Absence of ill Hugo Chavez sparks speculation

Marisol Manzano 9:39pm Jun 30 video del discurso de hugo chavez; se le ve desmejorado. Chávez reveló que le extrajeron un tumor cancerígeno en Cuba america.infobae.com

26 June 2011 -Last updated at 02:58 ET – http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-13918380

Absence of ill Hugo Chavez sparks speculation

There is growing uncertainty in Venezuela over President Hugo Chavez’s health, two weeks after he underwent an operation in Cuba for what the authorities said was a pelvic abscess.

On Friday the Venezuelan Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro said Mr Chavez – who is still in Cuba – was in what he called a «great battle» for his health.

But Vice-President Elias Jaua accused the media of stoking speculation.

«We will have Chavez for a long time!», he said on Saturday.

The normally loquacious Mr Chavez, 56, had been uncharacteristically quiet since apparently undergoing surgery on 10 June in Cuba. He had been visiting the island as part of an international tour.

He had fallen silent after making a telephone call to state media on 12 June to tell them he was recovering quickly, and that medical tests showed no sign of a «malignant» illness.

Mr Chavez is normally a regular user of the micro-blogging site Twitter, but no messages were posted to the site for 19 days until Friday, when fresh tweets began to appear.

They did not directly address the question of his health. The latest tweet sent on Saturday evening said his daughter Rosines had arrived to visit him with his grandchildren.

Press ‘rejoicing’

But correspondents say the resumption of tweets will do little to address speculation about the president’s health.

He has not been seen – aside from in photos provided to the media showing Mr Chavez being visited by Cuban leaders Fidel and Raul Castro in hospital. And there is little clear indication of when he will return to Venezuela.

Opposition politicians have complained that it is unconstitutional for Mr Chavez to govern from abroad.

And correspondents say his absence has raised the question of who will succeed Mr Chavez, in the absence of any obvious candidate with Mr Chavez’s charisma and ability to connect with his supporters.

But on Saturday Vice-President Jaua dismissed the speculation and drew a parallel with the reporting of an attempted coup d’etat in April 2002, when Mr Chavez was ousted from power only to be returned two days later in a triumphant show of popular and military support.

«Chavez is a human being who is recovering to continue the battle,» Mr Jaua said.

«The national and international press are rubbing their hands and rejoicing about the state of the president’s health, even talking about the president’s death, as they did back on April 11,» he said – referring to the 2002 coup.

«We tell them and remind them from here, that after April 11, there was an April 13» – the date when Mr Chavez was returned to power.

Fighting Words

Published: June 11, 2011

http://www.upi.com/topic/Hugo_Chavez/

Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías (Spanish pronunciation: [ˈuɣo rafaˈel ˈtʃaβes ˈfɾi.as]; born July 28, 1954) is the 56th and current President of Venezuela, having held that position since 1999. Following his own political ideology of Bolivarianism and «Socialism for the 21st Century«, he has focused on implementing socialist reforms in the country as a part of a social project known as the Bolivarian Revolution, which has seen the implementation of a new constitution, participatory democracy and the nationalisation of several key industries.

Born into a working class family in Sabaneta, Barinas, Chávez became a career military officer, and after becoming dissatisfied with the Venezuelan puntofijismopolitical system which he viewed as corrupt and undemocratic, he founded the secretive Revolutionary Bolivarian Movement-200 (MBR-200) in the early 1980s to work towards overthrowing it. After the Democratic Action government of President Carlos Andrés Pérez ordered the violent repression of protests against spending cuts, Chávez led the MBR-200 in an unsuccessful coup d’état against the government in 1992, for which he was imprisoned.

Getting out of prison after two years, he founded a political party, the Fifth Republic Movement, and was elected president of Venezuela in 1998. He subsequently introduced a new constitution which increased rights for marginalised groups and altered the structure of Venezuelan government, and was re-elected in 2000. During his second presidential term, he introduced a system of Bolivarian Missions, Communal Councils and worker-managed cooperatives, whilst also nationalising various key industries. The opposition movement meanwhile, fearing that he was eroding representative democracy and becoming increasingly authoritative, attempted to remove him from power both through an unsuccessful military coup in 2002 and a recall referendum in 2003. He was again elected into power in 2006, following which he founded a new political party, the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), in 2007.

A vocal critic of capitalism and in particular neoliberalism, Chávez has been a prominent opponent of the United States’ foreign policy, which he describes asimperialistic.^[1] Allying himself strongly with the socialist governments of Fidel and then Raúl Castro in Cuba, Evo Morales in Bolivia, and Rafael Correa in Ecuador, his presidency is seen as a part of the leftist «pink tide» sweeping Latin America. He has supported Latin American and Caribbean cooperation and was instrumental in setting up the pan-regional Union of South American Nations, the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas, the Bank of the South, and the regional television networkTeleSur. His political influence in Latin America led Time magazine to include him among their list of the world’s 100 most influential people in both 2005 and 2006.^[2][3]

Pre-presidential life and career

Early life: 1954–1970

Hugo Chávez was born on 28 July 1954 in the home of his paternal grandmother Rosa Inéz Chávez (d.1982), a three-room mud hut located in the rural village of Sabaneta, Barinas State. His parents, Hugo de los Reyes Chávez and Elena Frías de Chávez, were working–lower middle class schoolteachers who lived in the small village of Los Rastrojos, and prior to Hugo’s birth they had already had one son, Adán Chávez and following Hugo’s birth would go on to have five more, although one of them, Enzo, died aged six months old.^[4][5] The Chávez family were of mixed Amerindian, Afro-Venezuelan, and Spanish descent.^[6] They lived in poverty, and as such Hugo and his brother Adán lived with their grandmother Rosa,^[7] whom he would later describe as being «a pure human being… pure love, pure kindness.»^[8] She was a devout Roman Catholic, and Hugo himself was raised into the faith, briefly being an altar boy at a local church.^[9] Chávez related that he and his brother «were very poor children but very happy», and that «At [Rosa’s] side I got to know humility, poverty, pain, sometimes not having anything to eat. I saw the injustices of this world.»^[10]

Attending the Julián Pino Elementary School, his various hobbies included drawing, painting, baseball and the study of history, in the latter of which he was particularly interested in the stories of nineteenth-centuryfederalist general Ezequiel Zamora, in whose army his own great-great-grandfather had served.^[11][12] In the mid 1960s, Hugo, his brother and their grandmother moved to the city of Barinas so that the boys could attend what was then the only high school in the rural state, the Daniel O’Leary High School.^[13] Here, he would later claim, he was simply «a normal boy… I didn’t have any political motivation», with his thoughts revolving around his school studies, baseball and girls.^[14]

Military Academy: 1971-1975

Aged seventeen, Chávez decided to study at the Venezuelan Academy of Military Sciences in Caracas, later remarking that «I felt like a fish in water. As if I had discovered the essence or part of the essence of life, of my true vocation.»^[16][17] At the Academy, he was a member of the first class that was following a restructured curriculum known as the Andrés Bello Plan. This plan had been instituted by a group of progressive, nationalistic military officers who believed that change was needed within the military. This new curriculum encouraged students to learn not only military routines and tactics but also a wide variety of other topics, and to do so civilian professors were brought in from other universities to give lectures to the military cadets.^[18][19] Living in Caracas, he saw more of the endemic poverty faced by working class Venezuelans, something that echoed the poverty he had experienced growing up, and he has maintained that this experience only made him further committed to achieving social justice.^[20][21] He also began to get involved in local activities outside of the military school, playing both baseball and softball with the Criollitos de Venezuela team, progressing with them to the Venezuelan National Baseball Championships. Other hobbies that he undertook at the time included writing numerous poems, stories and theatrical pieces, painting^[22] and researching the life and political thought of 19th-century South American revolutionary Simón Bolívar.^[23] He also became interested in the Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara (1928–1967) after reading his memoir The Diary of Che Guevara, although also read books by a wide variety of other figures, from Karl Marx to Hannibal and Napoleon Bonaparte.^[24]

