English Edition Nº 45

Pg. P g. 7 | S Social ociaal Justice Justtice

Pg. P g. 8 | O Opinion pinnion

A new university law to democratize higher education has provoked criticism from the exclusionist academic elite

Veteran journalist John Pilger on media manipulation and deceptive reporting of war

THURSDAY | December 30, 2010 | No. 45| Bs 1 | CARACAS

ENGLISH EDITION The artillery of ideas

Dilma: a woman in power in Brazil

Venezuela’s economy to grow in 2011

On Saturday, Brazil will inaugurate its first woman president in history, Dilma Rousseff

In attendance at the presidential ceremony will be heads of state from across the region and around the world, including Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Dilma, a leftist leader and close confidant of outgoing Brazilian President Lula da Silva, has a strong history of activism and struggle against powerful interests. Her rise to power shows that women in Latin America are taking on leading roles. Rousseff will head the region’s largest economy and one of the world’s most powerful nations.

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Enabling Law allows for housing fund A much criticized Enabling Law approved by Venezuela’s National Assembly last week was used by President Hugo Chavez to create a special emergency fund to provide relief for thousands left homeless by heavy rains that devastated the nation last month. The multi-billion dollar fund will enable homes to be built for the displaced in areas most affected by the rains.

Politics

International solidarity More than 500 tons of international aid have been sent to Venezuela from ally nations.

Foreign funding banned A new law prohibiting foreign funding for internal political activities in Venezuela will put an end to external meddling.

Social Justice

Q&A on new laws Find quick answers to common questions about Venezuela’s new media law.

New laws in Venezuela to give more power to people

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enezuela is passing new laws based on constitutional principles to give more power to the people and strengthen national sovereignty, according to declarations made by Marelis Perez Marcano, deputy vice president of the National Assembly, on Tuesday.

According to Perez Marcano, it is no coincidence that the opposition is attacking the process of change underway throughout the country, because they do not believe in the organizational capacity of the Venezuelan people.

“We are aware of the

opposition´s attempts to confront our project for giving the population more participation in public power”, added Perez Marcano.

According to the parliamentarian, the National Assembly is taking measures to develop participation policies, and offer the people more self-management capacity.

Perez Marcano said that it is very important for the population to be informed of and understand laws that are being passed with the goal of transferring services to communities for distributing resources with more equity.

“We are building a new State of law and justice, seeking democracy and a higher organizational capacity for Venezuelans”, reiterated the legislative representative.

She noted that about 56 laws have been passed to improve the domestic situation and international agreements had been reached to stop the decentralization of wealth and old mechanisms established during prior governments in the twentieth century that served the interests of the elite.

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n 2011, the economy in Venezuela will recover and grow 2% despite the drop registered in 2010, assured the President of the National Statistics Institute (INE), Elias Eljuri.

“Venezuela is coming out from the economic crisis.

Next year the economy will grow and indicators will recover. During the coup and the oil sabotage [in 2002 and 2003], the economy fell more than 8 points and we recovered from it really fast. In the first trimester of this year, the economy dropped 5.2%; however, when we compare the third trimester of 2009 with the same period in 2010, it is already at 0.4%. That is to say, in the fourth trimester the economy will be positive and next year we will have an economy that will grow at least 2%”, he explained.

The President of the INE pointed out that the Internal Added Demand fell last year by 10.9%; nevertheless, statistics show a growth of 4.1% in 2010.

Eljuri underscored that despite the economic crisis that effected Venezuela, the current government kept its social investment policy.

“In these 10 years, the Bolivarian Government has destined 60.6% of the national budget to social investment”.

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No 45 • Thursday, December 30, 2010

The artillery of ideas

Chavez: emergency fund to provide for new homes referendum over his eleven years as head of state, referred to the opposition’s criticism of the initiative as a guise for their intentions to “destabilize the country” as was the case in 2002. “[The Law] is an excuse for the opposition to try to take up violence once again, to justify a coup and an assassination”, he imputed.

Indeed, recent opposition protests against a package of laws passed by the National Assembly have turned violent as business leaders and the conservative student movement have encouraged people to engage in acts of civil disobedience against the government.

Last week, the head of the Venezuelan chamber of commerce, FEDECAMARAS – the primary organization behind the 2002 coup against Chavez which left at least 17 people dead – made a call to members of the armed forces to disobey orders which they consider to be in violation of the constitution.

Chavez has rejected out of hand the assertions of FEDECAMARAS president Noel Alvarez, referring to the declarations as a call to subversion that must be investigated by the Public Attorney’s Office.

“I can only, as head of state, emphatically denounce this call to violate the Constitution and the laws of the Republic made, yet again, by this corrupt organization tied to the worst part of our nation’s past”, he said.

