<a href=www.vheadline.com>Venezuela's Electronic news Posted: Monday, June 02, 2003 By: Patrick J. O'Donoghue

The South American Vaccination Week kicked off on Sunday and Venezuela aims at vaccinating more than a million and a half children against measles and other viral diseases. 

President Hugo Chavez Frias says the campaign will last till June 8 and costs 7 billion bolivares. Anti-measles shots will be administered to a quarter of a million children between 6-11 months,  500,000 1-year olds,  212,000 2-4 yr. olds, 480,000 from 5-29 years, as well as 28, 500 between 5-14 years living in border areas. 

Vaccinations to counter polio, and hepatitis B and the famous triple will be applied . The President claims that when he took office infant mortality stood at 25 of 1,000 and now it is 17 of every 1,000 ... "it's still too high." 

Metropolitan Mayor Alfredo Peña visited J.M de Los Rios Children's hospital to review the start of the campaign and took the opportunity to complain that the municipal health budget has been reduced 50%. 

• Peña reveals that 60% of patients in Caracas hospitals are from the provinces causing overcrowding and lack of medical supplies.

Referring to 900 million bolivares that the government approved to treat children with heart condition, Pena admits he doesn't know where it is and angrily reports that the donation of hospital equipment from Spain has been diverted to the Finance Ministry for one reason or another.

<a href=www.vheadline.com>Venezuela's Electronic News Posted: Tuesday, May 20, 2003 By: David Cabrera

Date: Tue, 20 May 2003 13:24:07 +0100 From: David Cabrera davidckr@yahoo.com To: Editor@VHeadline.com Subject: nothing more than back-to-back trash talk

Dear Editor: I have a little problem that I saw fit at this moment for you to help me figure out. It seems obvious to me that what Mr. Coronel and Mr. Heck are getting into is nothing more than back-to-back trash talk, some kind of personal grievances that both are determined to war about until nobody knows when.

But I have to be realistic this time ... <a href=www.vheadline.com>although there may be things that I agree with Mr. Heck, at least I have to recognize that he's been honest enough as to declare himself a supporter of Chavez and his policies. I suppose it is because he identifies himself ideologically with the Venezuelan political process or because he simply likes the way Chavez tells his speeches, who knows.

The truth of the matter is that Mr. Heck, as also Mr. Coronel, speaks and writes what's on his mind.

Now, while reading <a href=www.vheadline.com>Mr. Coronel's articles, I also find a lot of discrepancies and contradictions that are hard to disguise. Take for example what hr wrote in his reply to Mr. Heck, where he insinuates that Chavez has his own paid personnel ready to combat letter-oriented criticism, and this he says is based on the fact that people for one reason or another realize that what he writes in his articles is solely HIS point of view ... not that of others who find his writings dubious and untrue in many cases, or they maybe would disagree with him because they are Chavistas.

Thus, in my opinion, it is simplistic and unprofessional that he does away with criticism by simply saying that those people are government-hired men determined to make him look bad. Well, if that is the case, one can judge by looking at his credentials as Salas Romer's campaign advisor and deduce that he just doesn't limit himself to answer for Mr. Salas although it is not necessary to name him to make his point ... but that he is also engaged in an anti-Chavez campaign on behalf of Mr. Salas through journalistism. I am positive he wouldn't want to be called somebody else's puppet ... but if one uses his methods of containing criticism, it would be fair then to say that Mr. Gustavo Coronel will be welcome to shut up, after the referendum, because it is obvious that Chavez won't lose it and Mr. Coronel's boss is doomed to failure if elections are to be held.

On the other hand Mr. Coronel, I could see that you love to talk about the "dictatorial tendencies" embedded in Chavez' government. I would like to ask you then, how many times has your house been raided by the government's secret police because of your political positions, as you know it was common to happen in past governments when the President at-the-time would get rid of bothersome journalists? Or how much time have you served in prison due to the same reasons?