In 1974 he was selected to be a representative in the commemorations for the 150th anniversary of the Battle of Ayacucho in Peru, the conflict in which Simon Bolívar’s lieutenant, Antonio José de Sucre, defeated royalist forces during the Peruvian War of Independence. It was in Peru that Chávez heard the leftist president, General Juan Velasco Alvarado (1910–1977), speak, and inspired by Velasco’s ideas that the military should act in the interests of the working classes when the ruling classes were perceived as corrupt,^[25] he «drank up the books [Velasco had written], even memorising some speeches almost completely.»^[26] Befriending the son of Panamanian President Omar Torrijos (1929–1981), another leftist military general, Chávez subsequently visited Panama, where he met with Torrijos, and was impressed with his land reform program that was designed to benefit the peasants. Being heavily influenced by both Torrijos and Velasco, he saw the potential for military generals to seize control of a government when the civilian authorities were perceived as only serving the interests of the wealthy elites.^[25][27] In contrast to military presidents like Torrijos and Velasco however, Chávez became highly critical of Augusto Pinochet, the right-wing general who had recently seized control in Chile with the aid of the American CIA.^[28] Chávez would later relate that «With Torrijos, I became a Torrijist. With Velasco I became a Velasquist. And with Pinochet, I became an anti-Pinochetist.»^[29] In 1975, Chávez graduated from the military academy, being rated one of the top graduates of the year.^[30][31]

Early military career: 1976-1981

Chávez at a military ceremony in 1976.

Following his graduation, Chávez was stationed as a communications officer at a counterinsurgency unit in Barinas,^[32] although the Marxist-Leninist insurgency which the army was sent to combat had already been eradicated from that state, leaving the unit with much spare time. Chávez himself played in a local baseball team, wrote a column for the local newspaper, organized bingo games and judged at beauty pageants.^[33] At one point he found a stash of Marxist literature that was in an abandoned car riddled with bullet holes. Apparently having belonged to insurgents many years before, he went on to read these books, which included titles by such theoreticians as Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin and Mao Zedong, but his favourite was a work entitled The Times of Ezequiel Zamora, written about the 19th-century federalist general whom Chávez had admired as a child.^[34] These books further convinced Chávez of the need for a leftist government in Venezuela, later remarking that «By the time I was 21 or 22, I made myself a man of the left.»^[35]

In 1977, Chávez’s unit was transferred to Anzoátegui, where they were involved in battling the Red Flag Party, a Marxist-Hoxhaist insurgency group.^[36] After intervening to prevent the beating of an alleged insurgent by other soldiers,^[37] Chávez began to have his doubts about the army and their methods in using torture.^[35] At the same time, he was becoming increasingly critical of the corruption in both the army and in the civilian government, coming to believe that despite the wealth being produced by the country’s oil reserves, Venezuela’s poor masses were not receiving their share, something he felt to be inherently un-democratic. In doing so, he began to sympathise with the Red Flag Party and their cause, if not their violent methods.^[38]

In 1977, he founded a revolutionary movement within the armed forces, in the hope that he could one day introduce a leftist government to Venezuela: the Venezuelan People’s Liberation Army (Ejército de Liberación del Pueblo de Venezuela, or ELPV), was a secretive cell within the military that consisted of him and a handful of his fellow soldiers. Although they knew that they wanted a middle way between the right wing policies of the government and the far left position of the Red Flag, they did not have any plans of action for the time being.^[37][39][40] Nevertheless, hoping to gain an alliance with civilian leftist groups in Venezuela, Chávez then set about clandestinely meeting various prominent Marxists, including Alfredo Maneiro (the founder of the Radical Cause) and Douglas Bravo, despite having numerous political differences with them.^[41] At this time, Chávez married a working class woman named Nancy Colmenares, with whom he would go on to have three children, Rosa Virginia (born September 1978), Maria Gabriela (born March 1980) and Hugo Rafael (born October 1983).^[42]

Later military career and the Bolivarian Revolutionary Army-200: 1982-1991

Five years after his creation of the ELPV, Chávez went on to form a new secretive cell within the military, the Bolivarian Revolutionary Army-200 (EBR-200), later redesignated the Revolutionary Bolivarian Movement-200 (MBR-200).^[43][44] Taking inspiration from three Venezuelans whom Chávez deeply admired, Ezequiel Zamora (1817–1860), Simón Bolívar (1783–1830) and Simón Rodríguez (1769–1854), these historical figures became known as the «three roots of the tree» of the MBR-200.^[45] Later describing the group’s foundation, Chávez would state that «the Bolivarian movement that was being born did not propose political objectives… Its goals were imminently internal. Its efforts were directed in the first place to studying the military history of Venezuela as a source of a military doctrine of our own, which up to then didn’t exist.»^[46]However, he always hoped that the Bolivarian Movement would become politically dominant, and on his political ideas at the time, remarked that «This tree [of Bolívar, Zamora and Rodríguez] has to be a circumference, it has to accept all kinds of ideas, from the right, from the left, from the ideological ruins of those old capitalist and communist systems.»^[47]

In 1981, Chávez, by now a captain, was assigned to teach at the military academy where he had formerly trained. Here he taught new students about his Bolivarian ideals, and recruited those whom he felt would make good members of the MBR-200, as well as organizing sporting and theatrical events for the students. In his recruiting attempts he was relatively successful, for by the time they had graduated, at least thirty out of 133 cadets had joined it.^[49] In 1984 he met a Venezuelan woman of German ancestry named Herma Marksman who was a recently divorced history teacher. Sharing many interests in common, she eventually got involved in Chávez’s movement and the two fell in love, having an affair that would last several years.^[50][51] Another figure to get involved with the movement was Francisco Arias Cárdenas, a soldier particularly interested in liberation theology.^[52] Cárdenas rose to a significant position within the group, although came into ideological conflict with Chávez, who believed that they should begin direct military action in order to overthrow the government, something Cárdenas thought was reckless.^[53]

However, some senior military officers became suspicious of Chávez after hearing rumours about the MBR-200. Unable to legally dismiss him without proof, they re-assigned him so that he would not be able to gain any more fresh new recruits from the academy. He was sent to take command of the remote barracks at Elorza inApure State,^[54] where he got involved in the local community by organizing social events, and contacted the local indigenous tribal peoples, the Cuiva and Yaruro. Although distrustful due to their mistreatment at the hands of the Venezuelan army in previous decades, Chávez gained their trust by joining the expeditions of an anthropologist to meet with them. His experiences with them would later lead him to introduce laws protecting the rights of indigenous tribal peoples when he gained power many years later.^[55] While on holiday, he retraced on foot the route taken by his great-grandfather, the revolutionary Pedro Pérez Delgado(known as Maisanta), to understand his family history; on that trip, he met a woman who told Chávez how Maisanta had become a local hero by rescuing an abducted girl.^[56] In 1988, after being promoted to the rank of major, the high ranking General Rodríguez Ochoa took a liking to Chávez and employed him to be his assistant at his office in Caracas.^[57]

Operation Zamora: 1992

In 1989, President Carlos Andrés Pérez (1922–2010) of the centrist Democratic Action party was elected after promising to go against the United States government’sWashington Consensus and to oppose the economic cuts imposed by the International Monetary Fund (IMF). When he got into office however, he did neither of these, instead continuing with neoliberal economic policies, dramatically cutting social spending, putting prominent businessmen in governmental posts, and increasing the costs of energy and fuel, leading to widespread public outrage.^[59][60] Attempting to stop the widespread protests that were taking place as a result of his cuts in social spending, Pérez ordered the violent repression and massacre of protesters known as El Caracazo, which «according to official figures … left a balance of 276 dead, numerous injured, several disappeared and heavy material losses. However, this list was invalidated by the subsequent appearance of mass graves», indicating an even higher death count.^[61][62][63] Pérez had used both the DISIP political police and the army to orchestrate El Caracazo, but Chávez, who was hospitalized with chicken pox, did not take part, something that he would be grateful for, condemning the event as «genocide«.^[64][65]

