November 30th., 2009

Chavez in the center of the hurricane

"A true revolutionary does not carry out business”, Chavez said in clear reference to the outbreak of a large multimillion-dollar corruption scandal linking several of his closest collaborators, and he exposed frauds and scams of incredible magnitude involving public funds, in which appear to be responsible for the so-called "boliburgueses", which are entrepreneurs emerged in recent years in the shadow of power. The dissenting Congress member of Chavez, Ismael Garcia, unleashed the storm. He reported that the scandal involves Adan Chavez, brother of the president and now governor of Barinas State, the former Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel, Ministers Diosdado Cabello and Jesse Chacon. According to Garcia, the regime took steps to cover up by ordering the arrest of Ricardo Fernandez Barrueco and the intervention of the banks that he presides. To the statement "there are some rich men that we do not know where they got so much money”, expressed by Chavez, the congressmen replied: "It is absolutely impossible that the president does not know who Fernandez is, since he gave him the monopoly to import and distribute foodstuffs that have allowed the operation of Mercal, the main tool of populist government, and Chavez family travels in Fernandez´s aircrafts”. The banker detained, in addition to chairing the intervened banks, owns companies working for the State, of a fleet leased by PDVSA to export diesel and he recently made a bid to purchase Digitel, a telecommunications company valued at $ 1,200 million dollars.

Chavez, in Aló Presidente, requested to jail the corrupt bankers "anyone will go to prison and I say something to all private bankers, anyone who makes a
slip loses, and those who don't, lose too, I will remove the bank no matter the size. Do you want me to nationalize the banks? I have no problem ... what they do is to collect money from people and use it to earn more money”. The Unity Committee (Mesa de la Unidad) gave a press conference, acting as spokesman Henry Ramos Allup, who pointed out names, submitted documents and offered information on the interconnected businesses of what he called "mafia boliburguesa" he assured that in recent years the amount of such unlawful enrichment may reach 70,000 million dollars. He supported the impossibility that the situation of the intervened banks and the involved insurance companies was not known by the Minister of Finance and the Superintendence of Banks and Insurance Companies, or that the President himself did not know about what is happening in PDVSA. He said that the whole plot had its origin in the criminal use of budget funds that were provided to entrepreneurs who he clearly identified. He concluded by requesting Chavez to establish whether or not the allegations are true and invited him to make good his words in Aló Presidente.  According to the newspaper Tal Cual, it was a report by the Cuban G2, delivered by Fidel to Chavez, which made him intervene the more committed banks and order the prosecution of the offenders, several of whom have gone abroad. Corruption seems to be a properly diagnosed cancer of the XXI century socialism. Terminal?

PRAISES TO EL CHACAL, IDI AMIN AND MUGABE

 This time Chavez managed that the press of the 5 continents will take care of his statements. The setting was a meeting in Caracas of leftist parties, where he proposed the creation of the Socialist International V "in the spirit of its predecessors, the thought of Marx, Engels and Lenin. We have traveled the world and the creation of the Fifth International is a popular acclaim”.  His proposal was not without interest because it reveals the bold aim of giving structure to the left-wing political movements, ensuring his leadership with funding from the Venezuelan oil, with the addition that the poor turnout for the event was testimony to the evident deterioration in the International clientele of Chavez. The news went unnoticed before the debauchery of what followed. "I restored Carlos Ilich Ramirez, as a revolutionary fighter who is paying a life sentence in France unjustly”. He added that he has kept correspondence with that "distinguished compatriot" expressive of shared solidarity. In France, the media reacted with outrage, stating that the character praised by Chavez was El Chacal, a legend of the international terrorism from the '70s and '80s, for his activity in Europe and the Middle East where he starred in criminal achievements of such features that earned him the ominous label of El Chacal. In 1975, he participated in the kidnapping, in Vienna, of eleven OPEC ministers, in the course of the operation of which three people were killed. The French government summoned the Venezuelan ambassador in Paris to protest the claim that Ilich Ramirez had been kidnapped in Sudan and was paying unfairly life sentence, as Chavez said. “He was sentenced as an author of very serious crimes, terrorism and murder; he is responsible for the death of several Frenchmen, fully verified by the justice of the country”.