In case you feel like making analogies between the present and the past, I recommend you to talk to Dr. Marcel Granier so he could broaden your mind with regard to compliant media and government, bribes, jailed journalists, and all about restrictions on freedom of speech in past years. Undoubtedly, one of Dr. Granier's favorite subjects he would want to share with you would be the scandal behind the El Diario de Caracas back in the eighties.

About the PDVSA affair, there are certain things that I have to agree with you, one of them being that it is wrong to call all of the fired personnel saboteurs and terrorists. You have a point with that, but you fail to address properly the complexity behind the issue. For example, you claimed that the values which guided the real PDVSA were "Meritocracy," "apoliticism" and "professional management."

• Would you mind telling me what real PDVSA was that one ... the Calderon Berti's PDVSA? Or the Luis Giustis PDVSA?

What type of meritocracy was that one that allowed Calderon Berti and Luis Giusti to handpick their friends from COPEI and Maraven to hold key positions in the company, pretty much a la Cisneros and his Pedro Tinoco in the Banco Central during the CAP years?

Would you mind describing the "professional management" that so characterized PDVSA when the magazine America Economia ranked it first in turnover income but at the same time among the least efficient Latin American corporations?

What kind of professional management is that which has almost inverted the state royalties and operational costs relation of 80-20% in 1976 to 20-80% twenty-four years later?

As far as I'm concerned, you don't have to be a prominent economist to figure out that the logic behind all corporations is to maximize profits and reduce costs as possible, then why shouldn't the same principle apply to a state-owned company?

Isn't an excess of costs to keep almost a substantial part of the personnel doing office jobs in Caracas, where there is not a single oil-field? And most important of all, why a handful of managers claim to themselves the right to decide the fate of a state-owned company whose shareholders are the 23 million-plus Venezuelans who are entitled to benefit from it?

Don't you think that by recycling petrodollars through outsourcing and joint ventures it responds only to the interests of those doing business inside it (Giusti, the former managers, UNOCAL, SAIC, including countless of other subsidiaries) and that by allowing PDVSA go the path it was taking it was going to lead eventually to its privatization?

Don't you realize either that the strategies of transnational oil capital are not compatible at all with the national interests of our country, that one of the biggest aims for people like Cheney and Bush is to undermine the efforts of oil-producing countries on protecting their exports, pretty much like the US protects its own?

When you carefully study these issues you would surely make clear conclusions as to whom the dismissed professional management was really working for.

You also like to talk about fascism. You accuse Mr. Heck of being a fascist, because you surely expected people such as myself to jump happily, party around or to sit idly while seeing how our oil corporation was literally being destroyed, including pirate-hijacking of oil tankers, damaging pipelines, valves, electric systems, computers, and countless other marvels that cost us all more than $5 billion.

So we are supposed ... including a Chavista like Mr. Heck ... to celebrate such noble achievement in the name of democracy? On top of that, Chavez-haters were supposed to sacrifice to get the tyrant out (to borrow Carlos Ortega's words) all while Carlos Fernandez sacrificed himself in Aruba by drinking whisky under a hot and pleasant Caribbean sun, and the meritocratic Juan Fernandez traveled on private jets all around Venezuela to lead the resistance against the "barbaric dictatorship" of Hugo Chavez.

But, incidentally, it was not them but the "mas pendejos" who had to carry the burden of the so-called strike by making hours and sometimes one-day-long lines at the gas stations, watching 24/7 sickening propaganda on TV throughout the month and part of the next one, and suffering a corporate lock-out nationwide.

At the end Chavez remained in power, broken promises were easily forgotten, and the entrepreneurs who stopped during the strike started a firing exodus that surpassed that of PDVSA ... but you stopped short of calling these people fascists maybe because you were optimistic that by the methods they employed, Chavez would eventually be overthrown.

Unfortunately for you and the meritocratic warriors, the end was another one. However, it just shows that the term fascism, terrorism or other epithets are only to be used when the enemy ... in your case Chavez, his hordes and Oscar Heck ... dare to denounce actions that led to irreversible damage for the nations economy and to us all. In fact, when a real fascist attitude such as that witnessed in the following days after last-year's coup, it logically did not elicit outrage or condemnation at all from you, because of course, it was not Chavez who killed the 70 people during those two precious days of democracy, it was instead Carmona and his associates who gave the orders.

