Fired Venezuela Oil Strikers Jobless but Defiant

asia.reuters.com Thu March 20, 2003 12:11 PM ET By Pascal Fletcher

CARACAS, Venezuela (Reuters) - Four months ago, Migdalia Salazar and Cecilia Hernandez had cushy office jobs at Venezuela's state oil firm Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA), one of the giants of the oil world.

Today, jobless and struggling to keep their family budgets afloat, they are selling homemade cakes and pastries at a makeshift stall outside their old office in east Caracas.

Fired with 16,000 other PDVSA employees for joining a recent two-month opposition strike against leftist President Hugo Chavez, the two are fighting to come to terms with their new status among the ranks of Venezuela's unemployed.

"I can't say that we're feeling happy. This is tough for all of us," said Hernandez, 45, as she waved away flies from a cloth-covered table offering potato omelets and cakes.

As a bilingual secretary of 23 years service in PDVSA's operations department, she and other fired colleagues enjoyed some of the best-paid and most coveted state jobs in the poverty-plagued nation, the world's No. 5 oil exporter.

But their lives as members of the country's envied professional elite were turned upside down in early December after they joined an opposition walkout seeking to force populist Chavez to resign and hold early elections. His foes accuse him of trying to install Cuban-style communism.

The tenacious former paratrooper, who survived a coup last year, refused to budge and ordered the strikers fired in their thousands, vilifying them as "traitors" and "terrorists" trying to topple him. The fired workers represent more than 40 percent of the original PDVSA work force.

Chavez, who makes a point of emphasizing his own humble background, displays little sympathy for the fired strikers. While they held their jobs, their average living standard was far above the destitution experienced by the impoverished majority of Venezuela's population.

Invoking the social and economic fault lines that bisect Venezuela's society, Chavez portrays the PDVSA rebels as a snobbish, insensitive "mafia" whom he accuses of plundering the country's oil wealth while turning their backs on the poor.

COME DOWN IN THE WORLD

Most found out about their dismissals through daily newspapers, where the government published long lists of the executives and employees being removed from their posts.

"I was fired twice, in two lists," said Maria Gabriela Gil, who used to work for PDVSA's technology and information department but now staffs the strikers' cake stall.

The fired oil employees are now rallying together to survive, setting up a solidarity fund to help out the most needy of their out-of-work colleagues and organizing raffles, bingo games, dances, markets and cake sales to raise money.

Salazar, a 56-year-old mother of three who worked for PDVSA for 34 years and speaks English and French, is unrepentant.

"This is all about resistance. We're not moving an inch," said the veteran oil company staffer, who before the strike served in PDVSA's external relations department attending foreign oil delegations and helping to organize conferences.

But some of the fired workers, who range from highly paid executives and engineers to secretaries and field workers such as welders and divers, are already feeling the pinch from not having received a paycheck for several months.

"I think the majority of us are already living off our savings," said Mirna Santella, who had worked as a supervisor at the PDVSA petrochemicals affiliate Pequiven.

The strikers have set up a meeting place outside PDVSA offices in east Caracas, a hotbed of opposition to Chavez. They gather daily around the building to plan their next protests against the government, organize solidarity campaigns or simply to offer each other advice, sympathy and support.

"There is a sense of family that is being maintained ... It's as if the company is existing on the street," said Rafael Porras, a former advisor for strategic planning in PDVSA's exploration and production department.

HOPING TO RETURN, BUT WHEN?

Porras said private companies and individuals were supporting the solidarity fund with donations. Associations of doctors and psychologists, insurance firms and even landlords' groups were also offering services, facilities, credits and discounts to make life easier for the fired workers.

But Porras said the strikers were so far avoiding holding mass public collections in the streets because they are aware that even without jobs they are still better off for the moment than the vast majority of unemployed Venezuelans.

The strikers maintain the hope that, sooner or later, they will be going back to the company. "We're doing this with the conviction that we are going to return," said Gil.

But the question is when. Chavez says most of the recent PDVSA strikers actively backed the short-lived coup against him in April 2002 and vows they will not be given another chance to cause mischief in the country's most strategic industry.