While the financial crisis has forced millions from their homes in the United States with no help from government agencies, Venezuelan President Chavez decreed a new fund this week to provide several billion dollars in relief aid for housing construction to help thousands displaced from the severe rains that hit the nation in late November

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n his first use of the decree powers granted to him through the Venezuelan congress earlier this month, President Hugo Chavez announced the creation of a 10 billion bolivar (US$2.3 billion) emergency fund to provide relief for those affected by the torrential rains that have ravaged parts of the country.

506 million bolivars ($117.7 million) of the newly created Simon Bolivar Fund will be put to use to construct four thousand new homes in areas of the western state of Zulia, one of the regions most affected by the downpours. “[W]e’re beginning the reconstruction phase”, Chavez said of the initiative on Sunday.

“We’re going to build thousands and thousands of homes for people, much more than we’ve done up till now”, he declared.

ENABLING HELP The Simon Bolivar fund was created by presidential decree via the nation’s newly passed Enabling Law which, according to the Venezuelan Constitution, gives the head of the Executive branch the ability to bypass congress in order to enact specific legislation with greater celerity.

Venezuela’s congress, the National Assembly, approved the Enabling Law by a two-thirds majority on December 15th giving Chavez the power to rule by decree for the next 18 months.

OPPOSITION AGAINST AID Members of the conservative Venezuelan opposition have decried the passage of the law, us-

ing private media outlets both nationally and internationally to denounce what they consider “the road towards dictatorship”.

The opposition, which carried out a violent coup d’etat in 2002 to oust the democratically-elected Chavez from power, has referred to the Enabling Law as an intent to usurp democratic institutions.

“In Venezuela, there is a coup d’etat process being carried out by the state”, said Congresswoman-elect Maria Machado of the right-wing opposition coalition Democratic Unity Roundtable (MUD). Machado, founder of the US-funded group Sumate, was a principal signator of the “Carmona Decree” during the April 2002 coup d’etat, which dissolved

all of Venezuela’s democratic institutions and briefly forced the country into a dictatorship.

Currently, the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) dominates the National Assembly due to an opposition boycott of congressional elections in 2005 that ceded power to Chavez supporters.

The supermajority that the PSUV has enjoyed since 2005 will be diminished in 2011 as opposition representatives who won 40 percent of congressional seats during elections last September 26th take their posts on January 5th. Still, the minority opposition will not have enough voting power to be able to enact or retract any legislation.

DESTABILIZATION ATTEMPTS In response to the criticisms emanating from the private media and other opposition sectors, the Venezuelan President and his supporters in the PSUV have defended the Enabling Law as a necessary response to the emergency provoked by the rains which has led to the death of nearly 40 people and the displacement of more than 100 thousand.

“They say that this is a dictatorship, but the law exists to deal with the emergency and the crisis that we’re living. And throughout 2011 and 2012 it will be for reconstruction of devastated areas”, the Venezuelan President declared.

Chavez, who has won three presidential elections and a recall

COLLECTIVE EFFORT According to the Venezuelan President, instead of manipulating the passage of national legislation for political purposes, all Venezuelans should be focused on expediting reconstruction efforts for the victims of the natural disaster that has befallen the nation.

After touring various areas affected by the rains on Sunday with Bolivian President Evo Morales, Chavez called for a collective effort to construct housing units and overcome the tragedy.

“For this reason, I’m asking for, in the first place, a lot of participation on the part of communal businesses, the Armed Forces, mayors and governors, congress members and the most responsible and serious construction firms”, Chavez said.

T/ Edward Ellis P/ Presidential Press

No 45 • Thursday, December 30, 2010

The artillery of ideas

International

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Dilma: Brazil’s first woman President takes office Brazil’s first female president Dilma Rousseff, who takes up the helm on January 1, will lead a small but powerful group of women taking on the political challenges facing Latin America

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hen she is inaugurated as the head of the region’s biggest economy, Dilma Rousseff will be the most visible face of the inroads women are making into a paternalist tradition that has so long sidelined them into secondary roles.

It will be a tricky test for Rousseff, who takes over from her charismatic mentor Luis Inacio Lula da Silva, whose gruff, bearded manner proved persuasive in a variety of situations—not least in getting her elected.

She joins a select club of Latina female leaders that already includes Argentine President Cristina Kirchner and Costa Rican President Laura Chinchilla.

“In Brazil, there is an attempt to undermine Dilma’s legitimacy because she was chosen by Lula, as if she was incapable of making her own decisions just because she’s a woman”, said Professor Rosemary Segurado, a social sci-

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rotecting the rights of renters will be a top priority of the Venezuelan government into the New Year, President Hugo Chavez announced last week during a ceremony held at the Presidential Palace, Miraflores The declaration was made as the government delivered new apartment titles to homebuyers scammed by development agencies in the Caracas neighborhood of La Avileña.

Speaking out against the rampant abuse that many tenants face from unscrupulous landlords and private real estate firms, Chavez affirmed his commitment to put an end to the fraud that has become commonplace throughout the country.

“I’m going to do what I have to do inside the guidelines of the Constitution to make this stop.

ences professor at Sao Paulo University.

