Hugo Chavez Kills Democracy

Picture: Hugo Chavez during his failed 1992 military coup d'etat to seize power in Venezuela.

"Chávez held the loyalty of less than 10% of Venezuela's military forces..."

Committee for the Protection of Journalists, CPJ, ranked Russia’s President Vladimir Putin equal to Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez, calling both of them a new breed of sophisticated and elected leaders creating enforcement bodies for mass media’s control, intimidation and censorship

"With respect to domestic policies, critics report that both corruption and crime are rampant. They also cite a failing infrastructure and public hospitals. Criticism from Chávez supporters arises from reports that Chávez is not fulfilling his major campaign pledges with respect to labor and land reform. Critics have also charged that the Chávez government has engaged in "gigantic fraud" during the 2004 recall referendum.

"Chavez has been accused of concentrating power of judicial and legislative branches. The leading business daily of Argentina, Ambito Financiero , described Venezuela under Chavez in 2007 as having a "nationalized economy, out-of-control spending, government by decree, and perpetual re-election." The daily also compared Chavez to King Louis XIV of France, stating his 2007 inauguration would mark "a concentration of power without precedent in Venezuela". More

"Just two decades after democracy took hold in the region, we're seeing a rapidly growing trend to expand presidential powers in countries such as Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Colombia and Argentina. Some of them are also creating ''people's organizations'' to intimidate and silence opponents, much like Benito Mussolini did in Italy or Fidel Castro in Cuba. Consider the most recent developments:

* In Venezuela, the entirely pro-Chavez National Assembly on Jan. 31 passed a law that gives the president special powers to rule by decree for 18 months. Under the new rule, Chavez will be able to sign sweeping economic and political laws, including one allowing for his indefinite re-election.

'The president has received imperial powers,' Teodoro Petkoff, an ex-Marxist guerrilla and former planning minister who now runs the daily Tal Cual, told me in a telephone interview from Caracas. 'Chavez already controlled all powers, but the legislative procedures were cumbersome and bothered him. Now, he can rule without legislative delays.'

What's more, Article 2 of the new law allows Chavez to create government-backed people's organizations ''to allow the direct exercise of the people's sovereignty.'' More.

+ More 'elected dictators' are taking hold in Latin America
+ Hugo Chavez Kills Democracy
+ Hugo Chavez' turn toward dictator
+ The Kennedy, Chavez & Chomsky Pipeline

"Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two make four. If that is granted, all else follows."
-- Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984), by George Orwell.