October 28th., 2005

Keys of the Current Situation

Summary:

• 2006 budget provides that the public expenses will go up to 40.500 million dollars.

• It will be an electoral budget, managed by the President in its sole discretion.

• Oil, public expenses and administrative opacity are the keys of the current situation.

• The problem is at institutional level. Controlling entities do not work.

• Transparency International points out Venezuela among the most corrupt countries on the planet.

• The government’s response: “We have proofs of its mercenary nature. They charge a fee for ranking countries”.

• The IAPA approved a resolution in rejection to the authoritarian behavior of the government.

• Editors acknowledge that fear has achieve self censorship. Those who disagree are threatened and punished.

• A great number of journalists is persecuted and submitted to illegal trials.

• Marcel Granier states that recent law amendments seek to silence dissident opinions

• While Chavez has used over 20 million minutes, the opposition just has been able to use 825 minutes.

• The Economist ranks Venezuela as one of the less attractive countries among the Latin American economies.

• Chavez’ radical speech seems to be contrary to the Venezuelan political thinking.

• Abstention of 80% is predicted for the next parliamentary elections of December 4

The budget for 2006 provides public expenses for 40,500,000,000 dollars. The underestimation of the oil price is quite remarkable ($26 a barrel, while the Venezuelan basket averages over $40 so far this year). The annual production is calculated in 3,452,000 barrels a day. There is a serious argument about the government trying to hide that the production is actually 500,000 barrels lesser than the original figure. The regime alleges conservative previsions. The experts retort that a reasonable price, taking into account the current international market conditions, might be $36, which covers the amount of public expenses designed in this Budget. Chavez exclaims, exalted, that 53% of incomes come from non-petroleum taxes. If this statement is true, petroleum is not enough to maintain the level of public expenses.

This is an electoral budget, managed by the President in its sole discretion. There will be surpluses for certain, which will be earmarked for additional credits. These credits must be approved by the National Assembly, which has never rejected an application in this regard. The parliamentary support went to the extreme of authorizing the free disposition of 8.000 million dollars from the National Development Fund and Fondespa, which are not included in the Budget Law. There is an important ingredient of social expense, basically in the misiones, (Missions) in the so-called “productive units of new kind” and in bureaucracy.

Given its characteristics, 2006 public expenses, including the Funds, might go up to 40% of the GDP, which technically does not qualify as reproductive. Oil, public expenses and administrative opacity are the keys of the current Venezuela.  In the media, denunciations about corruption, prodigality and a whole range of irregularities are presented on a daily basis.  

The President has stated that corruption is an enemy as dangerous as Washington for the revolution. But so far he has not taken any measure to translate his concerns into actions. Newspapers or members of the parliament from the opposition frequently present documents or facts that should oblige, at least, to open an investigation. The problem is at institutional level. Controlling entities do not work. These - the Parliament, General Comptroller’s Office, General Attorney’s Office and Courts - are submitted to a military obedience. As a consequence, the impunity and freedom of corrupt officers to pillage and the complicity with those who trade under the shelter of power.                  

Transparency International (TI) published the Corruption Perception Index 2005. TI researches in 159 countries. Venezuela ranks 130 among the most corrupt countries on the planet, barely under Paraguay and Haiti in Latin America. This is an epidemic with backgrounds and regional nature. According to the researchers of TI, corruption is “a major cause of poverty”. It is remarkable that for the regime, whose main emblem is the struggle against poverty, TI’s opinion is just an incident in the media war of the imperialism against the Bolivarian revolution. The Vice-president added another charge: “We have proofs of its mercenary nature. They charge a fee for ranking countries in good, regular or bad positions. I am saying this openly”. The regime had a similar against the report made by Reporters without Borders (10-20-05) which labeled as serious the Venezuelan case regarding press freedom. According to the report, restrictions to free speech have increased gradually with the approval by the Parliament of the Social Responsibility Law (or Gag Law). The document adds that the government counts on a legislative arsenal capable to produce self-censorship, and that it allows punishments for recalcitrant ones. In response to Chavez, who states that the media attack its administration as they never did with former administrations, Reporters without Borders answered: “The risks faced by the media when doing so never were this high”.