Rousseff, Lula’s former cabinet chief; Kirchner, first lady before taking over the presidency; and Chinchilla, a former vicepresident of Costa Rica, are finding themselves forced to prove “they are not in anyone’s shadow”, she said. “Latin American politics is seen as an area for men, and society has trouble accepting they have their own opinions, ideas and initiatives”, she added.

In Rousseff’s case, the fact she had never run in an election before winning the presidency was taken as evidence that she was simply a prolongation of Lula’s government—something which diminished her own accomplishments, Segurado said.

Chinchilla, likewise, faced criticism that she was propelled to the top by her predecessor, Oscar Aria. And Kirchner was previously credited with being more influential when she was the senator wife of president Nestor

Kirchner. When she became president with her husband’s backing, “it was as if she had no political past” for much of the electorate, Segurado said. In contrast, Chile’s former female president Michelle Bachelet served as defense minister before becoming head of state, Segurado noted.

She had successfully negotiated military matters that still felt the tug of ex-dictator Augusto Pinochet.

“Bachelet is a case of a woman who had her own path, who man-

aged to show she was not only a creation of ex-president Ricardo Lagos but a public figure in her own right”, she said.

Latin America also had several other female figures who, though not in the spotlight of international politics, were regarded as influential within their own countries. They included Maraa Estela Martinez de Peron in Argentina, Nicaragua’s Violeta Chamorro and Panama’s Mireya Moscoso. In Haiti, former first lady Mirlande Manigat took 31 percent of the vote in November’s first round of presidential elections and will stand in next month’s run-off vote.

Even after running their country’s affairs, some female leaders have remained at the forefront of global politics.

Bachelet, for instance, was chosen by UN chief Ban Ki-moon this year to run UN Women, a genderequality entity. Women “manage to always take decisions, and all decisions, not only the easy ones”, Bachelet recently told the Brazilian newspaper O Estado de Sao Paulo. She also said Rousseff’s election gave greater visibility to female leaders worldwide.

“This contributes to changing the belief that women are secondclass citizens”, she said.

T/ AFP P/ Agencies

Venezuela: putting tenant rights first

This is an abomination against exploited families”, he exclaimed.

In efforts to increase the profitability of rental properties, many private agents and landlords raise rents illegally, evade taxes and charge extra fees for fictitious services.

Speculation in the real estate

market is widespread and tenant rights are rarely respected, leaving ordinary residents at the mercy of private firms and individuals who employ an arsenal of bureaucratic maneuvers to manipulate renters and first time homebuyers.

“As President it gives me great shame to see that this is still occur-

ring in my country and, before the entire nation, I commit myself to put an end to this”, Chavez declared.

In order to combat these illicit practices, the President has proposed the creation of a task force headed by Labor Minister Maria Iglesias and comprised of government officials alongside residents belonging to popular housing associations.

According to the head of state, it will be a working group “where the people, the Vice President of the Council of Ministers for Politics (Nicolas Maduro) and congress members create proposals that arrive in my hands as quickly and efficiently as possible”.

Chavez said that he would use the powers granted to him through the recently passed Enabling Law to enact the changes.

The Enabling Law, passed by

the Venezuelan Congress earlier this month, gives the President the authority to enact specific legislation without the need of debate in the legislative chambers of the National Assembly.

“This can be one of the laws that falls under the Enabling Law”, Chavez said. “I want [government officials] to work with me on the law…I’m asking for the support of those who have the most experience writing laws. We have to create a fair law to deal with this issue”, he implored.

With respect to tenant’s rights, the government-citizen task force would work to develop proposals that would then be submitted to the Enabling Cabinet in the process of writing the new law.

T/ Edward Ellis P/ Presidential Press

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No 45 • Thursday, December 30, 2010

The artillery of ideas

International aid shows solidarity with Venezuela Countries from around the world have provided hundreds of tons of aid to Venezuela after the devastating rains that hit the nation in late November. Bolivian President Evo Morales visited Venezuela this week to bring more assistance

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s testament to the bridges of solidarity that have been built through Venezuela’s multilateral foreign policy over the past ten years, more than 500 tons of international humanitarian assistance have arrived in the country in response to the torrential rains that have drenched the nation, displacing more than 100 thousand people.

On Friday, thirty tons of assistance including electric generators and two thousand blankets were received from Russia while on Sunday, fifty tons of aid were provided by the government of Bolivia.

“This is another sign that the Venezuelan government has excellent relations with all the countries of the world”, said Luis Curbelo, National Director of the office of Civil Protection and Disaster Administration.

“We haven’t declared a national emergency but we’ve seen solidarity from all the countries

that are friends of Venezuela”, the director declared.

REGIONAL STATES OF EMERGENCY Although the government has not declared a national disaster, a state of emergency has been confirmed in eight states throughout the South American country due to the downpours.

Last Thursday, a shipment of personal hygiene products, baby food, and furniture from Indonesia arrived to be distributed among the 900 shelters that have been installed across the country.