Disturbed by the Caracazo, rampant government corruption, the domination of politics by the Venezuelan oligarchy through the Punto Fijo Pact, and what he called «the dictatorship of the IMF» Chávez began preparing for a military coup d’état,^[66] known as Operation Zamora.^[67] Initially planned for December, Chávez delayed the planned MBR-200 coup until the early twilight hours of 4 February 1992. On that date, five army units under Chávez’s command moved into urban Caracas with the mission of overwhelming key military and communications installations, including the Miraflores presidential palace, the defense ministry, La Carlota military airport and the Military Museum. Chávez’s ultimate goal was to intercept and take custody of Pérez, who was returning to Miraflores from an overseas trip. Despite years of planning however, the coup attempt soon ran into trouble. Chávez held the loyalty of less than 10% of Venezuela’s military forces,^[68] and numerous betrayals, defections, errors, and other unforeseen circumstances soon left Chávez and a small group of rebels hiding in the Military Museum, without any means of conveying orders to their network of spies and collaborators spread throughout Venezuela.^[69] Further, Chávez’s allies were unable to broadcast their prerecorded tapes on the national airwaves in which Chávez planned to issue a general call for a mass civilian uprising against Pérez. As the coup unfolded, the coup plotters were unable to capture Pérez, who managed to escape from them. Fourteen soldiers were killed, and fifty soldiers and some eighty civilians injured in the ensuing violence.^[70][71][72]

Chávez calls for the surrender of all forces on national television (1992)

Realising that the coup had failed, Chávez gave himself up to the government. On the condition that he called upon the remaining active coup members to cease hostilities, he was allowed to appear on national television, something that he insisted on doing in his military uniform. During this address, he invoked the name of national hero Simón Bolívar and declared to the Venezuelan people that «Comrades: unfortunately, for now, the objectives we had set for ourselves were not achieved in the capital city. That is, those of us here in Caracas did not seize power. Where you are, you have performed very well, but now is the time for a reflect. New opportunities will arise and the country has to head definitively toward a better future.»^[73]

Many viewers noted that Chávez had remarked that he had only failed «por ahora» (for now),^{[74][75][76][77]} and he was immediately catapulted into the national spotlight, with many poor Venezuelans seeing him as a figure who had stood up against government corruption and kleptocracy.^[78][79]

Chávez was arrested and imprisoned at the San Carlos military stockade, where he remained wracked with guilt, feeling responsible for the coup’s failure, despite his growing popular support amongst the civilian population.^[80][81] Indeed, pro-Chávez demonstrations that took place outside of San Carlos led to him being transferred to Yare prison soon after.^[82] The government meanwhile began a temporary crackdown on media supportive of Chávez and the coup.^[83] A further attempted coup against the government occurred in November, which was once more defeated,^[84] although Pérez himself was impeached a year later for malfeasance and misappropriation of funds for illegal activities.^[85]

Political rise: 1992–1998

Whilst Chávez and the other senior members of the MBR-200 were in prison, his relationship with Herma Marksman broke up in July 1993.^[87] She would subsequently become «a bitter critic of Chávez, whose supporters wondered how much of her anger was stoked by their failed romance.»^[88] In 1994, Rafael Caldera(1916–2009) of the centrist National Convergence Party was elected to the presidency, and soon after taking power, freed Chávez and the other imprisoned MBR-200 members as per his pre-election pledge. Caldera had however imposed upon them the condition that they would not return to the military, where they might organise another coup.^[89][90] After being mobbed by adoring crowds following his release, Chávez went on a one hundred day tour of the country, promoting his Bolivarian cause of social revolution using the slogan of «The Hope is in the Streets».^[91] Now living off a small military pension as well as the donations of his supporters, he continued to financially support his three children and their mother despite divorcing Nancy Colmenares around this period. On his tours around the country, he would meet Marisabel Rodríguez, who would give birth to their daughter shortly before becoming his second wife in 1997.^[92][93]

Travelling around Latin America in search of foreign support for his Bolivarian movement, he visited Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, Colombia, and finally Cuba, where the Marxist-Leninist President Fidel Castro (1926-) organised to meet him. After spending several days in one another’s company, Chávez and Castro became friends, with the former describing the Cuban President as being like a father to him.^[94] Returning to Venezuela, Chávez failed to gain mainstream media attention for his political cause, something his supporters believed was partially down to the fact that the mainstream media was owned and controlled by the wealthy oligarchy that Chávez himself was so opposed to. Instead, he gained publicity from small, local-based newspapers and media outlets.^[95] As a part of his condemnation of the ruling class, Chávez became critical of President Caldera, whose policies had caused economic inflation, and who had both suspended constitutional guarantees and arrested a number of Chávez’s supporters.^[96] A debate soon developed in the Bolivarian movement as to whether it should try to take power in elections or whether it should instead continue to believe that military action was the only effective way of bringing about political change. Chávez was a keen proponent of the latter view, believing that the oligarchy would never allow him and his supporters to win an election,^[97] whilst Francisco Arias Cárdenas instead insisted that they take part in elections. Cárdenas himself proved his point when, after joining the Radical Cause socialist party, he won the December 1995 election to become governor of the oil-rich Zulia State.^[98] Subsequently changing his opinion on the issue, Chávez and his supporters in the Bolivarian movement decided to found their own political party, the Fifth Republic Movement (MVR—Movimiento Quinta República) in July 1997 in order to support Chávez’s candidature in the Venezuelan presidential election, 1998.^{[70][99][100]}

At the start of the election run-up, most polls gave Irene Sáez, then-mayor of Caracas’ richest district, Chacao, the lead. Although an independent candidate, she had the backing of one of Venezuela’s two primary political parties, Copei.^[102] Chávez however was also gaining much support, and not only from his own MVR, but also from other leftist parties, including the Patria Para Todos and the Movement for Socialism, which together fashioned a union of parties supporting his candidacy called the Polo Patriotic (Patriotic Pole).^[103] Chávez and his followers described their aim as «laying the foundations of a new republic» to replace the existing one, which they cast as «party-dominated»; the current constitution, they argued, was no more than the «legal-political embodiment of puntofijismo«, the country’s traditional two-party patronage system.^[104] Chávez’s promises of widespread social and economic reforms won the trust and favor of a primarily poor and working class following. By May 1998, Chávez’s support had risen to 30% in polls, and by August he was registering 39%.^[105] Chávez became more and more popular with the electorate, despite the fact that much of the oligarchy-owned press criticised him; this got to the extent where Chávez had to publicly deny rumours that he ate children.^[106]Much of his support came from his ‘strong man’ populist image and charismatic appeal.^[107] With his support increasing, and Sáez’s decreasing, both the main two political parties, Copei and Democratic Action, put their support behind Henrique Salas Römer, a Yale University-educated economist who representated the Project Venezuela party.^[108]

Chávez won the election in a landslide victory with 56.20% of the vote, having gained 3, 673, 685 voted cast in his favour. Salas Römer came second, with 39.97% of the vote, whilst the other candidates, including Irene Sáez and Alfaro Ucero, only gained tiny proportions of the vote.^[109] As Gregory Wilpert noted, «He won the vote with support from nearly all classes of society, but especially from the disenchanted middle class, which had been slowly slipping into poverty for the previous 20 years, and from the country’s poor.» However, the working class, «just as anywhere else in the world, turned out to vote in a much smaller proportion than the middle and upper class», and that in effect, «Chávez was thus elected largely by the middle class.»^[110] Following his victory, Chávez gave a speech in which he declared that «The resurrection of Venezuela has begun, and nothing and no one can stop it.»^[109]

Presidency

First Presidential Term: 1999–2000

A triumphant Hugo Chávez visiting Porto Alegre, Brazil in 2003.

