Another weekend came and went, and still there is no real news about Hugo Chavez. Nothing. The only information the world gets, is through VP Nicolas Maduro and his team, who in a series of contradictory messages paint an image of Hugo Chavez as the president who is both present and absent. Jokes are going around about the enigmatic president - one that he is the true Santa: no one sees him but everyone has to believe in him. Needless to say at this point, the government hasn't done anything to dispel rumors about the true condition of Hugo Chavez. If anything, the contradictory reports from within the government itself have only fanned them to new heights. But attention of the Venezuelans is gradually turning to their everyday problems such as the devaluation, the scarcity of products, and above all the rampant criminality. Even the opposition media are paying less and less attention to what is happening politically. Everybody is getting tired of this hide-and-seek game, even the chavists.
But the social networks, specially Twitter, are fuming with wildest rumors, truths, half-truths and downright lies. There was one rumor, last Friday just after I closed my blog, that there was a quarrel between VP Maduro and the defense minister admiral Molero, in which Maduro supposedly wanted to sack Molero for insubordination and Molero replied that the only one to sack him is Chavez personally, and no one else. Nobody has confirmed this news / rumor, but I personally don't discard it. The army have been very silent these last days, their political conman Diosdado Cabello has kept his mouth shut as well while Maduro and his civil neocommunist club have been endlessly blabbing and contradicting each other. It is advisable to watch how the armed forces, this dark horse, the source of power and coup d'etats, will behave the weeks to come.
Meanwhile, on the economic front things are going from bad to worse. Something is not going right with the importations. There are signs that the chavist government is strapped of cash with the barrel of oil at around 100 bucks (???). That could explain in great part the puzzling shortage of even sugar! This country exported sugar! Now it seems most of the white sweet stuff is coming from capitalist Brazil. The government is doing everything to contradict this even with the use of plain lies. According to this socialist government, there is no shortage. "Hamstering agents" of the "ultraright fascist groups" under orders of the "foreign imperialists" are supposedly sabotaging the blooming socialist economy, planted by the "endless wisdom of Chairman Mao, sorry Comandante Chavez" blablabla. The same endless communist blabber which I heard in the seventies and eighties. Anyone suffering of so-called "Ostalgia", or nostalgia for Soviet times, should come here. For me, it's like riding a time machine over and over again. With of course knowing that this movie, called Socialist Venezuela, will end in total and utter failure.
But back to the news. The expected devaluation is now 3 weeks old, but independent economic analysts are already stating that Venezuela will suffer a second devaluation. If that is true, and I think it is, the devaluation will take place after the July elections, putting the country under a very tough situation till that month, when it probably will get worse. To erase all doubts: the economic decline in Venezuela started right after Chavez started the conversion to a marxist economic structure in January 2007, after his second reelection. It has virtually devastated the country's non-oil production, making the country even more dependent (over 90%) on its oil revenues. Despite heavy warnings from all side, the Chavez team is bent on keeping and even radicalizing its marxist course, thinking maybe that the oil revenues will wash away all mistakes. But to me and countless others living this downward hill ride with horror and amazement, things in Venezuela will get worse, much worse. This neocommunist Jurassic Park will throw Venezuela to the level of Castrist Cuba.
Unless people open their eyes. This however is a wish, not a statement built on facts. Venezuelans are still much too cozy in their semi fantasy world, fueled by the world's cheapest gasoline, to really understand what is coming to them. And the poor? Always been poor and ignorant, always will be. To them, Hugo Chavez will remain a redeemer for the time to come, even as this regime is starting to crumble away under the crushing weight of its own ineptitude.
Monday, February 25, 2013
Friday, February 22, 2013
Back again! Reloaded!!!!
Well, it's been a very long time. Living in this godforsaken city - it will be 7 years coming July - has impeded me in keeping true to this blog. But I have made a solemn promise to myself to be a Good And Faithful Blogger.
At this very moment, I am sitting in the middle of the Venezuelan post-Chavez vortex, about 20 minutes driving from the military hospital where he is SUPPOSED to be convalescing after having SUPPOSEDLY been flown back from Havanna, Cuba last Monday.
It's now Friday on the calendar and we have seen "dick" of Chavez, nothing, not even a blurry picture. The smiling and happy-happy pictures of Chavez and his daughters, SUPPOSEDLY taken last February 14, are most probably Photoshop fakes, as countless Venezuelan Twittees have posted their own version of the picture with Chavez reading Playboy, an opposition newspaper, you name it. I have downloaded some very funny ones, one very crafty one of Hitler reading a Venezuelan newspaper of that very day. Photoshop is Magic. That was for sure. But what is happening with Chavez? Where is he? Is he still alive?