Once completed the defense of El Chacal, Chavez chose another notorious criminal as an object of praise: Idi Amin, known among other nicknames as "the butcher of Kampala”.  "Although he has been discredited, and even presented as a cannibal, when he was rather a great nationalist, a patriot”. Again his opinion first occupied spaces in the international press, especially in African countries, and as well as in France, his opinion prompted official protests from Uganda.  The presidential secretary said his government is offended by the praise of Chavez to the former dictator, who "led the country on a brutal way in the 60´s”.  The presidential secretary, Tamale Murundi, gave a press conference drawing up the gruesome history of Idi Amin. The Uganda Record said that if Chavez absolves Amins from his atrocities as the ruler of the 70´s, then he should explain who actually committed them during the time that he dominated the country. International observers estimate that Idi Amin killed about 500,000 people.  "The regime was characterized by violation of human rights, political repression, ethnic persecution, death sentences without trial, nepotism, gigantic corruption and ruinous economic management".  In the file of those who evoke the admiration of Chavez could not miss Mugabe, the villain that has subjugated Zimbabwe to a 28-year dictatorship.  Perhaps, because Chavez envies his example of governing in perpetuity, he conferred him the highest honors that can receive a foreigner in Venezuela.

FRIENDSHIPS THAT COMPROMISE

I am your brother and friend, Chavez told Mahmoud Ahmadinejad when he met him at the third visit to Venezuela. Words confirmed by the facts. They held hands for five minutes, lavishing praise and testimony of fraternal affection. They signed 45 new agreements to "strengthen our strategic alliance”, which are added to the 270 already signed “Beyond trade and economic alliance, our countries have formed a coalition determined to confront the enemies of our peoples”, the Iranian said.  They agreed to increase to 1,000 million dollars, the Binational Fund for joint projects and the opening of a new Caracas-Tehran route via a direct flight with Mahan Air line. The Venezuelan airline, Conviasa, has a direct flight Caracas-Damascus-Tehran, whose passengers use the presidential ramp at Maiquetia without submitting a passport to customs authorities The official TV broadcasted meetings of Ahmadinejad and Chavez in which this fervently reiterated his support for Tehran's plans to develop nuclear energy and said that it was outrageous to question the electoral results that hold his ally in power. Chavez recalled that the Israeli President, Shimon Peres, had stated in Argentina that leaders like him and Ahmadinejad were doomed to disappear.  “We take this as a threat and will act accordingly”. The visit coincided with the decision of the International Atomic Energy that condemned the Iran´s nuclear policy, with the dissenting votes of Cuba and Venezuela.  The motion was brought at the behest of the so-called group of six that brings together the permanent members of the Security Council.  The support of China and Russia, so far reluctant to condemn Iran is interpreted as a sign that the major powers suspect that the Iran's nuclear program has military goals. The Confederation of Israeli Associations in Venezuela said: "Ahmadinejad is an ominous character that threatens to destroy Israel, of dubious legitimacy as a ruler, since he was reelected in elections, where the Iranian people was put down with ferocity, leaving dead, injured and many people tortured He recalled that the new Iranian Minister of Defense has been wanted by Interpol as responsible for the terrorist attack on the Argentine- Israeli Mutual Association that left 85 dead and hundreds injured. The Unity Committee, which brings together the Venezuelan democratic parties, condemned the visit. "We condemn that in the land of Bolivar, the undesirable Iranian dictator is welcomed with undeserved honor, who appeals to electoral fraud and repression to stay in power”.

Chavez's agenda is newsworthy in recent weeks. He had lunch with Fidel Castro and spoke with Raul about the collaboration between both countries.  He met Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian Authority President, to whom he expressed that the Bolivarian revolution is on his side in the fight "against the genocidal state of Israel", for which recognition "Venezuela had shamefully voted when its rulers were lackeys of the empire". He said: "Israel is the Washington murderer arm in the Middle East”. By giving Abbas a duplication of the Sword of Bolivar (La Espada de Bolivar), he said: “You carry a sword in one hand and an olive branch in the other one.  They do not want to unsheathe it, but one should always keep the sword”.   He added that in the struggle for liberation, "Carlos Ilich, to whom they have given the infamous nickname of El Chacal, represented all Venezuelans”. He criticized the celebration of the Berlin Wall fell: "I doubt that this fact has to be celebrated”.