Chávez’s presidential inauguration took place on 2 February 1999, and during the usual presidential oath he altered from the prescribed words to proclaim that «I swear before my people that upon this moribund constitution I will drive forth the necessary democratic transformations so that the new republic will have a Magna Carta befitting these new times.»^[111][112] He subsequently set about appointing new figures to a number of government positions, including promoting various leftist allies to key positions; he for instance gave one of the founders of MBR, Jesús Urdaneta, the position in charge of the secret police, and made one of the 1992 coup leaders, Hernán Grüber Ódreman, governor of the Federal District of Caracas.^[113] Chávez also appointed some conservative, centrist and centre-right figures to government positions as well, reappointing Caldera’s economy minister Maritza Izaquirre to that same position and also appointed the businessman Roberto Mandini to be president of the state-run oil company, Petroleos de Venezuela.^[114] His critics referred to this group of government officials as the «Boliburguesía» or «Bolivarian bourgeoisie»,^[115][116] and highlighted the fact that it «included few people with experience in public administration.»^[111] He also made several alterations to his presidential privileges, scrapping the presidential limousine, giving away his entire presidential wage of $1,200 a month to a scholarship fund,^[117] and selling off many of the government-owned airplanes, although alternately many of his critics accused him of excessive personal expenses for himself, his family and friends.^[118] The involvement of a number of his immediate family members in Venezuelan politics has also led to accusations of nepotism, something Chávez denies.^[119] Meanwhile, in June 2000 he separated from his wife Marisabel, and their divorce was finalised in January 2004.^[120]

Although he publicly used strong revolutionary rhetoric from the beginning of his presidency, the Chávez government’s initial policies were moderate, capitalist and centre-left, having much in common with those of contemporary Latin American leftists like Brazil’s president Lula da Silva.^[121][122] Chávez initially believed that capitalism was still a valid economic model for Venezuela, but that it would have to be Rhenish capitalism or the Third Way that would be followed rather than the neoliberalism which had been implemented under former governments with the encouragement of the United States.^[123] He followed the economic guidelines recommended by the capitalist International Monetary Fund and continued to encourage foreign corporations to invest in Venezuela,^[124] even visiting theNew York Stock Exchange in the United States in an attempt to convince wealthy investors to do so.^[125][126] To increase his visibility abroad, Chávez spent fifty-two days of his first year as president outside of Venezuela, travelling the world meeting various national leaders, such as American President Bill Clinton, Governor of Texas George W. Bush and Chinese Premier Jiang Zemin.^[127]

Whilst he was remaining fiscally conservative, he introduced measures in an attempt to alleviate the poverty of the Venezuelan working class. Chávez immediately set into motion a social welfare program calledPlan Bolívar 2000, which he organised to begin on 27 February 1999, the tenth anniversary of the Caracazo massacre. Costing $113,000,000, Plan Bolívar 2000 involved 70,000 army officers going out into the streets of Venezuela where they would repair roads and hospitals, offer free medical care and vaccinations, and sell food at cheap prices.^{[128][129][130]} Chávez himself described the Plan by saying that «Ten years ago we came to massacre the people. Now we are going to fill them with love. Go and comb the land, search out and destroy poverty and death. We are going to fill them with love instead of lead.»^[131] In order to explain his latest thoughts and plans to the Venezuelan people, in May he also launched his own Sunday morning radio show, Aló Presidente (Hello, President), on the state radio network, as well as a Thursday night television show, De Frente con el Presidente (Face to Face with the President). He followed this with his own newspaper, El Correo del Presidente (The President’s Post), founded in July, for which he acted as editor-in-chief, but which was later shut amidst accusations of corruption in its management.^[132] In his television and radio shows, he answered calls from citizens, discussed his latest policies, sung songs and told jokes, making it unique not only in Latin America but the entire world.^[133]

Constitutional reform

Chávez holds a miniature copy of the 1999Venezuelan Constitution at the 2005 World Social Forum held in Brazil.

Chávez then called for a public referendum – something virtually unknown in Venezuela at the time – which he hoped would support his plans to form a constitutional assembly, composed of representatives from across Venezuela, as well as from indigenous tribal groups, which would be able to rewrite the nation’s constitution. The referendum went ahead on 25 April 1999, and was an overwhelming success for Chávez, with 88% of voters supporting the proposal.^[134][135]

Following this, Chávez called for an election to take place on 25 July, in which the members of the constitutional assembly would be voted into power.^[136] Of the 1,171 candidates standing for election to the assembly, over 900 of them were opponents of Chávez, but despite this, his supporters won another overwhelming electoral victory, taking 125 seats (95% of the total), including all of those belonging to indigenous tribal groups, whereas the opposition were voted into only 6 seats.^{[134][137][138]} On 12 August 1999, the new constitutional assembly voted to give themselves the power to abolish government institutions and to dismiss officials who were perceived as being corrupt or operating only in their own interests. Whilst supporters of the move believed that it could force reforms that had been blocked by corrupt politicians and judicial authorities for years, many opponents of the Chávez regime argued that it gave Chávez and the Bolivarians too much power at the expense of their political opponents, and was therefore dictatorial.^[139][140]

The elected members of the constituent assembly put together a new constitution, and a referendum was held in December 1999 which saw 72% of the electorate approving its adoption.^[138][141] The new constitution included increased protections for indigenous peoples and women, and established the rights of the public to education, housing, healthcare and food. It added new environmental protections, and increased requirements for government transparency. It increased the presidential term from five to six years, allowed people to recall presidents by referendum, and added a new presidential two-term limit. It converted the bicameral legislature which comprised of a Congress with both a Senate and a Chamber of Deputies into a unicameral one that comprised only of a National Assembly.^{[142][143][144][145]} The constitution gave greater powers to the president, not only by extending their term but also by giving them the power to legislate on citizen rights as well as the economic and financial matters that they were formerly able to do.^[146] It also gave the military a role in the government by providing them with the mandated role of ensuring public order and aiding national development, something they had been expressely forbidden from doing under the former constitution.^[146] As a part of the new constitution, the country, which was then officially known as the Republic of Venezuela, was renamed the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela (República Bolivariana de Venezuela) at Chávez’s request, thereby reflecting the government’s ideology of Bolivarianism and the influence of Simón Bolívar on the nation as a whole.^[137][138]

Second Presidential Term: 2000-2006

This section requires expansion.

Chávez visiting the USS Yorktown, a US Navy ship docked at Curacao in theNetherlands Antilles, in 2002.

Under the new constitution, it was legally required that new elections be held in order to relegimatize the government and president. This presidential election in 2000would be a part of a greater «megaelection», the first time in the country’s history that the president, governors, national and regional congressmen, mayors and councilmen would be voted for on the same day.^[147][148] Although some of his supporters feared that he had alienated the middle class and the Roman Catholic Church hierarchy who had formerly supported him, Chávez was re-elected with 59.76% of the vote (the equivalent of 3,757,000 people), a larger majority than his 1998 electoral victory.^[149][150]

The elections had led to his supporters gaining 101 out of 165 seats in the Venezuelan National Assembly, and so in November 2001 they voted to allow him to pass 49 social and economic decrees.^[151][152]

In late 2001, just after the American-led invasion of Afghanistan in retaliation for the September 11 attacks against the United States, Chávez showed pictures of Afghan children killed in a bomb attack on his television show. He commented that «They are not to blame for the terrorism of Osama Bin Laden or anyone else», and called on the American government to end «the massacre of the innocents. Terrorism cannot be fought with terrorism.» The U.S. government responded negatively to the comments, which were picked up by the media worldwide.^[153]

Origins of the opposition movement

An opposition movement to Chávez soon gained in strength in Venezuela, dominated primarily by members of the middle and upper classes. As leftist political analyst Gregory Wilpert noted in his study of the Chávez regime, these social groups were so angry at the Bolivarian government because they had lost much of their dominance over Venezuelan politics with the introduction of the 1999 constitution and the relegitamization of all areas of government that it required.^[154] Subsequently, this wealthy elite used its control of the country’s mass media to create an anti-Chávez campaign aimed at the middle classes, stirring up the latent racism and classism that existed in Venezuelan culture.^[155] One of the most prominent examples of this was through the popularization of the racist term ese mono («that monkey») which began to be applied to Chávez by his opponents,^[135][156] who would also often accuse him of being «vulgar and common».^{[149][157][156]} The media (both in Venezuela and the western world) also characterized Chávez’s supporters, who were known as the Chávistas, as being «young, poor, politically unsophisticated, antidemocratic masses» who were controlled, funded and armed by the state.^[158] This description has been refuted by certain academics who, after studying Chavista groups, have argued that they comprise of people from many classes of society, and are educated and largely non-violent.^[159] Chavista-run organizations have since claimed to have been the target of violent attacks from opposition groups: for instance, the Ezequiel Zamora National Farmers’ Coordinator estimated that 50 Chavista leaders involved in the land-reform program had been assassinated in 2002 and 2003.^[160]