But you know, this was not fascism, people with a mindset to blame Chavez for the evils of the society since 1998 would have you believe that these murders during the post-coup days were a product of measures to keep the public order from focuses of resistance pretty much like the euphemisms the media and the government employed in the 1989s genocide better known as El Caracazo.

Or at a lesser extent, take the assault on the Cuban embassy last year for instance. That was not an act of fascism they say, and it weren't hordes the people who behaved themselves that day like what they usually accuse Chavistas of being. Instead, the opposition hordes are commonly presented as peaceful demonstrators, such as those who smashed the windows of diplomatic vehicles, deprived them of electricity and water and threatened to lynch them if they didn't hand over suspected Chavistas hiding in the embassy.

• Mr. Coronel ... did you,  in the name of all of your countrymen, condemn, this act of fascism?

Judging from the high morals that you withhold, don't you agree and ... to use your own words ... that these events could be subject to penal action?

Don't you also think that by the media denying or justifying these actions would make it unacceptable for honest people like yourself to bear?

What about the humble people who are not thugs and criminals, and happen to be hardworking laborers or housekeepers that support Chavez, when all they read is hatred toward them in the newspapers, and toward anything that smells like Chavez and to what they identify with?

Who is alienating who then?

Or when the media comes with fancy stories such as Aristobulo Isturiz buying luxurious yachts, why didn't you Mr. Coronel ask for a shred of evidence to support the libelous accusation?

It seems to me that you simply don't care, that's about it.

After all it is Chavez' supporters who are being attacked, so why should you bother to raise concern about their constitutional rights? As long as it is Chavez and his supporters who denounce what they consider wrong, then that's when you think that a shred of evidence is needed to support libelous accusations.

Therefore Mr. Coronel, I think you should respond appropriately to criticism without falling yourself into the same standards of Ybelise Pacheco's journalism.

I think that you are entitled to have your opinions and to express them as well, but if credibility and respect mean anything to you, I guess you should be more objective and fair before getting into blame game and citing vague examples to back your statements and insulting others who don't share your views.

The same goes to Mr. Heck of course.

David Cabrera davidckr@yahoo.com Caracas, Venezuela

<a href=www.vheadline.com>Venezuela's Electronic News Posted: Sunday, May 11, 2003 By: Patrick J. O'Donoghue

Venezuelan Executive Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel has received a visit from the US non government organization called The Foreign Relations Council (FRC).  

Rangel spoke for more than three hours with International Crisis Group deputy president and FRC official, Mark Scheider, Robert Orr, Julia E. Sweig, George Folsom, Williams L. Nash, Daniel Chistman and John G. Heimann. 

After the meeting a spokesman for the visitors said it will continue exchanges with government officials and "relevant institutions" to draw up a report entitled, "Beyond Drugs: A USA strategy for Regional Challenges of Colombia and the Andes." 

The report will revolve around economic development and enforcement of law and security in Colombia, Ecuador and Venezuela. 

Rangel says he thinks the visitors took away a good impression of Venezuelan border policy and bilateral relations with the USA.

<a href=www.vheadline.com>Venezuela's Electronic News Posted: Sunday, May 11, 2003 By: Patrick J. O'Donoghue

Venezuelan Executive Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel has received a visit from the US non government organization called The Foreign Relations Council (FRC).  

Rangel spoke for more than three hours with International Crisis Group deputy president and FRC official, Mark Scheider, Robert Orr, Julia E. Sweig, George Folsom, Williams L. Nash, Daniel Chistman and John G. Heimann. 

After the meeting a spokesman for the visitors said it will continue exchanges with government officials and "relevant institutions" to draw up a report entitled, "Beyond Drugs: A USA strategy for Regional Challenges of Colombia and the Andes." 

The report will revolve around economic development and enforcement of law and security in Colombia, Ecuador and Venezuela. 

Rangel says he thinks the visitors took away a good impression of Venezuelan border policy and bilateral relations with the USA.

