Venezuela News And ViewsVenezuela News And Views: Homework for the readers of this blog
Venezuela News And Views
Monday, October 17, 2005
Homework for the readers of this blog
The BBC has a rather unfortunate initiative: to set upo a forum where "supposedly" Chavez will reply to questions sent to him. The LINK.
This is what I sent:
A few questions for you.
What about separation of power as the basis for democracy?
Why is it that in Venezuela 99% of public officials in the courts and elswhere, but more notably in the courts, swear allegiance to you?
Why has it been years since you have not given a real press conference to ALL of the Venezuelan media to account for your actions? I mean a real press conference where you MUST answer the questions, not one with only sycophantic journalists to interview you.
Why is it that your administration is blocking REAL investigation to a whole list of political murders, including to people that were following your leadership such as Danilo Anderson?
Why is it that we cannot have a real auditable tax return from any of your ministers?
Why have you not launched a serious investigation on this modern apartheid/fascism that is the Tascon list who segregates 3 million of Venezuelans to a second class citizen status just because they disagree with you?
Last but not least, how long do you think you will be able to keep fooling the people that support you overseas without knowing what is really going on inside Venezuela? In other words, what are you going to do to hide the mess you are creating in Venezuela once Bush and Iraq are not around anymore to serve as convenient whipping boys?
And I have more embarassing questions for you to reply if you wish it so.
So your job is to send your own questions, briefly stated and to the point. What I did is already too long, I encourage you to write less, if anything to contrast with all the flatterers of Chavez who have been very busy gloryfying their hero, without even asking questions for many of them, which goes a long way to illustrate the minds behind the words.......
Please, do not criticize Chavez too much, just ask the hard questions with a minimum of objective documentation. No recrimination please, we want all the questions to be approved by the BBC. The simple fact that the hard questions will be put on screen by BBC, and maybe even reach Chavez, should be enough satisfaction for us as the BBC does not erase what it publishes. Do not make it a personal moment to scream at Chavez, you have the comment section fo this blog for this :)
Written from the Venezuelan provinces, this blog started as private letters to my friends overseas, letters narrating the difficult days of the 2002/2003 strike in Venezuela. These letters became this mix of news, comments, pictures of the Venezuelan situation. Unknowingly, I have written the diary of Venezuela slow descent into authoritarianism, the slow erosion of our liberties, the takeover of the country by a military caste, the surrendering of our soul to our inner demons.
Click logo above to go directly to the English language blog. Click here to go to the Spanish language mirror.
Estamos en Venezuela, nunca se sabe. In spite of its Spanish title, an irregular blog about a French student observing Venezuela. Interesting pictures.
General info and discontinued blogs but with good archives
Venezuela Crisis has a visual and textual record "hors pair" of the recent electoral campaign in Venezuela, the first blogger to have covered live a Venezuelan campaign. Seems to be on a resting phase for a few weeks.
Digital papers with Venezuela and LatAm in mind (in Spanish)
There are two major digital papers with forums and all, for a permanent clash between factions. Noticiero Digital is the oldest one and Noticias 24 is giving it a run for tis money.
And a new comer:Venezuela es noticia.
Ciudadania Activa has a large selection of articles on Venezuelan politics and civil rights issues.
Relevant info to expose some of the regime's propaganda and human rights violations
The lies of April
The famous "infamous" video "The revolution will not be televised" has been duly analyzed and shown to be in large measure a crass manipulation. Counter-video in Spanish here, and summary of main points here.
There is a documentary that follows the April 2002 events from the perspective on what Chavez did that April 11, "La Cadena". It is about the forced broadcast made by Chavez to hide the massacre of the pacific march on Miraflores.
The infamous apartheid like system of the Tascon and Maisanta lists
The compilation of various documents from Miguel.
The video "La Lista" and my reviews in English and Spanish by invitation at Hispalibertas.
The El Nacional review of Perez Oramas.
The original video itself can be seen here.
Diverse Human Rights pages
Of course, from Amnesty International to the Human Rights Watch page, without forgetting local organizations such as prestigious COFAVIC, the Venezuelan government comes only too often lacking in its Human Rights record.
OTHER FOLKS WITH VENEZUELA MORE OR LESS IN THEIR MIND (Please send links that should be added here)
And of course to be fair there must be links to pro-Chavez sites. I do pride myself of having been the first opposition blog to have listed pro Chavez links; a situation that has now changed. However extremely rare is the pro Chavez page or blog that links to any of the sites listed above. The readers might draw their own conclusion
Aporrea (Beat up, bruise! as in the imperative mode of the verb; the only interesting one if you can read Spanish. Predicts the future)
And of course the full time propaganda agencies, ALL at tax payer expenses, the National Radio coverage, RNV, and the rather deficient official news agency, ABN (both in Spanish).
Without forgetting the "official" newsletter in English.
Some blogs, more or less sycophantic.
Yosmary, campaigning for Mario Silva, quite something.
Less sycophantic, even critical on occasion Terreno baldio.
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Map of Venezuela to help you locate the different locales mentioned through the blog (click here for a more detailed map)
For the memories. The picture below dates from the epic days of the December 2002/January 2003 "El Paro", when the opposition was strong and decided, and when Chavez was low in polls.
Then came the "misiones" and the worst populist episode of our history. Through pacific protests and strikes we tried to preserve democracy.
History proved us right even if we lost that battle.
Marching toward Hotel Melia, 01/31/03, 5 PM.
Small yellow square under the Pepsi ball is the big stage.
A special thanks to JoAnne Schmitz for the suggestions and help in setting this blog up.