"There will be no forgiveness for anyone. Traitors are traitors. They can't come back and they won't come back," the president said earlier this month as he swore in a new, firmly pro-government management of PDVSA.

This means that the former PDVSA employees are banking on Chavez being pressured or voted out of office well before he completes his current term due to end in early 2007.

The president has resisted opposition calls for early elections. But his government says it accepts the idea of a binding recall referendum which under the constitution can be held after August 19, half-way through Chavez's current term.

"He's going, before August," said Hernandez optimistically.

Opposition leaders struggling to negotiate a deal on elections with the government have promised the fired PDVSA workers their reinstatement will be a condition of any political agreement. Government negotiators have dismissed this demand as a non-starter but the strikers see it as a lifeline.

SABOTAGE DENIED

But the PDVSA rebels insist they will not go back while the company remains under Chavez loyalists, such as the current president, former left-wing guerrilla Ali Rodriguez. He served as secretary general of the oil exporters' cartel OPEC before he took over as PDVSA president last year following the coup.

Chavez has called for the arrest of the oil industry strikers, accusing them of seriously damaging the national economy and sabotaging the installations they abandoned.

State prosecutors issued arrest orders for seven leading PDVSA strikers, forcing them into hiding, but an appeals court later quashed the orders, alleging legal flaws.

The strikers deny any sabotage and say the faults, fires and oil spills that have occurred at refineries and fields in the last few months were caused by inexperienced personnel and troops brought in by the government to replace them.

Nevertheless, the government says it is gradually restoring the country's oil operations to normal. The strikers dispute this, saying the company will never recover its former output and export levels unless the fired workers are reinstated.

www.nationnews.com Thursday 20, March-2003 by ROXANNE GIBBS

February 23: A man by the name of Colonel Michael Dewar, formerly of the British Army, tells a group of editors gathered in Sri Lanka that war against Iraq would take place in mid-March.

I was among the editors. Here is what he said: “The launch date would most likely be mid-March. That would allow for a second resolution at the United Nations. It would also allow British forces to get in place, train and acclimatise. It would allow United States logistic support to get in place and for axis from Turkey to be developed”.

About weather conditions there, he said: “Temperatures in Iraq will be about 100 degrees Fahrenheit during the day from April, thus the coalition will wish to finish the bombing campaign at the latest by early April.”

He also confessed that sandstorms were possible.

On the timeline: The war, he said, would last “inside one week”. “There will be an intense 48-hour aerial bombardment. There will then be a rapid advance on the main centres including Basra, Baghdad, Nasiriyah, Kirkuk and Mosul. The Iraqi forces will collapse or surrender very quickly.

“When he sees the writing on the wall, Saddam is likely to make a run for it, possibly to Libya. The United States and Britain would be quite happy with that. Having to put the man on trial would be complex and unpredictable in its consequences,” Dewar said.

In answer to a question, he stated emphatically: “This war has nothing to do with oil.”

And: “Thank God for America”, he said, to a question as to why America believed that it could dictate to another country how it should run its internal affairs.

“Would you have preferred it to be Russia running the world?” he said indignantly.

That was one side of the story.

February 26: Abdel bari Atwan, the editor-in-chief of a Pan-Arab newspaper in London, painted another picture when it was his turn to speak, days after after the colonel was safely back in London (there was no way the two could have been in the room together).

In an equally spirited and passionate address, he told editors that the expected war in Iraq had little to do with weapons of mass destruction, democracy, human rights, or the ignoring of United Nations demands; but was anchored in a sadistic need by Washington to remove Hussein from office.

Every time United States President George Bush gave a reason for the war and the reason was no longer valid, he came up with a new reason, Atwan said.

“The reason for this war is to make George’s mummy happy,” said the Arab editor who once interviewed bin Laden. “He would have avenged his father’s death threat from Saddam, so his mummy would be happy. He promised her to take care of the ‘bully’,” he said cynically, much to the amusement of many in the room.

His view was that the war would last much longer than the Americans anticipated.

He also spoke of Bush’s statements that Hussein had ties to bin Laden (the suspected terrorist of the 9/11 tragedy).