<a href=www.vheadline.com>venezuela's Electronic News Posted: Wednesday, April 30, 2003 By: Kira Marquez Perez

VHeadline.com commentarist Kira Marquez Perez writes: Before Mr. Coronel published his open letter to me, we had exchanged a couple of e-mails in which we had discussed my comments on his editorial from April 28.

Since Mr. Coronel has decided now to share the subject with all of you, I would also like to do the same. Here are some of my answers to him:

As I have mentioned in many of my commentaries in VHeadline.com before, I believe that every democracy needs a good opposition to keep it working. Actually, I think it is very good that Mr. Coronel expresses his opinions against Mr. Chavez' government (which he does quite often) and I respect his position, too. I know he believes in what he writes.

I particularly support the existence of a sane opposition in Venezuela (and I would like to emphasize the word SANE) … this opposition should be only against the government and not against the whole country; and here I come to my point: Mr. Coronel's editorial (contrary to most of his commentaries, with which I sometimes do not agree, but which I always find interesting) was clearly against Venezuela.

Mr. Coronel knows very well that PDVSA is the main source of income for our country. It is absolutely all right that Mr. Coronel criticizes PDVSA if he wants (I've done it myself several times). It is also all right that he criticizes Mr. Ali Rodriguez if he doesn't like him. It is ok if he says that Mr. Rodriguez used to be a terrorist. And . if there is evidence of that (and Mr. Coronel says there is), then, of course, he can say it ... and he even has my support for his criticism, since I support clean and authentic journalism (which is quite hard to find).

However, I believe Mr. Coronel is damaging our country when he asks foreign companies not to invest or work in Venezuela ... and that's what I mean when I talk about “being fanatic” with his comments. It is absolutely all right if Mr. Coronel doesn't like Chavez … but is that a good reason enough to push away potential investors and to wish that nobody even thinks of coming to Venezuela to invest his money as long as Chavez is here?

As Mr. Coronel pointed out himself in his editorial, Mr. Chavez will someday leave the Presidency (it may be in a couple of months but it may also be in several years. Nobody knows). That fact is that even after Mr. Chavez is gone, Venezuela will remain. Venezuela ú- and not Chavez -- is going to suffer the consequences of all this. That's why I believe that when Mr. Coronel tells potential investors to not come to our country, he's attacking Venezuela and not Chavez.

You can't be prepared and willing to destroy the whole country just to get rid of one person … and he knows that Venezuela's economic isolation will only contribute to destroy the country and definitely not  improve it.

As I mentioned in my e-mail to Mr. Coronel, I didn't like our corrupt ex-President Carlos Andres Perez at all (and I'm sure you've realized that already if you read any of my other commentaries). However, I certainly would have never even thought of asking foreign investors at that time not to come to Venezuela or not to do business with Mr. Perez just because I didn't like him. That would have done nothing against him ... it would have affected only me and the rest of the Venezuelans!

I had never thought of asking the USA to invade our country to get rid of Mr. Perez … Actually, although I didn't like Mr. Perez (who was so corrupt that he totally ruined our country), I never agreed with the 1992 coups against him, because I respect democracy above all.  So … I just believe we should know the limits and consequences of our words.

Now I would like to comment on some remarks made by Mr. Coronel in his open letter:

• First of all, Mr. Coronel made a very good point. He stated that the world is also made of decent and idealistic persons. I agree with him and I have never doubted about his decency or his idealism. Probably Mr. Coronel didn't see the following sentence in my writing: “In this particular, I must say that I was shocked to read Mr. Coronel's latest editorial” … which means:

First: that I was not connecting Mr. Coronel to the previous paragraphs but only to one particular point of my editorial i.e. to the fact that he was attacking Venezuela as a means of attacking Chavez; and

Second: that I was shocked to read such a commentary coming from a person like him (who knows very well what the effects of his words can be). However, it seems that Mr. Coronel felt the need to magnify and interpret my words in another way to make the story sound more interesting.