COMMANDER’S CONFLICTS

The government answered to the Inter American Press Association in the strongest terms (IAPA), who in its last General Meeting approved a resolution to condemn the authoritarian behavior of the Venezuelan government, considered as intended to restrict democratic freedoms and free speech. The resolution considers that there is an evident deterioration of the rule of law and exhorts the Inter American Commission on Human Rights to maintain a permanent surveillance.

The governmental reaction was conclusive, with unrepeatable and close to scatological expressions. The journalist Juan Manuel Carmona, as Regional Vice President of IAPA, presented a report about Venezuela. He denounced that during the last months 71 attacks against journalists and media have taken place.

He proved with irrefutable data that the government, by acquiring or authorizing radio and television stations and financing newspapers and magazines, became the most important broadcaster in the country. As editor, he acknowledges that there is a self censorship imposed by the fear and governmental threatens through its different bodies, and the recent amendment to the Penal Code transfers the punishment effects of the Gag Law to the written press. “Some broadcasting and press organizations dare to disagree, being aware of the risks we face”. In response, Carmona was punished for tax reasons. The competent entity (Seniat) (IRS) ordered a temporary closing of the newspaper El Impulso, carried out by military officers, and a high fine for the alleged omission of a supporting document in the accounts several years ago.

Another expositor in the IAPA was Marcel Granier. He expressed that numerous journalists are persecuted and submitted to illegal trials in military courts, inspections in networks are made by military forces to make disappear photographs and other documents, and all the aggressions against journalists and the media has remained unpunished. He stated that the precautionary measures granted by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights and the Inter-American Court have been ignored or violated.

According to Granier, Chavez exerts a virtual monopoly of politic propaganda, and takes over all the radio and television stations to broadcast, without time limits, his speeches and harangues, during the hours of higher ratings, without a right to answer. “So far this year, he has taken over radio and television stations 171 times. While he has used 20.944.000 minutes, the democratic opposition has used 825 minutes”. The Vice President Rangel, in the column that he writes in the newspaper Vea, accused Granier of having meetings with conspirators, plotting a coup against the government or the assassination of the president. Granier leads Radio Caracas Television, a television station that has been threatened with the suspension of broadcast authorization and is subject to frequent intimidating inspections by administrative entities.

The broadcasting media have been forced to make national chain broadcasts (cadenas) nine times more, during their primetimes, in order to make known the presidential activities in Europe, after Salamanca. The press conference in Paris and his declaration for the BBC have been repeated several times. According to Granier, certain presentations of Chavez, edited by experts, have been repeated in national broadcast 137 times with an average length of 135 minutes. The President is disturbed by publications in the European press about military occupation of landed estates and private enterprise installations, disregard for the property right, the politization of the judicial system, appropriation of the economy by the State and restrictions to the operative freedom of enterprises. These were key aspects in the report made by The Economist, according to which Venezuela is the less attractive country among the eight main Latin American economies and foresees and gradual deterioration of the enterprise environment “given the lack of legal warranties”.

That explains the lieutenant colonel’s insistence in the idea that his socialist project acknowledges the importance of foreign investment for the economic development, and the purpose of promote it within a framework of legal security. However, his radical ideological speech seems to be contrary to the key notions of the Venezuelan sociopolitical culture. The symbolic bonds that supported his popularity begin to weaken given the lack of material achievements and the permanence of fundamental problems as a consequence of inefficiency, incapacity and corruption. Polls foresee an abstention of 80% for the next parliamentary elections on December 4, because even when Venezuelans are passionate about voting, there is lack of trust on the arbitrator and the electoral procedures. Polls also set forth that in clear elections, it would be difficult for the regime to obtain its expected indisputable victory, because in the new scenario of socialism of the XXI century, and association with Cuba, the hard Chavism decreased to 30% and the negative response-rejection to the administration reaches 75%.

The next Submit of the Americas, in Argentina, with the attendance of Bush, will be a challenge and a risk for Chavez. Will his speech in this meeting be similar to the one in the event simultaneously held in Mar del Plata? There, he will be in charge of the closing ceremony that will be the starting point of a huge demonstration against the presence of Bush. Venezuela Hoy forecasts that the activities of Chavez in Argentina the next week will be newsworthy.