“Everybody in the Arab world knows that bin Laden hates Saddam and vice versa. bin Laden will be happy if Bush destroys Saddam . . . Bush must be the only person who doesn’t know that,” he said.

He described Bush in exactly the same words that Bush used to describe Saddam . . . sadistic, a dictator, a madman and a tyrant.

At the end of the presentation he made a dash for the airport where he caught the next flight back to London.

Left me saying hmmm . . . .

I remember, ten years ago, the world supported the defeat of Iraq after it had invaded Kuwait. At that time an international coalition went into the Persian Gulf and removed the Iraqis from Kuwait. Iraq had violated the sovereignty of another nation.

Now what has happened to America’s commitment then to: “a just world order based on respect for the rule of law and social justice and peace . . . .”

Since taking office, President George Bush has sought to tell Venezuela why its elected President Hugo Chavez should leave . . . . it has done all it could to engineer the ouster of Arafat, the Palestinian leader . . . our own Minister of Foreign Affairs Billie Miller is right when she asks: “Who will be next?”

How could we justify such a war in the name of peace . . . ?

And . . . the $25 million question – whatever happened to bin Laden?

Venezuela case study: Iron deficiency is costly, finds study

20/03/03 Anaemic adults and children cost developing countries billions of dollars in lost productivity, according to a recent study.

"One in three of the world's population suffers from anaemia so this has tremendous economic consequences," said Sue Horton, a University of Toronto economics professor and lead author of the study, ‘The Economics of Iron Deficiency’. The economic loss due to iron deficiency in South Asia alone is staggering: close to $4.2 billion is lost annually in Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka and Pakistan. Adults who lack sufficient iron in their diets are more lethargic which leads to lower productivity, while the motor and cognitive development of small children is also impaired.

Horton and co-author Jay Ross, an epidemiologist from the non-profit organisation Academy for Educational Development, calculated the economic impact of iron deficiencies in 10 developing countries in South Asia, Central America, Africa and the Middle East. They found that, on average, a country loses 0.6 per cent of its gross domestic product (GDP) due to physical productivity losses from adults lacking iron. When learning and motor impairments in anaemic children are added, the figure rises dramatically to 4 per cent of its GDP.

"A loss of 4 per cent of GDP even in poor countries translates into billions of dollars lost," said Horton.

Horton says iron fortification is extremely important and inexpensive. For example, it costs only 12 cents (US) per person per year to fortify wheat flour in Venezuela – and the payback is tremendous for a country's economy.

"With every dollar you invest, you receive $36 back in physical and cognitive productivity. Those are huge returns," he said.

The study, funded by Micronutrient Initiative, was published online in the February issue of the journal Food Policy.

Political notes Wednesday, March 19, 2003

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Frank criticizes Venezuelan government

U.S. Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., released a letter from seven members of the U.S. House of Representatives to Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez concerning recent events in Venezuela that seem to threaten the democratic rights of the president's opponents.

In their letter, the lawmakers told Chavez that, although they had written to President Bush last year objecting to the U.S. administration's reticence when the democratically-elected government of Venezuela was threatened by a coup, they are now concerned over undemocratic actions by the Chavez government.

The letter states, in part, "Our objection to any American action that would ignore the results of the last Venezuelan election should not be construed in any way as indifference to the importance in a democracy of respect for the untrammeled rights of a vigorous opposition, and we must tell you that we are concerned that recent events in Venezuela call into question that respect."........................

www.vheadline.com Posted: Tuesday, March 18, 2003 By: Gustavo Coronel

VHeadline.com commentarist Gustavo Coronel writes: While the US Constitution has 7 articles and has lasted more than 200 years our Venezuelan Constitution has 350 articles and is in imminent need to be reformed after 2 years.

The US Constitution is very matter of fact, dealing with government processes while ours is a philosophical treatise.

Our irresponsible legislators approved a Constitution so verbose and diffuse that the first 70 articles could easily be compressed into 10 articles without sacrificing the essentials. Worse still, the legislators approved a Constitution which can not be fulfilled by the State, even if they tried (which they do not).