Alfred Palembagan, Indonesian Ambassador to Venezuela spoke

about the importance of the aid, relating Venezuela’s crisis to the various tsunamis that the South Asian country has suffered over the years.

“We’ve come to donate various supplies but the most important is that this is a symbol of solidarity with the Venezuelan people and its government. We, as a people, have suffered many natural disasters. We know and understand the problem that our sister country Venezuela is confronting right now”, Palembagan said.

Other nations that have responded to the call for assistance include Ecuador, Nicaragua, Cuba, Aruba, Belarus, Spain, Por-

tugal, Switzerland, China and the United Arab Emirates.

The aid has arrived in the form of mattresses, potable water, nonperishable food items, diapers, tents and other supplies.

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez referred to the aid that has poured in from across the globe as “historic”.

“The humanitarian operation that is developing in Venezuela is something extraordinary”, he declared.

EVO’S VISIT On Sunday, Chavez toured affected zones in the western state of Zulia with his Bolivian coun-

terpart, Evo Morales, who delivered fifty tons of rice destined for indigenous populations in the area.

“We are grateful, from our hearts, for the support that Bolivia has provided from the start of this tragedy. I express our gratitude in the name of the Venezuelan people and all the families that have suffered from the rains”, Chavez said.

For his part Morales affirmed the Bolivian people’s support for the Venezuelans who have been victimized by the crisis.

“In the name of the Bolivian people, we’ve come to express our solidarity with the affected families in the face of these inundations and natural disasters. I’m content to be in Venezuela again and as sister nations, we’ll continue working together”, Morales affirmed.

The Bolivian president also used his visit to speak out against global warming and advocate for serious dialogue regarding climate change with the industrialized countries responsible for the vast majority of greenhouse emissions.

“Unfortunately, climate change and global warming are part of a structural problem on a global scale that brings deep social and economic problems. The poor and indigenous are the ones who must suffer the evils of capitalism”, Morales said.

T/ Edward Ellis P/ Presidential Press

ONA: over 63 tons of drugs seized in 2010 T

hrough December 2010, Venezuela’s Security Agencies have seized 63.294 tons of drugs in different procedures performed throughout the country.

The information comes from the figures published on the Venezuelan National Anti-Drug Office (ONA) website. The data details seizure and arrests for drug related crimes from January to December, 17. Additionally, it breaks down the operations carried out in the country according to the type of drugs seized: Marijuana (38.380 tons), cocaine (24.626 tons) heroin (52.520 kg), crack (169.715 kg) and crack cocaine (cocaine paste, 64.889 kg).

Likewise, from January to December, 2010 12,376 people were

arrested for drug offenses during 9492 procedures carried out by members of the Bolivarian National Guard (GNB), the Scientific, Penal and Criminal Inves-

tigation Police (CICPC), the Bolivarian National Police (PNB) the Bolivarian National Intelligence Service (Sebin), as well as regional and municipal police forces.

Venezuela’s anti-drug efforts have improved substantially since the nation broke ties and suspended cooperation with the US Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA), which it accused of sabotage and espionage. Recent documents made public by the whistleblower site Wikileaks evidence the DEA “has been transformed into a global intelligence organization with a reach that extends far beyond narcotics, and an eavesdropping operation so expansive it has to fend off foreign politicians who want to use it against their political enemies, according to secret diplomatic cables”, reported the New York Times.

In 2005, the Venezuelan government suspended cooperation with

the DEA after evidence came to light of several DEA agents based in the South American nation coordinating illegal drug shipments with traffickers for personal benefit. Additionally, evidence showed DEA espionage against Venezuelan government officials and sabotage of Venezuelan anti-drug efforts.

Subsequently, the US government punished Venezuela and labeled it as a nation “not cooperating” with regional anti-drug efforts.

In 2008, Bolivian President Evo Morales followed suit and expelled the DEA from his nation, citing sabotage, espionage and overall interference in Bolivian internal affairs.

T/ AVN P/ Agencies

No 45 • Thursday, December 30, 2010

The artillery of ideas

Politics

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New Venezuelan law makes foreign financing of political organizations illegal Venezuela has finally approved a law to regulate foreign funding for political activities in the country, which will impede the flow of unregulated multimillion-dollar funding from foreign agencies seeking to influence the country’s internal politics

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ast week, Venezuela’s National Assembly approved the Law in Defense of Political Sovereignty and National Self-Determination, making foreign funding of political organizations illegal. The legislature also passed a reform to the Political Parties Law, creating a penalty for legislators who change political parties after constituents have elected them based on a party platform.

The law banning foreign funding for political activities is short, with only 10 articles, and aims to protect Venezuelan political life from foreign interference through financial support or donations to political organizations.

It applies specifically to political organizations, which are defined as “organizations that promote citizen participation in public spaces or control of public power or that promote candidates seeking election”. It also applies to organizations that promote and defend citizens’ political rights.

