The Devil's Excrement

In the first serious poll to come out after Chavez decided to include all elected positions in his indefinite reelection proposal, Datanalisis reports that the pro-Chavez Yes vote is slightly ahead by a margin close to the margin of error. According to this poll, if the vote were held today, the Si would get 51.5% versus 48% for the NO. The poll was made between January 13 and 18th. before the recent repression to student protests and Chavez’ threats against the students.

The bad news is that the opposition seems to have squandered its 17% lead in only one month by the lack of  a focused campaign, while Chavez has used all of the resources of the State to promote his position. Unfortunately in polls, one has to watch the trend and the trend is right now very unfavorable to the NO vote and the opposition.

My concern is not that Chavez will be eligible for reelection, I really don’t think he has a chance if oil prices stay down for a while, but the fact that a win will propell him to move forward with his project and the deepening of the economic and moral destruction of our country.

• PDVSA is late in making payments to suppliers and companies that provide services to it. Sorry, I should say PDVSA is very late in making payments to suppliers and companies that provide services to it. How late? So late, that PDVSA today seized a drilling rig owned by ENSCO, after ENSCO decided to stop drilling unless PDVSA paid it the money it is owed.

• In the first 23 days of the year CADIVI, the foreign exchange control office had paid up US$ 839 million for travelers credit cards almost a quarter of what it paid in 2008 when the travel quota per person was twice as large. Clearly, Venezuelans have become quite adept at playing markets and arbitrage. Oligarco Burguesito lives on!

• And how about funny man Rodolfo Sanz, President of CVG saying that the aluminum companies are almost collapsed. According to Sanz rhe companies are obsolete, have huge debt with suppliers and need about US$ 3 billion to save them. What is the main problem? That the price of aluminum has fallen 66% and the stuff is being sold below cost. Well, in July 2008 the price of a Ton hit an all time high and we never heard Mr. Sanz talk about investing or anythig like that, no?

• And another one of the famous Chavez announcements came to nothing, as Brazil’s Petrobras says it will go alone if PDVSA does not participate as it becomes increasingly clear that PDVSA is not that interested in the project.

• And the shortages of coffee, sugar, milk and toilet paper are of course blamed on a conspiracy to sabotage the upcoming referendum vote. If rather than blaming it on conspiracies they worried about why this is happening maybe they could ease the problem. Additionally, maybe since the whole Government is working on the referendum, nobody is paying attention to unimportant things like importing food. Brace yourself, it will only get worse. I can live without coffee, sugar and milk, but toilet paper? No way…

Housing has been a true puzzle under Chavez. Despite the billions of dollars in revenues, the Hugo Chavez Government has been unable to build more than 50,000 housing units on any given year, despite the fact that in the hateful days of the IVth. Republic, 50,000 was considered to be a “bad” number. Caldera II, as an example, considered to be a terrible Government by all, managed to build more than 40,000 units in 1994, a cataclysmic year for the Venezuelan economy. And in 1997 and 1998, despite what is now extremely low oil price levels, Caldera II managed to build more than 90,000 and 60,000 units.

Venezuela is estimated to have a shortage of about 2 million housing units, so that the problem of building housing has always been considered to be a priority by all Governments, including Chavez’. This Government has gone through many Ministers of Housing, but somehow none of them have been able to do a decent job. Not that Chavez has not given it the priority it requires, as year after year, the Venezuelan President announces ambitious goals for housing.

But it just does not happen and last week the Government announced that it had built only 23 thousand plus units in 2008 and once again it projects that it will build over one hundred thousand houses in 2009.

But what is the problem? I have talked to many people about the subject and everyone seems to blame something different. When Hugo Chavez came to power in 1999, the people he named to the Ministry of Housing had the outlines for a very ambitious project to build between 1.5 and 1.7 million housing units and if my memory serves me right the price tag was US$ 60 billion.

Remarkably, at the time such an amount was considered to be a little bit too large, so the plan was to obtain multilateral financing for it over the next five years and devote fairly large amounts from Government resources to it. The idea was that the plan would have a two fold effect: It would not only build the housing, but would become a driver for the economy. Of course, given the high oil prices of the last few years, it would have been rather easy to implement the plan without even borrowing the money.

So, what went wrong? Mostly that the experts Chavez first appointed to the Ministry of Housing were not loyalists and they were quickly displaced by more hard core Chavistas, many with no expertise, including the current Minister Farruco Sesto, who was Minister of Culture for a few years before being moved to Housing. Sesto is an architect by profession but has expressed all his life that he is not interested in urban matters. But Chavze even announced his Mision Vivienda in 2005, but we have never heard anything else about it.

My understanding is that the Government has never assigned huge amounts of funds to housing, believing instead that forcing banks and the like to lend to housing would help in increasing the number of units built each year. On top of that, the Minister of Housing has apparently been terrible at assigning funds for projects and deciding who gets how much and every time a new Minsiter has been appointed, he has suspended projects until he could understand the situation. Then, there is of course corruption, with funds spent erratically and not always assigned to those that have the best capabilities.