Opponents of Chávez’s Bolivarian government often accused it of trying to turn Venezuela from a democracy into a dictatorship by centralising power amongst its supporters in the Constituent Assembly and granting Chávez increasingly autocratic powers. Many of them pointed to Chávez’s personal friendship with Fidel Castro and the one party socialist government in Cuba as a sign of where the Bolivarian government was headed.^[151] Venezuelan lawyer and academic Allan R. Brewer-Carías, a professed opponent of Chávez, has made the claim that under his regime the country has «suffered a tragic setback regarding democratic standards, suffering a continuous, persistent and deliberate process of demolishing institutions and destroying democracy, which has never before been experienced in the constitutional history of the country.»^[161] Other academics have argued that the opposite was true, and that «the Chávez government is in fact more democratic than previous ones» because of the increased checks and balances introduced by the 1999 constitution and the introduction of workers’ councils.^[162]

The first organized protest against the Bolivarian government occurred in January 2001, when Chávez tried to implement educational reforms through the proposed Resolution 259 and Decree 1.011, which would have seen the publication of textbooks with a heavy Bolivarian bias. The protest movement, which was primarily comprised of middle-class parents whose children went to privately-run schools, marched to central Caracas shouting out the slogan «Don’t mess with my children». Although the protesters were denounced by Chávez, who called them «selfish and individualistic», the protest was successful enough for the government to retract the proposed education reforms and instead enter into a consensus-based educational program with the opposition.^[163] That year, an organization known as the Coordinadora Democrática de Acción Cívica (CD) was founded, under which the Venezuelan opposition political parties, corporate powers, most of the country’s media, the Venezuelan Federation of Chambers of Commerce, the Frente Institucional Militar and the Central Workers Union all united to oppose Chávez’s regime.^[151][164] The prominent multimillionaire businessman Pedro Carmona (1941-) was chosen as the CD’s leader.^[151] They received support from various foreign sources, including from policies implemented by the United States government, and used the various resources that were at their disposal, including those which were state-owned and those which were privately-owned, against the Bolivarian government.^[165]

Coup, strikes and the recall referendum

A rally in favour of the 2004 effort to recall Hugo Chávez in the capital, Caracas. The recall referendum was defeated, with 59% of voters opposed to it.

On 11 April 2002, mass protests took place in Caracas against the Bolivarian government, during which guns were fired, and violence ensued involving both pro- and anti-Chávez supporters, the police and the army.^[166] Twenty people were killed and over 110 were wounded.^[167] A group of high ranking anti-Chávez military officers, likely supported by figures in the business community, media and certain political parties, had been planning to launch a coup against Chávez and used the civil unrest as an opportunity.^[168] After the plotters gained significant power, Chávez agreed to step down, and was transferred by army escort to La Orchila, and although he requested to be allowed to leave the country, he refused to officially resign from the presidency at the time. Nonetheless, the wealthy business-leader Pedro Carmona declared himself president of an interim government.^[169] Protests in support of Chávez along with insufficient support for Carmona’s regime, which many felt was implementing totalitarian measures, led to Carmona’s resignation and Chávez was returned to power on 14 April.^[170]

Chávez’s reaction to the coup attempt was to moderate his approach, implementing a new economic team that appeared to be more centrist and reinstated the old board of directors and managers of the state oil company Petróleos de Venezuela S.A. (PDVSA), whose replacement had been one of the reasons for the coup.^[171][172]

In December 2002, the Chávez presidency faced a two-month management strike at the PDVSA when he initiated management changes. As Wilpert noted, «While the opposition labelled this action a ‘general strike’, it was actually a combination of management lockout, administrative and professional employee strike, and general sabotage of the oil industry.»^[173] The Chávez government’s response was to fire about 19,000 striking employees for illegally abandoning their posts, and then employing retired workers, foreign contractors and the military to do their jobs instead. This move further damaged the strength of Chávez’s opposition by removing the many managers in the oil industry who had been supportive of their cause to overthrow Chávez.^[173]

Following the failure of these two attempts to remove Chávez from power, the opposition finally resorted to legal means in order to try and do so. The 1999 constitution had introduced the concept of a recall referendum into Venezuelan politics, and so the opposition called for such a referendum to take place. A 2004 referendum to recall Chávez was defeated. 70% of the eligible Venezuelan population turned out to vote, with 59% of voters deciding to keep the president in power.^[150] Unlike his original 1998 election victory, this time Chávez’s electoral support came almost entirely from the poorer working classes rather than the middle classes, who «had practically abandoned Chávez» after he «had consistently moved towards the left in those five and a half years».^[174]

Policies

In May 2006, Chávez visited Europe in a private capacity, where he announced plans to supply cheap Venezuelan oil to poor working class communities in the continent. The leftist Mayor of London Ken Livingstonewelcomed him, describing him as «the best news out of Latin America in many years».^[175]

Third Presidential Term: 2006-present

This section requires expansion.

Chávez on a visit to Guatemala.

In the national election of December 2006, which saw a 74% voter turnout, Chávez was once more elected, this time with 63% of the vote, beating his closest challengerManuel Rosales, who conceded his loss. The election was certified as being free and legitimate by the Organization of American States (OAS) and the Carter Center.^{[176][177][178]} After this victory, Chávez promised an «expansion of the revolution.»^[179]

Domestic policy and the United Socialist Party of Venezuela

In August 2007, Chávez proposed a broad package of measures as part of a constitutional reform. Among other measures, he called for an end to presidential term limitsand proposed limiting central bank autonomy, strengthening state expropriation powers and providing for public control over international reserves as part of an overhaul of Venezuela’s constitution. In accordance with the 1999 constitution, Chávez proposed the changes to the constitution, which were then approved by the National Assembly. The final test was a December 2007 referendum.^[180] The referendum was narrowly defeated, with 51% of the voters rejecting the amendments.^[181]

In order to ensure that his Bolivarian revolution took hold in Venezuela, Chávez discussed his wish to stand for re-election when his term ran out in 2013, and spoke of ruling beyond 2030.^[182] Under the 1999 constitution, he could not legally stand for re-election again, and so brought about a referendum to eliminate term limits on 15 February 2009. Venezuelan voters approved this alteration to the constitution with over 54% in favor, allowing any elected official the chance to try to run indefinitely.^[182][183]

Chávez’s current party, the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), had 5.7 million members as of 2007,^[184] making it the largest political group in Venezuela.^[185] The International Labor Organization of the United Nations expressed concern over voters being pressured to join the party.^[186]

Foreign policy and the Bank of the South

Chávez (far left) with fellow Latin American leftist presidents in 2009. From left to right: Paraguay’s Fernando Lugo, Bolivia’sEvo Morales, Brazil’s Lula da Silva and Ecuador’s Rafael Correa.

Within several years of Chávez’s ascendency, other leftist leaders were also voted into power in a number of Latin American countries, something that has been referred to as a «pink tide» sweeping across the region. In 2005, Evo Morales and his Movement for Socialism was elected in Bolivia, whilst the following year Rafael Correa and hisPAIS Alliance won the election in Ecuador.^[101] Chávez’s administration immediately seized this opportunity and entered into political and economic alliances with these fellow socialist governments.