Penalties include fines of double the amount received from a foreign entity and the expulsion from Venezuela of foreigners who participate in such financing. Directors of the organizations breaking the law would be barred from political positions for five to eight years and organizations would likewise be banned from electoral processes for five to eight years. In addition, political organizations that invite a foreigner to interfere in a way that “offends state institutions, civil servants or the exercise of sovereignty” will be penalized with fines of 5-10,000 tax unites. The current tax unit is worth 65 bolivars (US$15).

MIXED REACTIONS Legislative representative Rafic

Souki from the pro-Chavez United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) said the law prevents political parties and non-government organizations (NGOs) from receiving external financing with the aim of destabilizing the country.

Meanwhile, Edgar Lucena, representative from the Venezuelan Communist Party (PCV), explained that his party reserved their vote of support for this piece of legislation, saying that while the law was important in preventing “imperialist intervention through financing and any type of resources coming from drug trafficking”, the law does not “guarantee...the consolidation of proletarian internationalism... expressed by international cooperation of workers, of the people, and of revolutionary movements of the world”.

Opposition parties Podemos and Frente Humanista voted against the law because they believed it is “another act of persecution of dissidence”.

DEMOCRATIC STANDARD However, this type of law is not unique to Venezuela, in fact, most nations have some sort of legislation that prevents foreign actors, governments or entities from intervening in domestic affairs.

Overall, the issue is a question of national sovereignty. The United

States, for example, also forbids foreign funding for political campaigns, candidates or parties, and highly regulates all foreign financing for other activities, including lobbying, public relations and NGOs through the Foreign Agent Registration Act (FARA).

The passing of the Law in Defense of Political Sovereignty and National Self-Determination comes after years of funding for opposition political groups and media agencies through US entities such as USAID and the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) has aided in the execution of a coup d’etat and other anti-democratic activities slated to overthrow the Chavez government.

While some local organizations protested the law and criticized it as proclaiming the “death of NGOs”, most Venezuelans applauded the legislation as necessary to protect the nation from foreign interference. A large majority of opposition-oriented NGOs have popped up over the past eight years in response to US government efforts to help build and consolidate an anti-Chavez movement in Venezuela capable of provoking regime change and installing a more proUS government.

Venezuela, a nation with the world’s largest oil reserves, was also a close ally and client-state of

the US, until Hugo Chavez was elected in 1998 and the country began to transform through the Bolivarian Revolution. Chavez promoted independence, sovereignty and pronounced the nation’s vast oil reserves would be used to first benefit national development and progress. This redistribution of an industry previously operating at the behest of Washington touched very powerful interests and provoked a severe response from those seeking to retain control over Venezuela’s strategic resources.

The funding from US and some European nations to create and maintain anti-Chavez groups in Venezuela reached over $57 million in 2010, the majority channeled to propaganda and electoral campaigns charged with reducing President Chavez’s popularity, exploiting and exaggerating domestic problems and supporting opposition candidates campaigns to the National Assembly, which held elections in September. A report issued in May 2010 by the Spain-based think tank FRIDE revealed that a large portion of the $57 million funneled to opposition groups in Venezuela was also passed through irregular channels to avoid the South American nation’s “currency controls”. “…An additional problem for civil society organizations has

been the ‘double currency’: even after the devaluation of the Bolivar, the unofficial exchange rate is higher than the official one…Some donors have solved this problem by paying in hard currency, by using foreign bank accounts, or by applying a semi-official exchange rate”, hence violating the law.

Under the new legislation, such funding will be prohibited and Venezuela will join the ranks of most other democratic nations that protect national sovereignty by regulating or banning foreign funding for internal political activities.

POLITICAL PARTY LOYALTY The National Assembly also reformed the Political Parties, Public Meetings, and Protests Law so that legislators who change political parties during their legislative period will be penalized.

The aim of the reform is to “respect the will of the people who chose the legislators during the parliamentary elections”, Telesur reported.

In the last two weeks, the National Assembly has approved or reformed over 20 laws, according to legislator Dario Vivas, and still has several on their plate before the year is over.

T/ Tamara Pearson and Eva Golinger

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6 | Social Justice

No 45 • Thursday, December 30, 2010

The artillery of ideas

Venezuela: Q&A

Reform of the Social Responsibility in Media Law web. Additionally, the Chavez administration has provided tens of thousands of free laptop computers to school children and has opened thousands of “InfoCenters” (free computer and Internet access stations) nationwide.

5 Questions 5 Answers 1. How does the Reform of the Social Responsibility in Media Law modify the original?

In addition to radio and television, Internet media are added as subject to regulation, not in order to limit web sites or services available on the net, but rather to ensure the responsible use of this important tool. Concretely, the law provides for sanctions against those who use the Internet to incite hate, criminal activity, war propaganda, alterations in public order, homicide; or advocate to disobey constitutional authority.

The reformed Law also stimulates Venezuelan producers and media professionals by requiring the broadcast of at least 50% of nationally-produced television programming during prime time hours.