But in the end, none of the people I talked to understands the ineffectiveness. Each one blames a different aspect, but in the end suggests that the number of housing units built should have been much higher. some of them always expeceted the next year to have a boom because the number was so low and then nothing.

Thus, the low numbers remain a puzzle and are probably due to a combination of leack of epertize, management, corruption and the like. One person I talked to today even suggested that the Minsiter of Housing did not execute even half its budget in 2008 and the funds are now part of Chavez’ Miranda V fund, a sort of huge petty cash fund Chavez has that we know little about. Maybe he should use it for housing…

Even as inflation hits 200 million per cent, the Head of Zimbabwe’s Central Bank, still thinks he has done a good job (including helping solve the cholera epidemic), proving autocrats will always defend what they do. So, get ready!

The whole week has been a remarkable show of what this Government is capable of. After Hugo Chavez gave his order to give the students the “good” gas if they began to protest, the police and the National Guard went overboard managing to gas students even before they began protesting and remarkably, even within their own campuses, as they prepared to go out, as was the case at Universidad Simon Bolivar.

If this was not enough, armed urban guerrilla groups which support the Government roamed free around the city, threatening protesters with their weapons and Government-produced tear gas canisters, while taking over the Metropolitan Mayors headquarters, without the Chavez Government moving a finger to stop it. Curiously, pro-Chavez students were allowed to march without any police blocking their way, in a clear demonstrations that for Chavez and his Government there are two different types of citizens.

But as Human Rights ONG COFAVIC reported, the police and the National Guard have been making use of inordinate amounts of force, including:

• Massive use of high concentration and highly residual tear gas as well as the use of pellets from short range, which is expressly prohibited by international legislation on human rights.
• Violent actions by armed civilian groups which affected workers of the Ateneo de Caracas and created security problems for the march by opposition students to the Supreme Court.
• Arbitrary detentions which seek to criminalize actions of protest. 45 students have been arrested but the Courts ordered 40 freed and four were charged with resisting arrest and have to report regularly to the authorities.
• Civilians are being accused in military Courts as was the case of two students charged with assaulting the country’s symbols. This is expressly prohibited by the Venezuelan Constitution, which defines the natural judges of the civilian population, as well as international human rights agreements.

Perhaps no episode best represents the abuses and lies of the Chavez administration that the case of the video shown by pro-opposition students yesterday. In the video, a uniformed man is shown, in a Government-made video, filling up bottles with a liquid and arranging them in very orderly fashion in a box in the back of a truck seized from the students. The man is then shown to get off the truck to give an interview to the Government’s TV station and it happens to be none other than the head of the Metropolitan police.

Once the video was shown, the Government began claiming that the Head of the police was simply showing the media the Molotov cocktails the students were carrying in the truck. This fails to explain why the man had to show how to use the bucket and funnel to fill the bottles or stick pieces of cloth into the bottles. Moreover, Molotov cocktails are seldom prepared in such orderly and pretty fashion as those shown by the official caught red-handed.(And the students are not that stupid to bring boxes of ready made cocktails in this tense atmosphere)

Yesterday, the Minister of the Interior said that he challenged the students to give the Government their “manipulated” copy of the video, suggesting they should be jailed if the manipulation was proven, but failing to say what would be his punishment if the video were shown to be authentic.

But the students were not intimidated and as the Head of the Police gave a press conference to ask that the Prosecutors’ office should open an investigation on the “manipulated video”, the students actually showed up at the Prosecutors office to hand over a copy of the video to prove their point.

But the Pinochian award of the day goes to former Metropolitan Mayor candidate Aristobulo Isturiz, who not only denied that Chavez had ordered anyone be gassed (despite videos), but actually seemed to get mad at the accusation. I guess just like Aristobulo said once that Chavez must be smoking something funny (Se fumo una lumpia, he smoked an eggroll),  he must be inhaling some really weird stuff these days.

Tomorrow is the 50th. anniversary of the overthrow of our previous dictatorial regime and the students will march to Plaza Venezuela, all permits have been approved and the CNE will send representatives to meet them there. However, with the short fuse the Government has had in the last few days, I can’t help but be concerned about what may happen tomorrow.

Today, the fate of inflation and future devaluations was sealed when the Government formally announced that it had transfered US$ 12 billion from the Venezuelan Central Bank to the development fund Fonden. Quico has two excellent posts on why this is a huge negative here and here, thus I will not go into the details. It suffices to say that Venezuela�s foreign currency reserves are already at US$ 29.47 billion, while monetary liquidity (M2) at the official rate of Exchange stands at US$ 88.6 billion making the ratio M2/Reserves~3.