In 2007, the socialist Daniel Ortega and his Sandinista National Liberation Front were elected into government in Nicaragua, and his administration immediately entered into deals with the Venezuelan government. On Ortega’s first day in power, Chavez announced plans to aid the impoverished Central American country by forgiving the $30 million it owed Venezuela, and agreed to supply them with a further gift of $10 million in aid, as well as providing them with a $20 million loan with little or no interest designed to benefit the country’s poor.^[187]

As of September 26, 2009, Chávez, along with allies such as Argentina, Brazil and Bolivia, has set up a regional bank and development lender called Bank of the South, based in Caracas, an attempt to distance himself from financial institutions such as the International Monetary Fund. Chávez first mentioned the project before winning the Presidential election in 1998.^[188] Chávez maintains that unlike other global financial organizations, the Bank of the South will be managed and funded by the countries of the region with the intention of funding social and economic development without any political conditions on that funding.^[189] The project is endorsed by Nobel Prizewinning, former World Bank economist Joseph Stiglitz, who said: «One of the advantages of having a Bank of the South is that it would reflect the perspectives of those in the south,» and that «It is a good thing to have competition in most markets, including the market for development lending.»^[190]

Following the outbreak of the 2011 Libyan civil war, in which forces opposed to the regime of Muammar Gaddafi rose up against the government, Chávez, who had always had good international relations with Gaddafi’s regime, offered to act as an intermediary between the government and the rebel-controlled National Transitional Council, however the latter declined the offer.^[191] During the subsequent 2011 military intervention in Libya, in which western forces attacked the Libyan army, Chávez criticised the «indiscriminate bombing» of the country, accusing the United States of simply trying to «lay its hands on Libya’s oil and water».^[192]

Political philosophy

19th century general and politician Simón Bolívar provides a basis for Chávez’s political ideas.

Hugo Chávez defines his political position as Bolivarianism, an ideology developed by himself which is heavily influenced by the writings of Simón Bolívar (1783–1830), a 19th-century general who led the fight against the imperialist Spanish authorities, and who is widely revered across Latin America today. Along with Bolívar, the other two primary influences upon Bolivarianism are Simón Rodríguez (1769–1854), a philosopher who was Bolívar’s tutor and mentor, and Ezequiel Zamora, (1817–1860), the Venezuelan Federalist general.^[193]Political analyst Gregory Wilpert, in his study of Chávez’s politics, noted that «The key ingredients for Chávez’s revolutionary Bolivarianism can be summarized as: an emphasis on the importance of education, the creation of civilian-military unity, Latin American integration, social justice, and national sovereignty. In many ways this is not a particularly different set of principles and ideas to those of any other Enlightenment or national liberation thinker.»^[194]

Although he has been a leftist ever since his days at the military academy, since becoming president Chávez’s political position has progressed further left, rejecting capitalist leftist ideologies like social democracy or the Third Way and instead embracing socialism. He has propagated what he calls «socialism for the 21st century«, but according to Gregory Wilpert, «Chávez has not clearly defined twenty-first century socialism, other than to say that it is about establishing liberty, equality, social justice, and solidarity. He has also indicated that it is distinctly different from state socialism«, as implemented by the governments of the Soviet Union and the People’s Republic of China.^[195] As a part of his socialist ideas, he has emphasised the role of participatory democracy, which he has implemented through the foundation of the Venezuelan Communal Councils and Bolivarian Circles which he cites as examples of grassroots and participatory democracy.^[196]

Chávez is well acquainted with the various traditions of Latin American socialism, espoused by such figures as Colombian politicianJorge Eliécer Gaitán,^[197] former Chilean president Salvador Allende,^[197] former Peruvian president Juan Velasco Alvarado,^[23] former Panamanian president Omar Torrijos^[27] and the Cuban revolutionaries Che Guevara and Fidel Castro.^[197] Other indirect influences on Chávez’s political philosophy are the writings of American linguist Noam Chomsky^[198] and the Gospel teachings of Jesus Christ.^[199][200]

Chávez’s connection to Marxism is a complex one. In May 1996, he gave an interview with Agustín Blanco Muñoz in which he remarked that «I am not a Marxist, but I am not anti-Marxist. I am not communist, but I am not anti-communist.»^[201] He is, however, well versed in many Marxist texts, having read the works of many Marxist theoreticians, and has often publicly quoted them. Various international Marxists have supported his government, believing it to be a sign of proletariat revolution as predicted in Marxist theory.^[202] In 2010, Hugo Chávez proclaimed support for the ideas of Marxist Leon Trotsky, saying «When I called him (former Minister of Labour, José Ramón Rivero)» Chávez explained, «he said to me: ‘president I want to tell you something before someone else tells you … I am a Trotskyist’, and I said, ‘well, what is the problem? I am also a Trotskyist! I follow Trotsky’s line, that of permanent revolution,» and then cited Karl Marx and Lenin.^[203][204]

Policy overview

Economic and social policy

Venezuela is a major producer of oil products, which remains the keystone of the Venezuelan economy. Chávez has gained a reputation as a price hawk in OPEC, pushing for stringent enforcement of production quotas and higher target oil prices. According to Cannon, the state income from oil revenue has «increas[ed] from 51% of total income in 2000 to 56% 2006»;^[205] oil exports «have grown from 77% in 1997 […] to 89% in 2006»;^[205] and «this dependence on oil is one of the chief problems facing the Chávez government».^[205] The economist Mark Weisbrot, in an analysis of the Chávez administration, said: «The current economic expansion began when the government got control over the national oil company in the first quarter of 2003. Since then, real (inflationadjusted) GDP has nearly doubled, growing by 94.7 percent in 5.25 years, or 13.5 percent annually.»^[206] For the year 2009, the Venezuelan economy shrank by an average of 2.9% due to the global recession.^[207] Chávez has stated that the Venezuelan economy will most likely continue shrinking throughout 2010, citing both the IMF and World Bank. Chávez sees the economic crisis as «an opportunity for socialism to spread and take root ..».^[208] According to Ian James, citing estimates from the Venezuelan Central Bank, the Venezuelan government «controls» the same percentage of the economy as when Chávez was elected in 1998, with «the private sector still control[ling] two-thirds of Venezuela’s economy».^[209]

A pro-Chávez van in Venezuela, with the slogan «Latin America advances» printed upon it.

Since Chávez was elected in 1998, over 100,000 worker-owned cooperatives—representing approximately 1.5 million people—have been formed with the assistance of government start-up credit and technical training;^[210] and the creation and maintenance, as of September 2010, of over 30,000 communal councils, examples of localised participatory democracy; which he intended to be integration into regional umbrella organizations known as «Communes in Construction».^[211] In 2010, Chávez supported the construction of 184 communes, housing thousands of families, with $23 million in government funding. The communes produce some of their own food, and are able to make decisions by popular assembly of what to do with government funds.^[212] In September 2010, Chávez announced the location of 876 million bolivars ($203 million) for community projects around the country, specifically communal councils and the newly formed communes. Chávez also criticised the bureaucracy still common in Venezuela saying, when in discussion with his Communes Minister Isis Ochoa, that «All of the projects must be carried out by the commune, not the bureaucracy.» The Ministry for Communes, which oversees and funds all communal projects, was initiated in 2009.^[211]

Chávez has also supported the creation of a series of Bolivarian Missions aimed at providing public services to improve economic, cultural, and social conditions. A 2010 OAS report^[213] indicated achievements in addressing illiteracy, healthcare and poverty,^[214] and economic and social advances.^[215]

Barry Cannon writes that «most areas of spending have increased».^[216] «[S]pending on education as a percentage of GDP stood at 5.1% in 2006, as opposed to 3.4% in the last year of the Caldera government.»^[216] Spending on health «has increased from 1.6% of GDP in 2000 to 7.71% in 2006».^[216] Spending on housing «receives low public support», increasing only «from 1% in GDP to 1.6% in 2006».^[216] Teresa A. Meade, writes that Chávez’s popularity «rests squarely on the lower classes who have benefited from these health initiatives and similar policies […] poverty rates fell from 42 to 34 percent from 2000 to 2006, still leaving over 30 percent in this oil-rich nation below the poverty line».^[217]

The Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) reports that the Venezuelan economy grew on average by 11.85% in the period 2004–2007.^[218] According to The Washington Post, citing statistics from theUnited Nations, poverty in Venezuela stood at 28% in 2008,^[219] down from 55.44% in 1998 before Chávez got into office.^[220] Economist Mark Weisbrot found that, «During the … economic expansion, the poverty rate [was] cut by more than half, from 54 percent of households in the first half of 2003 to 26 percent at the end of 2008. Extreme poverty has fallen even more, by 72 percent. These poverty rates measure only cash income, and does take into account increased access to health care or education.»^[206][221]