2. Why weren’t the same objectives achieved with the original Law? The Law of Social Responsibility in Television and Radio did not include any reference to regulating the responsible usage of Internet media. Sheltered by this omission, some web sites, such as Noticiero Digital, have published numer-

ous articles and messages inciting violence, rape, criminal activities and even the assassinations of public figures. It’s not difficult in Venezuela to find calls for the Armed Forces to revolt against the government or even to assassinate President Chavez on different web sites, blogs, Twitter or Facebook.

These are dangerous actions that no civilized society can permit.

3. Will social networks such as Twitter and Facebook be prohibited in Venezuela?

Some private media have portrayed the idea that Internet and social networks will be censored in Venezuela. This is a massive distortion of the reality of the Bolivarian Revolution, which has made major, irreversible advances in providing all Venezuelans

with access to new technologies.

It’s hard to imagine, even by mistake, that Twitter would be prohibited in the country with the most BlackBerry users in Latin America. Or that Facebook would be censored in a nation where access to Internet has grown by 900% in the past two years with over 8 million Venezuelans connecting daily to the world wide

4. Do Internet regulations exist in other countries?

You only need to search the web to find the answer to this question.

In Spain, for example, the AntiDownloading Law authorizes the government to eliminate any sites that publish content violating copyright regulations. As could be imagined, the sponsors of this law are major multinational companies that greatly benefit from this measure.

In the United States, the President can disconnect all Internet services for up to four months based on the threat of cyberattacks that could place national security in danger. New laws are underway also in the US to prohibit any content on any website that “threatens national security”.

And all content inciting violence against individuals or criminal activity is strictly prohibited on commercial websites.

T/ MINCI

Venezuela: Q&A

Enabling Law 5 Questions 5 Answers

displaced throughout the nation and affected agricultural production.

1. What is an Enabling Law for?

To concede powers to the Executive for a determined period of time to approve decrees that permit the implementation of important transformative policies which would otherwise take too long to enact due to bureaucratic obstacles.

The current law has been approved by the National Assembly for 18 months to enable decrees relating to infrastructure, transportation, housing and public services, amongst other matters, responding directly to the emergency caused by torrential rains that left more than 130,000 people

2. What practical use has an Enabling Law had before?

It has permitted the President to advance social and economic benefits within the model of development fomented by the Bolivarian Revolution. Legislation such as the Hydrocarbons Law, which returned the administration and oversight of national oil resources to Venezuela in order to directly benefit and address the needs of the people; the Law of Food Sovereignty, which contributed to improving the nutritional index in the country; the Fishing Law, which eliminated trawling as a form of fishing; and the Land

Reform Law, which has progressively reduced the presence of unjust and unproductive land estates in order to advance and improve national agricultural production and promote smallscale farmers - were all approved under Enabling Laws.

3. Why is there so much fuss over the Enabling Law? President Chavez has answered this question himself: “The opposition are more and more distanced and disconnected from the people and demonstrate their profound disregard for the nation’s needs”.

Recently-elected opposition congress members laud their alleged capacity to paralyze the country, once the new legislature

is installed on January 5th. They dream of tying the hands and feet of the President and of dissolving current institutions and policies.

Nonetheless, the opposition do not have a significant majority capable of achieving such undemocratic objectives.

The Enabling Law will allow the Executive to legislate in an expedited and accelerated way in favor of the people, and will guarantee structural responses in connection with the People’s Power to the problems generated by the emergency caused by the rains.

4. Does the current Parliament have the authority to approve a law that extends beyond January 5th?

Yes. All laws approved by any

legislative body in the world are valid beyond the legislative sessions. Only popular will can revoke them.

5. Will the new Parliament be unable to legislate?

Elected members from the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV), the Communist Party of Venezuela (PCV), as well as those from opposition parties, will be in full capacity to pursue legislative initiatives and policies within the new National Assembly. The powers given to the President do not impede those laws, whose approval - or not - will depend strictly on the amount of votes issued by members of parliament.

T/ MINCI

No 45 • Thursday, December 30, 2010

The artillery of ideas

Social Justice

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Venezuelan University Law creates student bill of rights, “democratizes” higher education As students in the United States and Europe protest against soaring tuition and lack of funding for public higher education, the Venezuelan National Assembly has passed an unprecedented law to include professors, students, workers, and local community members in university decision-making and to eliminate barriers to higher education

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he law is based on the principle that the government has the responsibility to provide free, high-quality, public education from childhood through the undergraduate university level. This principle is established in Article 103 of the nation’s constitution.

The law says students will have the right to an equal vote in the election of university authorities, evaluate professors and participate in self-evaluation, freely express opinions, access university administrative records, and receive a range of services including housing, transportation, meals, health care, and monthly stipends, among other rights.

BALANCED DECISION-MAKING The law also establishes a series of university councils that are to be elected on each campus through a one-person, one-vote democratic system that includes students, professors, administrators, wage workers, and other members of the university community.