The whole group of articles on Social and Family Rights, Educational and Economic Rights: numbers 76, 78, 80-89, 99-101, 104, 108, 110-111, 117, are impossible to be honored. Environmental issues mentioned in articles 128 and 129 can not be tackled due to extreme disorganization of the government agencies in charge. Article 141 on the nature of Public Administration is a piece of science fiction.

The articles listed above can not be fulfilled because the State simply can not guarantee what these articles orders the State to guarantee. Those articles of the Constitution which can be fulfilled by the State are often being violated.

Although I am not a Constitutional expert but just a reader of our Constitution, like the President is, I have identified around 60 or more articles of the Constitution which have been or are being violated by President Chavez and/or his fellow government officers. The articles are:

1. The name of the country. Chavez often calls it "The Revolutionary Republic of Venezuela" in violation of its real name...

2. "The government will always be decentralized"... However, Chavez is doing all he can to centralize power. He tells governors. "Go and ask for money to the coupsters...." although he is obliged to send regional governments the money allotted to them by the Constitution.

3. "All government officers should abide by this Constitution"... As I will show, Chavez is not doing this...

4. "The territory can not be the site of foreign installations with military purpose"... There are Colombian guerrilla sites in the Perija range of Venezuela and the government knows it.

5. "The State is obliged to... preserve territorial integrity"... this is not being done ... see above

6. "The State guarantees justice which will be impartial, transparent, independent, without delay"... this is a cruel joke as none of these qualities is present in revolutionary justice.

7. " No one can be arrested without a judicial order ... and will have the right to communicate immediately with relatives, lawyers or friends..." Violated in the case of Carlos Fernandez, who was kidnapped for 10 hours before the family knew where he was.

8. Private property can not be violated without a judicial order"... General Acosta Carles broke into POLAR's plant without a judicial order, acting like a savage, confiscating property arbitrarily, hitting women...

9. "Privacy of communications can only be interfered by judicial order..." In Venezuela government regularly records private conversations and make them public without being penalized.

10. " A person is presumed innocent until proof in contrary"... Chavez accuses opposition leaders and PDVSA managers of saboteurs, bombers and criminals every week over national TV, all without proof. He violates this article of the Constitution.

11. "Every citizen can transit freely within the country or in and out of the country" ... extortion by National Guard and immigration officers is a common occurrence.

12. "Every citizen can request information from public officers and should receive adequate and timely answer"... You must be kidding. Public officers will not do that. Most of them will not even talk to you.

13. "Religious intolerance is forbidden..." But Chavez says publicly that the Catholic church is one of the worst tumors of Venezuelan society.

14. "Financing of political events with State funds is forbidden." Who pays for the Bolivarian Circles, for the buses which transport people to hear Chavez speak, for the program "Alo Presidente" which is a vehicle to browbeat the opposition? The State...

15. "The use of firearms and toxic substances in the control of peaceful marches is strictly forbidden..." The Venezuelan army is the best customer for tear gas in Latin America and they use against the opposition in every march.

71 " Issues of national importance can be the object of a Consultative Referendum whenever required by 10% or more of the voters..." This was duly asked for and rejected by government in February of this year... The Ombudsman did not open his mouth.

91 "Minimum salary should be equal to the Basic Basket of Goods." In reality it is one third of that basket.

93. "Work dismissals contrary to the Constitution are null and void." Tell this to most of the 16,000 dismissed workers of PDVSA.

94. "Labor unions can not be intervened." This is what the government tried to do to CTV.

95. |"Environmental Education is mandatory in public and private Institutions." This is largely unfulfilled.

96. "The State will promote private economic initiative." In reality government has been destroying private economic initiative.

97. "The State guarantees the right to private property." But it promotes the invasion of private property.

120-126. "On the rights of indigenous people to have their economic activities." In practice they have become beggars in the big cities without the government doing anything about it.

127. "The State is obliged to guarantee a clean environment in all respects." This a joke as the government is doing most of the contaminating in the country through oil spills by PDVSA, uncontrolled forest fires, garbage mounting in the streets of most cities.

