Chavez calls Bush an [korea]

Ozrat

Ozrat

Antediluvian as Feck
Orderite
Reuters

Sunday 29 February 2004

CARACAS, Venezuela - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez called President Bush an "asshole" on Sunday for meddling, and vowed never to quit office like his Haitian counterpart as troops battled with opposition protesters demanding a recall referendum against him.

Chavez, who often says the U.S. is backing opposition efforts to topple his leftist government, accused Bush of heeding advice from "imperialist" aides to support a brief 2002 coup against him.

"He was an asshole to believe them," Chavez roared at a huge rally of supporters in Caracas.

The Venezuelan leader's comments came as fresh violence broke out on the streets of the capital, where National Guard troops clashed with opposition protesters pressing for a vote to end his five-year rule.

Military helicopters roared in low runs overhead as soldiers fired tear gas and plastic bullets to repel several hundred opposition demonstrators who threw stones and set up burning barricades in eastern Caracas late into the night.

Troops and opposition activists also skirmished in other cities.

"We call on the country to continue with peaceful resistance," opposition leader Enrique Mendoza said. "This fight will last as long as necessary."

A soldier and a cameraman were shot and injured during the clashes and an opposition protester was wounded in the head by gunmen firing from motorbikes, witnesses and officials said.

Electoral authorities, citing the need to preserve peace in the country, said they were postponing until Monday the preliminary results of their verification of the opposition's petition for a recall vote.

One demonstrator carried a banner reading: "Bye bye Aristide, Chavez you're next," referring to Haiti's leader Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who fled into exile on Sunday in the face of an armed rebellion.

TENSIONS AHEAD OF POLL RULING

But the firebrand populist vowed to defeat any attempt to unseat him and threatened to cut off oil supplies to the United States from the world's No. 5 crude oil exporter should Washington try an invasion or trade sanctions.

"Venezuela is not Haiti and Chavez is not Aristide," he said.

Tens of thousands of Chavez supporters marched earlier on Sunday to protest what they condemned as U.S. meddling in Venezuelan affairs. The State Department routinely dismisses the president's accusations.

The referendum campaign is the latest political fight for Chavez, who survived the short-lived 2002 coup and a strike last year by opponents who fear his self-styled "revolution" is slowly turning Venezuela into a Cuban-style communist state.

Since his first election in 1998, the president has vowed to improve the lives of the impoverished who see little of the country's oil wealth. But his opponents say he has failed and has instead pushed the country into economic ruin.

Political tensions have flared again recently as setbacks delayed a ruling by the National Electoral Council on whether to allow the recall referendum to go forward. Two protesters were shot and killed on Friday during an opposition march.

The Organization of American States (OAS) and the Carter Center, which are observing the referendum process, appealed for calm on Sunday ahead of the council decision.

Electoral authorities said they would make a preliminary ruling Monday on whether the opposition collected the minimum 2.4 million valid signatures required for a vote. The opposition says it handed over 3.4 million signatures.

Opposition leaders accuse pro-government officials in the electoral council of trying to block the poll by disqualifying many valid signatures. Chavez says his opponents' petition is riddled with forgeries.
 
I'd like to hear more of the back story on Venezuela.

When the coup happened I wasn't sure who was on who's side. But it seems Venezuela's problem is less the US than it's own system. Much of it is supposedly owed to the "natural resource curse,' in their case oil, which one Venezuelan leader once called "the devil's excrement."

if you can open it- http://www.economist.com/PrinterFriendly.cfm?Story_ID=1795921

Is oil wealth a blessing or a curse?

THREE decades ago, the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) sent oil prices rocketing. By 1980, a barrel cost $30, ten times the price in 1970. Consumers suffered, whereas oil producers reaped an enormous windfall. Many assumed then that oil was a gift of God that would transform poor countries into flourishing economies within a generation. Yet even during those heady early days there were doubts. Juan Pablo Pérez Alfonso, a founder of OPEC, complained in 1975: “I call petroleum the devil's excrement. It brings trouble...Look at this locura—waste, corruption, consumption, our public services falling apart. And debt, debt we shall have for years.”

Several new publications argue that history has proved him right. A new book from the Open Society Institute, a foundation financed by George Soros, points out that resource-poor countries grew two to three times faster than resource-rich countries between 1960 and 1990 (even after adjusting for differences in population, initial income per head and other variables). Revealingly, the resource-rich countries began to lag only after the 1970s—in other words, only after oil wealth started to pour in.

Two factors explain this. The main economic problem is known as Dutch Disease, after the effects of the discovery of natural gas in the Netherlands in the 1960s. An oil bonanza causes a sudden rush of foreign earnings; this drives up the value of the currency. That, in turn, makes domestically produced goods less competitive at home and abroad. Over time, domestic manufacturing and agriculture fade and growth suffers.