This includes a University Public Defenders Council and an Ombudsman Council to audit and oversee university budgeting and administration. Likewise, each campus will elect a legislative body of representatives called the University Transformation Assembly that will work with the National Council for University Transformation to manage the changes to the public university system’s administrative structure

versity community, according to legislator Maria de Queipo, who heads the Commission for Education, Culture, Recreation, and Sports in the National Assembly.

and programs in line with the new law and the constitution.

Currently, universities are run by a smaller group of authorities called the University Council, which is elected in a system that weighs higher authorities’ votes more heavily and gives virtually no power to students or workers.

UNIVERSITY AUTONOMY The new law explicitly upholds the principle of autonomy of public university administration, which is mandated by Article 109 of the national constitution. This principle was inspired by Venezuela’s deep history of deadly political repression and resistance

on university campuses, especially during the US-backed, right wing dictatorship that ended in 1958 and the subsequent period of representative democracy.

But the legal interpretation of autonomy has changed under the new law, according to legislator Alberto Castelar from the governing United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV). He said public universities would now have “co-responsible autonomy, which means that university authorities cannot go and do as they please”.

University autonomy will be “deeper” because the new law increases the participation of previously excluded parts of the uni-

STUDENT DEMONSTRATIONS Last Thursday, several student organizations including the M-28 movement and student chapters of the PSUV held demonstrations in different parts of the country in favor of the law. M-28 leader Vicente Moronta told the state news agency AVN that those who oppose the new law “consider education to be a commodity, not a human right”.

In the central state of Lara, PSUV student leader Erick Prado said, “The student movement has fought for decades in favor of a more democratic and inclusive education, long before the revolution came into power”. He added that the new law would help to “democratize the university”.

Meanwhile, opposition political leaders and student organizations staged a march in Caracas last week to protest the new law.

Diego Scharifker, the head of the University Student Federation, told the Associated Press that the law “imposes socialism as the sole ideology and does away with university autonomy because it concentrates all powers in the minister for higher education”. Students carried signs calling President Hugo Chavez

a “dictator” and referring to his administration as a “totalitarian government”.

Opposition marchers pointed to the part of the law that says, “university education is part of the non-alienated labor that consolidates the socialist model of production”, and the part that says autonomy includes academic freedom but also must be exercised “in accordance with the National Development Plan for the strengthening, consolidation, and defense of the sovereignty and independence of the homeland”.

Police and National Guardsmen broke up the demonstration with a water cannon and plastic shotgun pellets after authorities said the students did not have a permit to extend the march beyond university campus boundaries.

OPPOSITION CALLS FOR VIOLENCE Central University of Venezuela (UCV) Rector Cecilia García Arocha called for widespread disobedience of the law and said the UCV will initiate classes next semester according to the old university law. “This is the beginning of the resistance”, she said while defending the opposition students’ decision to march beyond university grounds.

Despite the fact that all of Venezuela’s public universities already operate tuition-free and provide services such as free student housing, transportation, and meals, the tendency remains for rich students to be admitted to the traditional autonomous public universities while poorer students attend the burgeoning Bolivarian University of Venezuela, which was created by the Chavez government and has an openly pro-Revolution administration.

The passage of the new University Education Law comes just days before a new National Assembly with a 41% opposition contingent will replace the current National Assembly, which is almost entirely controlled by the PSUV. T/ James Suggett www.venezuelanalysis.com

THURSDAY | December 30, 2010 | No. 45| Bs 1 | CARACAS

ENGLISH EDITION The artillery of ideas

A publication of the Fundacion Correo del Orinoco • Editor-in-Chief | Eva Golinger • Graphic Design | Alexander Uzcátegui, Jameson Jiménez • Press | Fundación Imprenta de la Cultura

OPINION

Why are wars not being reported honestly?

I

n the US Army manual on counterinsurgency, the US Commander General David Petraeus describes Afghanistan as a “war of perception conducted continuously using the news media”. What really matters is not so much the day-to-day battles against the Taliban as the way the adventure is sold in the US where “the media directly influence the attitude of key audiences”. Reading this, I was reminded of the Venezuelan general who led a coup against the democratic government in 2002.

“We had a secret weapon,” he boasted. “We had the media, especially TV. You’ve got to have the media”.

Never has so much official energy been expended in ensuring journalists collude with the makers of rapacious wars that, say the media-friendly generals, are now “perpetual”. In echoing the West’s more verbose warlords, such as the waterboarding former US vicepresident Dick Cheney, who predicated “50 years of war”, they plan a state of permanent conflict wholly dependent on keeping at bay an enemy whose name they dare not speak: the public.

At Chicksands in Bedfordshire, the Ministry of Defense’s psychological warfare (Psyops) establishment, media trainers devote themselves to the task, immersed in a jargon world of “information dominance”, “asymmetric threats” and “cyberthreats”.

Of course, only the jargon is new.