128. "The State is responsible for damages caused to citizens due to errors on the part of the Public Administration." I have never seen this happening. On the contrary, government is promoting this damage through illegal invasion of private property.

129. "Citizens have the right to be informed promptly of all matters which affect them and to have access to the files related to them." This is rarely done, certainly never done in the case of the small people.

130. "Public officers are at the service of the State and not of interest groups." Chavez is also President of his political parties. The Bolivarian Circles headquarters is the Presidential Palace. All cabinet members attend political rallies. The Mayor Freddy Bernal is the coordinator of urban guerrillas.

131. "No contract of public interest can be signed without the approval of the National Assembly." The oil agreement with Cuba was not. The recent Gas contracts were not.

132. "The Regional States will have an income equal to 20% of the total income of the National Revenue to be distributed among the States." Chavez refuses to do this, in spite of an order of the Supreme Tribunal of Justice.

133. "The State guarantees the integrity of the territory." But we have Colombian guerrillas in our midst.

134. "The President is obliged to abide by the Constitution." But he is not doing this.

251-252. "The Council of State is the top advisory council of the government in matters of national policy." But this council has never been convened.

255. "The Law guarantees civic participation in the selection of judges." This has not been done.

256. Requisites to be a member of the Supreme Tribunal of Justice. Not fulfilled by several of the current incumbents.

257. Describes the mechanism to select the members of the TSJ. This mechanism was not followed in selecting the current ones.

258. Has to do with the quality of prisons and of the penal system. Systematically violated by the government.

273-274. "The Moral Power will be autonomous, independent and will investigate al acts against the public ethics." No action has ever been taken by the dishonest incumbents.

279. Details the mechanism of selection of the members of the Moral Power. This mechanism was not followed to name the current incumbents.

280. "The Ombudsman guarantees the Human Rights of citizens and protects them from all abuses of power by the State." The man in charge is rejected by Venezuelans due to his dishonesty and incompetence. He is called the Defender of the Job, not of the people.

281. "Attorney General guarantees that all Agreements and Treaties will be done in compliance of the Constitution." In the case of the Cuban oil agreement this article was violated.

282. "The National Comptroller will supervise national income and expenses and investigate all irregularities against the public patrimony, promoting actions against those irregularities." This man has not taken any action in cases of corruption which total millions of dollars.

283. This article describes the social and economic framework of the Nation. Reality is totally the opposite.

284. "The State will promote agricultural and animal production." But, in practice, the opposite is taking place due to illegal invasions of units of production.

285. "Tourism is an economic activity of national interest. The State will guarantee its development." I would laugh if I was not crying...

286. "Fiscal policy will be based on responsibility. All expenditures should be equal to ordinary income." However, 30% of the 2003 budget will come from new debt. Petroleum income is being used for the most ordinary of expenditures.

287. "Public debt will be limited to the capacity of absorption of the economy." The internal debt has increased five fold in less than 4 years. This is criminal.

288. "No expenses can be allowed except those already in the Budget Law." The violation of this article by Chavez has been systematic and should be enough to put him behind bars.

289. "Budget execution will be accounted for in detail before the National Assembly." This has never been done.

290. "The Central Bank is autonomous in formulating fiscal and monetary policy." In practice they do what Chavez tells them to do.

291. "The Central Bank can not finance fiscal deficits." But this is what they have been doing for the last two years.

292. Describes the Macroeconomic Stabilization Fund and how it operates. Article violated by Chavez several times.

293. "Border Security is top priority in National Security." But our borders have more holes than Gorgonzola cheese (or Gruyere if you prefer).

294. :The Armed Force is a professional, non-political body ... at the service of the Nation and not of a person or political group." However, Chavez says that his revolution is armed with tanks and bazookas and that the armed forces are with the revolution, a term which does not even exist in our Constitution.

Because of these multiple and criminal violations, Venezuelans have come to believe that they should follow Article 350 of the Constitution that says:

"The people of Venezuela will reject any regime, law or authority that violates democratic values or principles or tries to diminish their human rights."

We want this President out.

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 ppcvicep@telcel.net.ve