-Mr. Coronel says that millions of Venezuelans oppose Chavez at the expense of their tranquility and financial stability. To this I can only say that he's right in the issue that many people have been used by some others (like Cisneros or Poleo) who are definitely only protecting their own interests. For people like Cisneros, getting rid of Chavez at any cost is really an investment, and that's why they still haven't given up in spite of so many defeats. The fact that the amount of people that attend the opposition rallies has diminished dramatically in the last months ... and that in spite of the shows, music, bailoterapias-aerobic dancing), TV-starts, camping and all other activities the organizers have invented to attract attendants ... is a very clear evidence that the people are tired of being used. They believe they have been fooled by their pseudo-leaders and they're tired of it.

• Mr. Coronel talks about facts. I have always included facts in my critics against our “radical opposition”. Mr. Coronel did the same in his criticism of Mr. Ali Rodriguez (which is fair). However, it seems to me that Mr. Coronel wants to minimize the terrorist and sabotage attacks of the “radical opposition” in PDVSA and in many other areas of Venezuela's economical and social life. I hope I am wrong about that. I wouldn't dare to say that all accidents and oil spills are exclusively a result of sabotage, but many of them certainly were ... and it was not a coincidence that valves and pipe-lines in the Maracaibo Lake had been purposely damaged and that a helicopter from Globovision was there exactly at the right time and that right moment to film it all.

• Mr. Coronel also claims in his letter that the opposition is not damaging the image and the economical stability of our country abroad. Once again we seem to disagree in this point. I ask:

1. Who organized a coup d'etat against Venezuela's constitutional government and additionally exported edited, manipulated and twisted videos of the events of April 11 to other countries?
2. Who tried to stop and block all economic and social activities in the country for two months (including PDVSA, as well as schools, universities, banks, etc) and drove us to the price and exchange controls that Mr. Coronel so strongly criticizes?
3. Who went almost every week to Washington to ventilate internal affairs (telling only their twisted version of the events)? At this point I must say that before and during the war in Iraq there were peace demonstrations all over the world. The radical opposition in Venezuela demonstrated in front of the US Embassy as well … but ... there was one big difference: they were not demonstrating against the war in Iraq but because the USA had still not intervened in Venezuela. Can you believe that?

• Is that sane? Does that show love for their country? Definitely not. And … do you know who organized this demonstration? Gente del Petroleo (the “brilliant” managers of PDVSA).

4. Who invented that we are living in a dictatorship with no freedom of expression, while the opposition owns all the private media and presents a 24-hour anti-Chavez programming? That is a barefaced lie… and you know it, too, Mr. Coronel.
5. Who is responsible for the 80% poverty in Venezuela? Are you going to tell us now that this is new?

I could also go on and on…but I think it is not necessary.

• Mr. Coronel asks for a rapid return of PDVSA to a non-political management. What does he mean? Who is he talking about? Is he talking about Guaicaipuro Lameda? Is he talking about Juan Fernandez? Has Mr. Coronel forgotten that these “non-political” managers that he's talking about went to a very political strike just a few months ago?. They were not asking for improved salaries or for better working conditions. They were asking for the resignation of the President and they didn't care to take the country to such a chaotic situation.

Their political strike affected not only Chavez but also me and you, Mr. Coronel.

To conclude, I would like to say that I love Venezuela, too, and that I therefore oppose any attacks against her. Your points of view concerning Chavez or Rodriguez are valid and I respect them, but I will always respond when I feel the attacks are directed to us (Venezuelans) and that was the case in your editorial from April 28.

With my very best wishes, Kira Marquez Perez.

Kira Marquez Perez was born in Merida where she studied chemistry at the Universidad de los Andes (ULA) with a scholarship from PDVSA as a reward for outstanding participation in the Chemistry Olympics.  She obtained her Diploma (Licenciatura) in 1997 and entered the oil industry the same year,  working in process engineering and quality improvement. Kira has participated in many seminars and congresses all over the world and has won several national and international prizes.  She currently lives in Germany, where she is doing a PhD in Electrochemistry at the Heinrich-Heine-Universitat Dusseldorf ... before that, she lived and studied in England and the USA and speaks several languages fluently.