The Devil's Excrement

The Governor of the State of Cojedes announced yesterday that on Saturday they will begin the “intervention” of the Hato El Charcote farm, owned by British company Vestey, under the decree issued by that Governor in mid-December.  The concept of “intervention” does not exist in Venezuelan jurisprudence, so that it is unclear exactly what it means. According to the Governor: “The intervention will be performed with all of the machinery of the State to establish the first beachhead of the “Free land and Men Mission…With the aid of all of the Armed Forces and police forces and the authorities of the Governor ….”. According to that State’s Attorney General, the term intervention “means to make use of all the power of the State o solve a problem” and “the farm will be intervened without affecting its operations”

Since the whole issue is by now obscured in the details, it is a good time to step back a little and ask what is the fuss all about?

First of all, while many want to make this an economic or social issue, it is really simply a very emotional and political issue, not an economic one. Land issues were important in Venezuela 50 years ago, when over half of the country’s population was rural. Since then, Venezuela has seen the same migration to the urban centers seen in the rest of Latin America, perhaps even more intense, thanks to the oil revenue which has allowed the country to import a large fraction of its agricultural needs.

By now, almost 90% (89% is urban according to 2003 statistics ), so that on the scale of the social and economic problems of the country, this is not a huge issue. But it is an emotional one. Three quarters of all Venezuelans have some direct connection to a recent rural past, of failed efforts or lack of land or the absence of sufficient funds to make the land or family projects self-sufficient.

The story is one known all over the planet, but intensified in Venezuela: Large agricultural projects using modern techniques produce at such low costs, that small and medium size farms do not have the productivity and competitive factors required. The result is that in most of Venezuela, agricultural products are produced at prices which are higher than those of the equivalent import. The main exception to this is cattle. Meat can be produced at competitive prices and profitability, but the Government prefers agricultural products over cattle raising and calls many large cattle ranches a waste of land.

Proving the poor productivity and competitiveness of our lands, is the fact that the Chavez administration has created a chain of “popular” markets run by the Government and the military, which by now have become the first food distribution entity in the country. Over 80% of the products sold at this company, called Mercal, are imported and in no way has this company been involved in promoting local production or giving preferential treatment to local producers.

The land issue has four separate components all of which were considered in the original Land Bill of 2001, which in some sense propelled the opposition movement against Hugo Chavez, which saw that bill as a threat to the right of private property provided by the 2000 Chavez Constitution. There were four different components to that bill: Attacking the large farm states (Latifundios, defined by law as farms above 10,000 Hectares or 25,000 acres), promoting the use of unused lands, putting order in land ownership and introducing an element of Government planning into the type of crops that could or could not be grown.

According to the Land Bill, a new institution was created The National land Institute (INTI) which would be in charge of issuing new regulation required by the scope of the law, inventory the land and begin certifying which lands had rightful ownership and were being devoted to the right type of crops. Separately, the Land Institute would be in charge of  administering those lands under Government ownership.

Unfortunately, like much in the Chavez era, progress has been extremely slow, despite the fact that Chavez’ own brother was named as the first President of that Institute. The law stated that any expropriation could not begin until the full inventory of land was completed. That inventory is yet to be finished.

In November, after the sweeping victory of his party in the gubernatorial elections, Chavez held a closed door meeting with his party’s Mayors and Governors in which he said that the problem of large farm states should be the responsibility of the Governors. This is contrary to the Land Bill.  On December 19^th., right before Christmas, the Governor of Cojedes decreed the intervention of 16 farms, including British owned Hato El Charcote. This was followed the next day by nine Governors pledging to issue similar decrees, clearly following Chavez’s orders. So far, two other Governors have followed suit.

At the beginning some saw this as simply another legal misstep by an overeager regional Governor in his efforts to please Chavez. I disagreed. Too many times I have seen this Government start something only to gauge reaction and see whether to move forward or not. Coming after the Fuerte Tiuna meeting, this seemed to be no innocent move by a regional Governor. Unfortunately events have proven me right. Where I did make a mistake was in thinking that the British farm had been included for “balance” and that it would be Venezuelan owned farms that would be the target of the first interventions. Nothing has been further from the truth, which may be interpreted as the beginning of a new stage in this “revolution” with the Government ready for the first time to ignore international opinion.

The issue is simply political and emotional; who can disagree with the Government promoting production in unused lands, the minimization of large land states and determining the rightful ownership of land in Venezuela? But the truth is the Government is the biggest lawbreaker in Venezuela. According to a recent study by the Venezuelan Ministry of Agriculture, there are only 2.1 million productive hectares of land in Venezuela. But the Venezuelan Land Institute (INTI) owns 8.6 million hectares of arable land in 1,492 properties across the country. Thus, if the Government distributed this land among the estimated 660,000 rural families, it would give each one 13 hectares of land or 32.5 acres to each rural family. If this were an economic issue it would start right there. In fact, the cost of producing one season of crops is probably larger than the cost of the land for most crops.