Human rights

In the 1999 Venezuelan constitution, 116 of 300 articles were concerned with human rights; these included increased protections for indigenous peoples and women, and established the rights of the public to education, housing, healthcare, and food. It called for dramatic democratic reforms such as ability to recall politicians from office by popular referendum, increased requirements for government transparency, and numerous other requirements to increase localized, participatory democracy, in favor of centralized administration. It gave citizens the right to timely and impartial information, community access to media, and a right to participate in acts of civil disobedience.^[143][144]

Amnesty International has criticized the Chávez administration for targeting critics following several politically motivated arrests.^[222] Freedom House lists Venezuela as being «partly free» in its 2009 Freedom in the World annual report, claiming that women’s rights and indigenous rights have improved, but that press freedom has been threatened.^[223] A 2010 Organization of American States report found concerns with freedom of expression, human rights abuses, authoritarianism, press freedom, threats to democracy,^[224][225] as well as erosion of separation of powers, the economic infrastructure and ability of the president to appoint judges to federal courts.^{[224][225][226]} OAS observors were denied access to Venezuela;^[226] Chávez rejected the OAS report, pointing out that its authors did not even come to Venezuela. He said Venezuela should boycott the OAS, which he feels is dominated by the United States; a spokesperson said, «We don’t recognize the commission as an impartial institution». He disclaims any power to influence the judiciary.^[227] A Venezuelan official said the report distorts and takes statistics out of context, saying that «human rights violations in Venezuela have decreased».^[228] Venezuela has said it will not accept an IACHR/OAS visit as long as Santiago Cantón remains its Executive Secretary, unless the IACHR apologizes for what he describes as its support of the 2002 coup.^[213][229]

In 2008, Human Rights Watch released a report reviewing Chávez’s human rights record over his first decade in power.^[230] The report praises Chávez’s 1999 amendments to the constitution which significantly expanded human rights guarantees, but notes a «wide range of government policies that have undercut the human rights protections established» by the revised constitution.^[230] In particular, the report accuses Chávez and his administration of engaging in discrimination on political grounds, eroding the independence of the judiciary, and of engaging in «policies that have undercut journalists’ freedom of expression, workers’ freedom of association, and civil society’s ability to promote human rights in Venezuela.»^[231] The report also mentioned improvements in women’s rights and indigenous rights. Subsequently, over a hundred Latin American scholars signed a joint letter with the Council on Hemispheric Affairs criticizing the Human Rights Watch report for its alleged factual inaccuracy, exaggeration, lack of context, illogical arguments, and heavy reliance on opposition newspapers as sources, amongst other things.^{[232][233][234]} The International Labor Organization of the United Nations expressed concern over voters being pressured to join the party.^[186]

Chavez.

Venezuelan Judge Maria Afiuni was arrested in 2009 on charges of corruption, after she ordered the conditional release on bail of banker Eligio Cedeño, who had been held on charges of fraud and other crimes due to alleged illegal currency trading activities. Some human rights officials allege the arrest was politically motivated; Cedeño «had been in pretrial detention for nearly three years, despite a two-year limit prescribed by Venezuelan law».^[235] Cedeño later fled to the U.S. to avoid prosecution. Following Afiuni’s arrest, several groups, including the United Nations, the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, the Episcopal Conference of Venezuela, Human Rights Watch, the Law Society of England and Wales, the U.S. Department of State, and the European Union Parliament accused Chávez of «creating a climate of fear» among Venezuela’s legal profession.^{[235][236][237][238][239][240][241][242]} The European Parliament called this «an attack on the independence of the judiciary by the President of a nation, who should be its first guarantor».^[243] A director of Human Rights Watch said, «Once again the Chávez government has demonstrated its fundamental disregard for the principle of judicial independence.»^[235]

Media and the press

The large majority of mass media in Venezuela is privately owned. As of 2007,^{[dated info]} private corporations controlled 80% of the cable television channels, 100% of the newspaper companies, and 706 out of 709 radio stations.^[244][245]

The Venezuelan government has required that all private television stations dedicate at least 25%^{[clarification needed]} of their airtime to programs created by community groups, non-profits, and other independent producers. In July 2005 Chávez inaugurated TeleSUR, a Pan-American equivalent of Al Jazeera that seeks to challenge the present domination of Latin American television news by Univision and the United States-based CNN en Español.^[246] In 2006 Chávez inaugurated a state-funded movie studio called Villa del Cine (English: Cinema City).^[247] According to Chávez, the goal of this indigenous film industry is to counter what he describes «the dictatorship of Hollywood», the lack of alternative media.^[248]

Chávez has a Twitter account with more than 1,100,000 followers as of December 2010.^[249][250] Chávez’s Twitter account has been described as a way for people to bypass bureaucracy and contact the president directly. There is a team of 200 people to sort through suggestions and comments sent via Twitter. Chávez has said Twitter is «another mechanism for contact with the public, to evaluate many things and to help many people»,^[251] and that he sees Twitter as «a weapon that also needs to be used by the revolution».^[252] In a Twitter report released in June 2010 Venezuela is third globally for the prevalence of Twitter with 19% of the population using it, nearly 2/3 of all internet users. This is behind Indonesia with 20.8% and Brazil with 20.5%.^[253]

In 2010 availability of internet service in Venezuela rose by 43%. The Venezuelan state has instituted Infocenters, community spaces equipped with computers with internet connections which are free to use. As of March 2010 there are 668 such centres, with more planned.^[253]

In 2008, Human Rights Watch criticized Chávez for engaging in «often discriminatory policies that have undercut journalists’ freedom of expression.»^[231] Freedom House lists Venezuela’s press as being «Not Free» in its 2009 Map of Press Freedom.^[254] Reporters Without Borders has criticized the Chávez administration for «steadily silencing its critics».^[255] In the group’s 2009 Press Freedom Index, Reporters Without Borders noted that «Venezuela is now among the region’s worst press freedom offenders.»^[255]

In the days before the 11 April 2002 coup, the five main private Venezuelan TV stations gave advertising space to those calling for anti-Chávez demonstrations.^[256][257] In 2006, Chávez announced that the terrestrialbroadcast license for RCTV would not be renewed, due to its refusal to pay taxes and fines, and its alleged open support of the 2002 coup attempt against Chávez, and role in helping to instigate the oil strike in 2002–2003.^[258] RCTV was transmitted via cable and satellite and was widely viewable in Venezuela until January 2010, when it was excluded by cable companies in response to an order of National Commission of Telecommunications.^{[259][260][261]} The failure to renew its terrestrial broadcast license had been condemned by a multitude of international organizations, many of whom have claimed that the closure was politically motivated, and was intended to silence government critics.^{[262][263][264][265]}

Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) questioned whether, in the event a television station openly supported and collaborated with coup leaders, the station in question would not be subject to even more serious consequences in the United States or any other Western nation.^[266] In a poll conducted by Datanalisis, almost 70 percent of Venezuelans polled opposed the shut-down, but most cited the loss of their favorite soap operas rather than concerns about limits on freedom of expression.^[267]

Crime and punishment

During the 1980s and 1990s there was a steady increase in crime in Latin America, and Colombia, El Salvador, Venezuela and Brazil all had homicide rates above the regional average.^[268] The major reasons for high levels of crime in Latin America are high inequality, low incarceration rates and small police forces.^[269]

During Chávez’ administration, homicide rates have more than doubled, with one NGO finding the rate to have nearly quadrupled;^[270][271] the number of homicides increased from 6,000 in 1999 to 13,000 in 2007.^[272] Kidnappings have also become increasingly common.^[273] Caracas in 2010 had the world’s highest murder rate.^[274] Chávez maintains that the nation is no more violent now than it was when he took office.^[275]