Tricky as this problem is, oil economies such as Norway and Alaska have come up with a clever (though still imperfect) solution: they hive off much of the oil income into “stabilisation” funds, disbursing “dividends” to citizens slowly—directly in Alaska, via social spending in Norway—so that the economy does not overheat. Chile, one of the world's more successful developing countries, has a similar fund for its copper revenues.

Contrast this cautious approach with the recklessness of the OPEC countries of the Middle East, which expanded domestic spending by about 50% a year between 1974 and 1979. This enriched the elite, but spawned white-elephant projects and fuelled inflation of more than 15% a year. Venezuela has earned over $600 billion in oil money since the 1970s, but the real income per head of its citizens fell by 15% between 1973 and 1985. It is falling again today.

On top of these economic difficulties can come even worse political problems. Because oil infrastructure can be controlled easily by a few, it often leads to a concentration of political power. Michael Ross, of the University of California at Los Angeles, argues that oil worsens poverty by stunting democratic development, among other things. It also tends to cause, or at least aggravate, civil wars. A new report by Christian Aid, a charity, says that oil economies are more likely than non-oil economies to maintain large armies, and generally do worse on literacy, life expectancy and other measures of human development. In addition, sudden oil wealth affords ample opportunity for corrupting the politicians who award contracts to foreign oil firms.
 
Interesting reads...

That said: "Go Chavez, go Chavez!" ;)
 
Sander said:
Interesting reads...

That said: "Go Chavez, go Chavez!" ;)
Click to expand...

Don't be so sure Sander.


http://www.economist.com/World/la/displayStory.cfm?story_id=2463548
Venezuela

Kafka in Caracas

Feb 26th 2004 | CARACAS

Chávez frustrates the petitioners

TIME was when Latin American rulers would lose an election but still manage to win it during the vote count. But it is a novelty for a vote to be stolen before it has even been scheduled. According to Venezuela's opposition, that is just what the country's increasingly authoritarian president, Hugo Chávez, is trying to do with a recall referendum which—if it ever happens—could bring his populist government to an abrupt end.

Ironically, Mr Chávez was once a great enthusiast for the idea of recall referendums, an innovation in a new constitution he sponsored in 1999. No longer. The electoral council (CNE) was slow to issue rules for referendums, so two previous opposition attempts were ruled invalid. Last year, the CNE finally drew up guidelines; these have been followed by the Democratic Co-ordinator, the opposition umbrella group.

On four days late last year, the Co-ordinator gathered over 3m signatures calling for the plebiscite. The CNE's rules were so strict that, for example, petition forms were printed on bank security paper to avoid fraud. The signature-gathering went smoothly, witnessed by officials from the government, the opposition and the CNE.

But on day three, when it became clear that the number of signatures would easily exceed the 2.4m (20% of the electorate) required, Mr Chávez denounced the exercise as a “mega-fraud”. If the CNE called the referendum, he would not recognise it.

But the president then backtracked, saying he would respect the council's decision and calling on the opposition to do the same. Why? Perhaps because the CNE's board, three of whose five members appear to support the government, is itself throwing up obstacles. It is already a month late in ruling on whether a referendum should take place. And it has been making up new rules as it goes along.

On February 24th, the CNE ruled that signatures will be annulled if the accompanying personal details were penned by another hand (eg, if they were taken down by the referendum organisers)—unless the signatories individually confirm during a five-day period that they really did sign. That should be enough to abort the referendum.

The Organisation of American States (OAS), which has observed the process, is said to have discussed pulling out if what it has called “excessive technicalities” take precedence over the will of the electorate. It is no mere onlooker. Together with the Carter Centre, headed by Jimmy Carter, a former American president, it did much to persuade the opposition to take the referendum route (despite its fears that Mr Chávez would bend the rules). Both are guarantors of a deal struck in May 2003 in which government and opposition agreed to abide by the constitution. “No tricks!”, warned Mr Carter at the time.

Absent a referendum, many would argue that Mr Chávez was no longer ruling as a democrat. Venezuela would risk expulsion from the OAS for violating its Democratic Charter. That decision might be closely fought. Mr Chávez would hope for many votes from the small states of the English-speaking Caribbean, to whom he supplies cheap oil. He recently visited neighbouring Guyana, where he downplayed Venezuela's claim to that country's Essequibo territory. A sudden about-turn aimed at forestalling diplomatic isolation, said opponents. But if forced to choose between isolation and power, Mr Chávez might prefer to walk alone.
 
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