To make maters even worse, of these 1,492 states, 53 of them have a total of 5.9 million hectares giving them an average of over ten times the definition of what a large farm state or latifundio is. Thus, if the Government really wanted to be revolutionary, it could give away only 30% of its own land and that would represent land equivalent to all of the productive land in Venezuela today!

But the whole process is simply a mockery, as legalities are simply set aside or in the words of the Governor of Cojedes “social needs are above legal technicalities”. Not only do Governors not have the legal power to do what they are doing according to the Land Bill, but other aspects of the law are also being violated. First of all, not all of the farms “intervened” in Cojedes are above 10,000 hectares in size. Second, ownership is sometimes being questioned, but only partially, but the whole farm will be intervened; some of the intervened lands have ownership and crop certification by the land institute and “unused” land is being defined as land invaded by squatters over three years ago without the Government making any effort to remove them.

Agroflora, the British company that owns Hato El Charcote actually published a full page ad in today’s newspapers saying that: 1) The old Agrarian Institute recognized in 1972 and 1978 the private nature of this farm. 2) The new Land Institute (INTI) recognized in 2003 the “clear and uninterrupted” chain of ownership of Hato El Charcote. 3) The land known as “El Charcote” owned by Dictator Juan Vicente Gomez was recovered by the Venezuelan Government in 1936 and is not related to Hato El Charcote. 4) The chain of ownership of Hato El Charcote has been uninterrupted since 1830. 5) They aim to prove the land is in use or invaded with the process.

This is probably all true, but in the end it does not matter to a Government that cares little about legality or economics. This is simply about gaining popularity via the use of highly charged emotional and complex issues, which are hard to explain or understand. This is what populism is all about.

–Minister of Interior and Justice Jesse Chacon: We do not rule out that assassinated Prosecutor was part of an extortion ring.

From hero to suspected criminal in less than two months

–Minister of Agriculture, Arnoldo Marquez: The British owners of the large estate El Charcote have not been able to demonstrate they own the land. The documents are not guarantee that the land is private property, but that they belong to the Agrarian Institute or the Land Institute.

There goes the VP’s promise to the British Government to respect their property.

–General Oswaldo Bracho: The Bolivarian Liberation front which backs Chavez is s subversive and terrorist group devoted to kidnapping, extortion and drug trafficking, it has to be exterminated as soon as possible.

This group, once praised by Chavez, has been in operation for six years with impunity, what happened?

–Jesse Chacon again: The police have yet to determine if the Foreign Minister of the Colombian FARC was kidnapped in Caracas or not. The investigations lead us to suppose that in the crime (the kidnapping) two people participated and we are trying to determine if Government security officers participated and if the person kidnapped was indeed Mr. Granda.

Well, this is not an accusation by the opposition. This is an accusation by Mr. Granda and the FARC themselves who said that he was in Caracas to participate in the II Congress of the Bolivarian People that was held in Caracas. The FARC claim Mr. Granda was invited by Bolivarian institutions which were known by the Venezuelan Government. No way to treat your guests, friends and supporters!

–The wife of one of those accused of participating in the killing of Danilo Anderson, Armando Guevara, was fired as a Prosecutor. This despite the fact that there has been no conviction or even direct evidence presented. She was not suspended; she was fired after 16 years in the Prosecutors office.

The Guevara brothers, accused of the assassination, were hired by the VP’s son to set up a special intelligence police in his municipality two years ago. Are they also going to go against him?

You can spin the news for so long, but eventually it catches up with you.

–Minister of Interior and Justice Jesse Chacon: We do not rule out that assassinated Prosecutor was part of an extortion ring.

From hero to suspected criminal in less than two months

–Minister of Agriculture, Arnoldo Marquez: The British owners of the large estate El Charcote have not been able to demonstrate they own the land. The documents are not guarantee that the land is private property, but that they belong to the Agrarian Institute or the Land Institute.

There goes the VP’s promise to the British Government to respect their property.

–General Oswaldo Bracho: The Bolivarian Liberation front which backs Chavez is s subversive and terrorist group devoted to kidnapping, extortion and drug trafficking, it has to be exterminated as soon as possible.

This group, once praised by Chavez, has been in operation for six years with impunity, what happened?

–Jesse Chacon again: The police have yet to determine if the Foreign Minister of the Colombian FARC was kidnapped in Caracas or not. The investigations lead us to suppose that in the crime (the kidnapping) two people participated and we are trying to determine if Government security officers participated and if the person kidnapped was indeed Mr. Granda.