Citizens now believe that crime is a serious problem and that police were themselves a factor in the increase in crime. Between 2000 and 2007, 6,300 police were investigated for violations of human rights. Because decentralization of police was blamed for their ineffectiveness, the 1999 constitution required the National Assembly to form a national police force; however legislation on this became bogged down in legislative discussions. In 2006 the government established the National Commission for Police Reform (Conarepol), in which a range of civil society representatives, politicians and academics investigated law enforcement in Venezuela and made recommendations. This included setting up a national police force designed to operate with high standards of professionalism and specific training in human rights. It also included initiatives whereby communal councils can participate in police supervision, by being able to request investigations into police behaviour and file recommendations and complaints.^[272]

In 2008, Chávez passed a decree designed to implement Conarepol’s recommendation on the national police force, and the National Bolivarian Police (PNB),^[276][277] and Experimental Security University began operations in 2009. According to the PNB, murder has been reduced by 60%, robberies by nearly 59%, and gender-based violence has diminished by 66% in the pilot areas where the PNB has been active in and around Caracas.^[277] However, not all homicides due to encounters with police are reported.^[278] According to the publications El Espectador and Le Monde diplomatique, rising crime in rural and urban areas is partly due to increased cross-border activity by Colombian right-wing paramilitary groups like Águilas Negras.^[279]

The decree has been criticized because it was negotiated behind closed doors, and did not follow all of Conarepol’s recommendations to deal with human rights, and because «politicization of the force could undercut the goal of professionalization».^[278][280]

Foreign policy

This section requires expansion.

Chávez and then-President of Argentina Néstor Kirchnerdiscuss energy and trade integration projects for South America. They met on 21 November 2005 in Venezuela.

Chávez has refocused Venezuelan foreign policy on Latin American economic and social integration by enacting bilateral trade and reciprocal aid agreements, including his so-called «oil diplomacy».^[281][282] Chávez stated that Venezuela has «a strong oil card to play on the geopolitical stage … It is a card that we are going to play with toughness against the toughest country in the world, the United States.»^[283] Chávez has focused on a variety of multinational institutions to promote his vision of Latin American integration, includingPetrocaribe, Petrosur, and TeleSUR. Bilateral trade relationships with other Latin American countries have also played a major role in his policy, with Chávez increasing arms purchases from Brazil, forming oil-for-expertise trade arrangements with Cuba, and creating unique barter arrangements that exchange Venezuelan petroleum for cash-strapped Argentina’s meat and dairy products. Additionally, Chávez worked closely with other Latin American leaders following the 1997 Summit of the Americas in many areas—especially energy integration—and championed the OAS decision to adopt the Anti-Corruption Convention. Chávez also participates in the United Nations Friends groups for Haiti, and is pursuing efforts to join and engage the Mercosur trade bloc to expand the hemisphere’s trade integration prospects.^[284]

Personal life

Chávez has been married twice. He first wed Nancy Colmenares, a woman from a poor family originating in Chávez’s hometown of Sabaneta. Chávez and Colmenares remained married for 18 years, during which time they had three children: Rosa Virginia, María Gabriela, and Hugo Rafael, the latter of whom suffers from behavioural problems.^[285] The couple separated soon after Chávez’s 1992 coup attempt. During his first marriage, Chávez also had an affair with historian Herma Marksman; their relationship lasted nine years.^[286] Chávez’s second wife was journalist Marisabel Rodríguez de Chávez, whom he divorced in 2000.^[287] Through that marriage, Chávez had another daughter, Rosinés.^[288]Both María and Rosa have provided Chávez with grandchildren.^[285][289] Allegations have been made that Chávez is a womaniser and has been all the way through his marriages, but these have remained unproven and are contradicted by statements provided by other figures close to him.^[290]

Chávez was raised in the Roman Catholic denomination of Christianity, although he has had a series of disputes with both the Venezuelan Catholic hierarchy and Protestantgroups like the New Tribes Mission.^[291][292] He describes himself as a Christian who grew up expecting to become a priest. According to him, as a result of this background his socialist policies have been borne with roots in the teachings of Jesus Christ,^[293] and he publicly used the slogan of «Christ is with the Revolution!».^[294] Although he has traditionally kept his own faith a private matter, Chávez has over the course of his presidency become increasingly open to discussing his religious views, stating that both his faith and his interpretation of Jesus‘ personal life and ideology have had a profound impact on his leftist and progressive views:

He [Jesus] accompanied me in difficult times, in crucial moments. So Jesus Christ is no doubt a historical figure—he was someone who rebelled, an anti-imperialist guy. He confronted the Roman Empire…. Because who might think that Jesus was a capitalist? No. Judas was the capitalist, for taking the coins! Christ was a revolutionary. He confronted the religious hierarchies. He confronted the economic power of the time. He preferred death in the defense of his humanistic ideals, who fostered change…. He is our Jesus Christ.^[122]

Recognition

Painted mural in support of Chávez and the Fifth Republic Movement (MVR) in Barcelona, Spain.

The United States-based Time magazine included Hugo Chávez among their list of the world’s 100 most influential people in 2005 and 2006.^[2][3] In a 2006 list compiled by the British magazine New Statesman, he was voted eleventh in the list of «Heroes of our time».^[295] In 2010 the magazine included Chávez in its annual The World’s 50 Most Influential Figures.^[296] His biographers Marcano and Tyszka believed that within only a few years of his presidency, he «had already earned his place in history as the president most loved and most despised by the Venezuelan people, the president who inspired the greatest zeal and the deepest revulsion at the same time.»^[297]

During his term, Chávez has been awarded the following honorary degrees:^[298]

• Honorary Doctorate in Political Science—Granted by Kyung Hee University (South Korea) by Rector Chungwon Choue on 16 October 1999.
• Honorary Doctorate in Jurisprudence—Granted by the Autonomous University of Santo Domingo (Dominican Republic) on 9 March 2001.
• Honorary Doctorate—Granted by the Academy of Diplomacy of the Ministry of External Affairs (Russian Federation) on 15 May 2001.
• Honorary Doctorate in Economics—Granted by the Faculty of Economics and Commerce of Beijing University (People’s Republic of China) on 24 May 2001.

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1187165,00.html

Hugo Chavez

By TIM PADGETT Sunday, Apr. 30, 2006

 

ILLUSTRATION FOR TIME BY JEFF SMITH

The rise of Venezuela’s left-wing President, Hugo Chavez, is a lesson in what can happen when the U.S. disses an entire continent. After 9/11, when most Latin American nations refused to endorse the U.S. invasion of Iraq, President Bush testily turned his back on the region—but not before he was widely accused of backing a failed 2002 coup against Chavez, Bush’s loudest critic south of the border. Washington denies the charge, but the perception of U.S. bullying won Chavez international sympathy. His anti-U.S. Bolivarian Revolution has been roaring ever since. At the same time, U.S. influence in Latin America is perhaps at its lowest ebb. As the Bush Administration cuts development aid to the region, Chavez, who controls the hemisphere’s largest oil reserves, is giving cash-strapped neighbors discounts and favorable financing on Venezuelan oil and billions of dollars in loans. That largesse, coupled with Latin America’s sharp antiglobalization mood, is helping a stunning number of leftists win or lead in Latin presidential elections today.

Chavez’s growing ties to Iran have prompted U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice to brand him a threat to hemispheric stability. «I sting those who rattle me,» Chavez said recently in his weekly TV address, «so don’t mess with me, Condoleezza!» But goading America into messing with him has so far proved to be a formula for success for Chavez, 51, who is widely expected to win re-election in December.

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1187165,00.html#ixzz1QNRK0GNh

http://www.elpais.com/todo-sobre/persona/Hugo/Chavez/325/

Cáncer de Chávez desata una guerra

Walter Mercado:”“la muerte de Hugo Chávez

Chávez fue operado de un cáncer de colon por un médico español

Cáncer de Chávez cambia panorama político para sus opositores

Chávez revela que fue operado de un tumor canceroso

Hugo Rafael Chávez Frías

Absence of ill Hugo Chavez sparks speculation

Enfermedad Hugo Chavez

Chávez “pelea la batalla por la vida”

Cáncer de Chávez desata una guerra