Despite Peace Noble prize winner Rigoberta Menchu and hordes of red-clad wellwishers screaming and assuring each and everyone that Chavez will be on his feet in no time, helped by astral forces and whatever, the rational look at Chavez' chances of ever reappearing, is bleak, to say the least. I personally sense that the regime of Vicepresident Maduro, which is doing everything to crush and intimidate dissenters and the opposition, is desperate to hold power no matter what the cost. A NO to Venezuela's plea for more credits from Big Buddy China has made things worse, leading the straggling economy to a dark abyss with a devaluation of almost 50% - the third in three years in a row - , rising prices, food shortages, rampant criminality and whatever else it takes to ruin my days in this country.
If Chavez is dead, or not fit anymore to hold the presidency he was reelected to last fall, then reelections are mandatory according to the country's constitution. The mentioning of this by MP's of the opposition have resulted in enormous regime yelling and screaming, threats and some of those opposition politicians being accused of corruption and persecuted juridically by the government-controlled justice apparatus. Forget any impartiality from the government's side. It's a Cuban-styled Soviet era totalitarian regime with trotskyist mannerisms. And the Chavez-wannabe VP Nicolas Maduro has made this clear to everyone caring to listen and understand. Under Chavez, this regime made its utmost efforts to show a democratic face to the world. Maduro and the cronies of his regime have no problems in tearing that mask from their totalitarian faces. Efforts are made to exclude the only independent TV channel Globovision from the new digital TV system, shutting the last critical mediatic voice down and submitting the rest to follow the regime's ideological line.
The last deed of the Maduro regime has now been to deny a former police inspector, accused of killing scores of demonstrators in 2002 in a kangaroo court with forged evidence, a more humane treatment, while medical reports clearly state that the prisoner's health is failing. The denial by a government-controlled judge will probably seal this man's fate.
Venezuela is a broke country, with all its oil richness. The country is rife with anarchy at the moment. The regime does everything now to prepare the credulous part of the Venezuelan population for what the rest already knows. But God only knows what the effect will be on a country that is feeling more like a shaken champagne bottle ready to burst.
Keep in touch, also via Twitter: @avginkel.
At this very moment, I am sitting in the middle of the Venezuelan post-Chavez vortex, about 20 minutes driving from the military hospital where he is SUPPOSED to be convalescing after having SUPPOSEDLY been flown back from Havanna, Cuba last Monday.
It's now Friday on the calendar and we have seen "dick" of Chavez, nothing, not even a blurry picture. The smiling and happy-happy pictures of Chavez and his daughters, SUPPOSEDLY taken last February 14, are most probably Photoshop fakes, as countless Venezuelan Twittees have posted their own version of the picture with Chavez reading Playboy, an opposition newspaper, you name it. I have downloaded some very funny ones, one very crafty one of Hitler reading a Venezuelan newspaper of that very day. Photoshop is Magic. That was for sure. But what is happening with Chavez? Where is he? Is he still alive?
Despite Peace Noble prize winner Rigoberta Menchu and hordes of red-clad wellwishers screaming and assuring each and everyone that Chavez will be on his feet in no time, helped by astral forces and whatever, the rational look at Chavez' chances of ever reappearing, is bleak, to say the least. I personally sense that the regime of Vicepresident Maduro, which is doing everything to crush and intimidate dissenters and the opposition, is desperate to hold power no matter what the cost. A NO to Venezuela's plea for more credits from Big Buddy China has made things worse, leading the straggling economy to a dark abyss with a devaluation of almost 50% - the third in three years in a row - , rising prices, food shortages, rampant criminality and whatever else it takes to ruin my days in this country.
If Chavez is dead, or not fit anymore to hold the presidency he was reelected to last fall, then reelections are mandatory according to the country's constitution. The mentioning of this by MP's of the opposition have resulted in enormous regime yelling and screaming, threats and some of those opposition politicians being accused of corruption and persecuted juridically by the government-controlled justice apparatus. Forget any impartiality from the government's side. It's a Cuban-styled Soviet era totalitarian regime with trotskyist mannerisms. And the Chavez-wannabe VP Nicolas Maduro has made this clear to everyone caring to listen and understand. Under Chavez, this regime made its utmost efforts to show a democratic face to the world. Maduro and the cronies of his regime have no problems in tearing that mask from their totalitarian faces. Efforts are made to exclude the only independent TV channel Globovision from the new digital TV system, shutting the last critical mediatic voice down and submitting the rest to follow the regime's ideological line.
The last deed of the Maduro regime has now been to deny a former police inspector, accused of killing scores of demonstrators in 2002 in a kangaroo court with forged evidence, a more humane treatment, while medical reports clearly state that the prisoner's health is failing. The denial by a government-controlled judge will probably seal this man's fate.
Venezuela is a broke country, with all its oil richness. The country is rife with anarchy at the moment. The regime does everything now to prepare the credulous part of the Venezuelan population for what the rest already knows. But God only knows what the effect will be on a country that is feeling more like a shaken champagne bottle ready to burst.
Keep in touch, also via Twitter: @avginkel.
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