including those waging a murderous guerrilla war in neighboring Colombia.

Venezuelans of all classes and occupations have taken to the streets to protest Chávez's actions. He was thrown out briefly in a coup last year, but the coup collapsed when it became clear that the old corrupt elites were going to return to their money-grabbing ways and would take their time restoring democracy. Chávez's smile, however, was soon wiped off his face as spontaneous protests continued. There was a general strike a few months ago, the effects of which sharply reduced Venezuela's oil production. But Chávez has clung to power.

Whether Chávez's rule should continue is supposed to be the subject of a referendum in August, but this Castro wannabe has made it clear he won't leave office voluntarily. He will either try to postpone the election or use his armed thugs to rig the results.

The U.S. has reacted gingerly lest Chávez play the anti-U.S. card--always an option in Latin America--to shore up his sagging popularity. The U.S. should make clear that a clean August vote must take place--that Chávez must not be allowed to set up a virtual dictatorship, even if that means oil prices go up because we embargo Venezuela's oil exports. When Venezuelans see that we're serious about Chávez, perhaps their army will do what it should have done a long time ago--send Chávez to Havana on a permanent vacation--and then promptly return to the barracks.