In my film, The War You Don’t See, there is reference to a pre-WikiLeaks private conversation in December 1917 between David Lloyd George, Britain’s prime minister during much of the First World War, and CP Scott, editor of the Manchester Guardian. “If people really knew the truth”, the Prime Minister said, “the war would be stopped tomorrow. But of course they don’t know, and can’t know”.

In the wake of this “war to end all wars”, Edward Bernays, a confidante of President Woodrow Wilson, coined the term “public relations” as a euphemism for propaganda “which was given a bad name in the war”. In his book, Pro-

paganda (1928), Bernays described PR as “an invisible government that is the true ruling power in our country” thanks to “the intelligent manipulation of the masses”. This was achieved by “false realities” and their adoption by the media.

I began to understand this as a young reporter during the US war in Vietnam. During my first assignment, I saw the results of the bombing of two villages and the use of Napalm B, which continues to burn beneath the skin; many of the victims were children; trees were festooned with body parts. The lament that “these unavoidable tragedies happen in wars” did not explain why virtually the entire population of South Vietnam was at grave risk from the forces of their declared “ally”, the US. PR terms like “pacification” and “collateral damage” became our currency. Almost no reporter used the word “invasion”.

On the walls of the Saigon bureaus of major US news organizations were often displayed horrific photographs that were never published and rarely sent because it was said they were would “sensationalize” the war by upsetting readers and viewers and therefore were not “objective”. The My Lai massacre in 1968 was not reported

from Vietnam, even though a number of reporters knew about it, but by a freelance in the US, Seymour Hersh. The cover of Newsweek magazine called it an “American tragedy”, implying that the invaders were the victims: a purging theme enthusiastically taken up by Hollywood in movies such as The Deer Hunter and Platoon. The war was flawed and tragic, but the cause was essentially noble. Moreover, it was “lost” thanks to the irresponsibility of a hostile, uncensored media.

Although the opposite of the truth, such false realties became the “lessons” learned by the makers of present-day wars and by much of the media. Following Vietnam, “embedding” journalists became central to war policy on both sides of the Atlantic. With honorable exceptions, this succeeded, especially in the US. In March 2003, some 700 embedded reporters and camera crews accompanied the invading US forces in Iraq. Watch their excited reports, and it is the liberation of Europe all over again.

The apogee was the victorious entry into Baghdad, and the TV pictures of crowds cheering the felling of a statue of Saddam Hussein. Behind this façade, a US Psyops team successfully manipulated what an

ignored US army report describes as a “media circus [with] almost as many reporters as Iraqis”. Rageh Omaar, who was there for the BBC, reported on the main evening news: “People have come out welcoming [the US], holding up V-signs. This is an image taking place across the whole of the Iraqi capital”.

In The War You Don’t See, Omaar speaks with admirable frankness.

“I didn’t really do my job properly”, he says. “I’d hold my hand up and say that one didn’t press the most uncomfortable buttons hard enough”. He describes how British military propaganda successfully manipulated coverage of the fall of Basra, which BBC News 24 reported as having fallen “17 times”.

The sheer magnitude of Iraqi suffering in the onslaught had little place in the news. “I am perfectly open to the accusation that we were hoodwinked”, said Jeremy Paxman, talking about Iraq’s non-existent weapons of mass destruction to a group of students last year. “Clearly we were”. Dan Rather, who was the CBS news anchor for 24 years, was less reticent. “There was a fear in every newsroom in the US”, he told me, “a fear of losing your job, the fear of being stuck with some label, unpatriotic or otherwise”.

In Britain, David Rose, whose Observer articles played a major part in falsely linking Saddam Hussein to al-Qaida and 9/11, gave me a courageous interview in which he said, “I can make no excuses. What happened [in Iraq] was a crime, a crime on a very large scale”.

“Does that make journalists accomplices?” I asked him.

“Yes. Unwitting perhaps, but yes”.

What is the value of journalists speaking like this? The answer is provided by the great reporter James Cameron, “If we who are meant to find out what the bastards are up to, if we don’t report what we find, if we don’t speak up”, he told me, “who’s going to stop the whole bloody business happening again?”

Cameron could not have imagined a modern phenomenon such as WikiLeaks but he would have surely approved. In the current avalanche of official documents, especially those that describe the secret machinations that lead to war, the failure of journalism is rarely noted.

And perhaps the reason Julian Assange seems to excite such hostility among journalists serving a variety of “lobbies”, is that WikiLeaks and its truth-telling shames them.

Why has the public had to wait for WikiLeaks to find out how great power really operates? As a leaked 2,000-page Ministry of Defense document reveals, the most effective journalists are those who are regarded in places of power not as embedded or clubbable, but as a “threat”. This is the threat of real democracy, whose “currency”, said Thomas Jefferson, is “free flowing information”.

In my film, I asked Assange how WikiLeaks dealt with the draconian secrecy laws for which Britain is famous. “Well,” he said, “when we look at the Official Secrets Act labelled documents, we see a statement that it is an offence to retain the information and it is an offence to destroy the information, so the only possible outcome is that we have to publish the information”. These are extraordinary times.

John Pilger