I looked at this ratio since 1994 and note that the only time it ever reached 2 before the Hugo Chavez Government was during the worst inflationary period Venezuela has ever enjoyed, which led to a huge devaluation and a very negative period for the Venezuelan economy. The fact that this ratio stands today at 3 is a predictor of another jump in inflation, already above 30%, for 2008 and the need for a devaluation sometime in our near future.

Alea Jacta Est for the Venezuelan economy and its citizens.

From an article in Tal Cual, a gem of a quote:

“You see a demonstration of 30 people and they throw at them the whale*, the rhinoceros*, the police, and the National Guard goes out. A demonstration of nurses waving a flag starts, the police goes out with shielded helmets and they take the flag away from them and step on it, that is, the State, after February 4th. and November 27th., has established a dictatorial Government, ready to repress and the country is militarized and has been taken over by the police with weapons of war”.

Hugo Chavez in 1998 when he was a Presidential candidate.

* Nicknames of vehicles used to contain demonstrations.

Pitiyanki in the comments notes this very clear message from the new President of the US:

“To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society’s ills on the West – know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.”

Can it be any clearer than that? I love the the build versus destroy part.

After Hugo Chavez gave the green light to repress on Saturday using his “best” tear gas to repress students, violence against students and the opposition escalated sharply both yesterday and today, including attacks on the Vatican’s representation. It has been a wholesale attack on opposition symbols and the students, led by the police, outlaw groups that Chavez lets roam Caracas with weapons. Among the violent events:

As usual, Laureano Marquez in Tal Cual writes a humor piece that is not that funny as it tries to explain the infamous question of the upcoming referendum and in the process shows how absurd the whole thing is with his fine humor.

The Riddle by Laureano Marquez in Tal Cual

Do you approve the amendment of Articles 160, 162, 174,192 and 230 of the Constitution of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, processed by the National Assembly, which widens the political rights of the people in order to allow any citizen, exercising an elected position, that he can be subject to be nominated as a candidate for the constitutionally established time depending only his possible election on the popular vote?

I don’t know what it is you don’t understand. Everything is extremely clear. The question says:”Do you approve the amendment (…) which widens…” Who is not going to want to approve this widening, if it happens to be everybody’s dream? More so, if it deals with political rights. Which, one must say, is not the same “political right” than a “right politician”. Of the latter you find fewer of them each day. It deals with, the question adds, with the political rights of Venezuelans. Very concretely and very specially that of one citizen: Hugo Rafael Chavez Frias, who has the right -all of the rights- to be not only lifetime President, but also absolute monarch, if the people so decide it. The only disadvantage which handing over absolute power to one man has, using the democratic process, is that there does not exist afterwards the democratic possibility of reverting his mandate, but those are small legalistic things of Constitutional Law, which have nothing to do with the case, because we have the certainty that he happens to be a good man.

Now, the question points out that the widening of those rights is made in the terms contemplated in the amendment. It is not necessary to explain if it is a small amendment, as the President says, or a huge one. An amendment is an amendment and the word itself tells you what it is, thus there is nothing to add on that point. What is it that we want to amend? Well, articles 230,160, 174, 192 and 162. Then, what is the need to say that the referendum seeks to the indefinite reelection of the President if it is extremely clear that it deal with just five tiny articles? Are we asking anyone if they want Chavez to stay forever? Never. Then, don’t say what it happens not be said. You can reach your own conclusion with that hateful word “indefinite”, which sounds absolutely horrible.

A little before it says: “processed by the initiative of the National Assembly”. There you may have the dilemma of what it is that is being “processed”, if it is the amendment, the Constitution or the Bolivarian Republic itself. If you still have any doubts just say it is all of them.

If you are reading the question, when it comes to: “widening the rights of the people,,”, take a breath so that you can happily reach and have some oxygen left at the end, which says:” in order to allow any citizen, exercizing an elected position, that he can be subject to be nominated as a candidate for the constitutionally established time depending only his possible election on the popular vote?

What this part means is that it will be allowed for any citizen, exercising an elected position, that he can be subject to be nominated as a candidate for the constitutionally established time depending only his possible election on the popular vote. That is exactly what it means, you don’t have to look for a malicious angle to it, nor add anything to it. What part don’t you understand? The proposal is clear and transparent. Perhaps the only thing your humble writer would propose at the end of the question, as a way of inviting people to the deep reflection that a participative process of this nature should have,  is that at the end we add a timid, but firm: Uhh?

That is my criteria with respect to this, unless my commander says something different and considers that is not well written. Which I would be in agreement with him, if that were to be his point of view. And I say it with all my responsibility and autonomy of criteria.

P.S. Mi heartfelt congratulation to the comrades of the National assembly for the show of courage during Chavez’ address to the Assembly. The self-control on bodily needs is another achievement of this process that has, as in everything else, the maximum leader as its main exponent. I will only criticize the Deputy that after the slogan “Fatherland, Socialism or Death” with which the President closed his speech, answered: We shall piss! I assume his subconscious gave him away.