Well, this is not an accusation by the opposition. This is an accusation by Mr. Granda and the FARC themselves who said that he was in Caracas to participate in the II Congress of the Bolivarian People that was held in Caracas. The FARC claim Mr. Granda was invited by Bolivarian institutions which were known by the Venezuelan Government. No way to treat your guests, friends and supporters!

–The wife of one of those accused of participating in the killing of Danilo Anderson, Armando Guevara, was fired as a Prosecutor. This despite the fact that there has been no conviction or even direct evidence presented. She was not suspended; she was fired after 16 years in the Prosecutors office.

The Guevara brothers, accused of the assassination, were hired by the VP’s son to set up a special intelligence police in his municipality two years ago. Are they also going to go against him?

You can spin the news for so long, but eventually it catches up with you.

The Secretary General of the Patria Para Todos (PPT) party Jose Albornoz, which backs Chavez and was part of the Constituent Assembly which wrote the new Constitution, said today that his political organization agreed with having primaries to elect the candidates for the upcoming elections of City Council and Parrish Juntas.

I am so glad they “agree” with it, since it is obligatory according to Article 67 of the Bolivarian Constitution he helped write. Why didn’t they “agree” with it when candidates for Deputies were selected by the Puppet Master?

Going back to work to start the year was no different than working last week; most Venezuelans are certainly not working and will likely not go to work for at least another week, a phenomenon that I have always marveled at. It is in fact pretty amazing that a country with such low productivity practically shuts down for three weeks every year at Christmas. And let’s not talk about Easter week and carnival week when similar slowdowns take place. But maybe I should lighten up.

The slowdown is general. The best part is that politicians also disappear from view for equivalent periods of time, so that real news is hard to come by. Reporters also disappear, I have always found it amazing how virtual newspapers like Descifrado, simply shut down for two weeks and a “real” newspaper like Tal Cual Digital simply shuts down. I guess they must have done an economic study, but there is something about it their absence that bothers me, if doesn’t truly annoy me.

Same thing with Op-Ed writers and those that contribute to the opinion pages. Most of their articles at this time of the year are reviews of the year or pieces that you know for a fact were written only to fulfill their duty. Most of them I can skip over without any problem. But the worst part is that much of this also leaves me with of feeling of isolation, as most of those that “know” what is going on, also go away. Thus, regular sources of good information or interpretation of what is going on, also are missing in action and this makes it sometimes hard to figure out what is happening. For example, I have not been able to verify yet why Chavez came home from China a few days early. And this is important to know, as Chavez is clearly playing his own China card of attracting Chinese investment vis a vis US investment. To me, this is actually a good development, since Venezuela needs lots of investments and Chavez was doing almost nothing to try to attract American one.

Quite annoying that people leave, given that I do exactly the opposite. To me, Caracas at Christmas and New Year’s is at its best. No traffic, no lines, few people. The air seems crisp and clear, so why do people go away? Maybe only to annoy me. But I certainly will not let them.

There is something else that is quite annoying. Besides newspapers having daily reviews of what happened last year just to fill space, they also have huge sections about your horoscope in 2005. They not only have them. They flaunt them! They advertise them! Astrology, much like populism, really sells. Populism is right as often as Astrology, but people seem to forget the misses and concentrate on the promises. Which is also quite annoying, at least to me.

I still remember when I first got back to my country after graduate work, how annoying it was to have a radio program called “Nuestro Insolito Universo” (Our Amazing Universe), which despite its scientific sounding name, devoted itself to the supernatural, myths, superstitions and the like. I marveled at the fact that serious private organizations would sponsor such a well produced program only to propagate half-truths, the paranormal and the unexplained, while devoting no funds to explaining the basic facts of scientific phenomena. The truth is, the paranormal sells, the scientific fact is only of interest to a very limited part of the population.

Recently, a good friend was annoyed by a website I recommended in this same pages as having good news, for propagating the “news” that a Venezuelan “researcher” was saying the recent Tsunami in Asia was actually caused by a meteorite hitting the Pacific. According to this wise Venezuelan researcher (Venezuelans love to use the word “sabio”), world powers wanted to hide the fact that this was the cause, as they had sponsored movies to make people believe that the world could actually defend itself from such an impact. How did this researcher know? Easy, he had predicted the meteorite impact based on his careful work in decoding the prophecies contained in the Bible. Moreover, he has a whole range of additional predictions based on his decoding of the whole Bible, including the fact that the Bible foresaw the Danilo Anderson assassination. As if the Bible did not have more important things to predict on a cosmic scale!

But if this annoyed my friend, it annoyed me even more when I wrote to the Editors of this website suggesting that such an article was not in line with the seriousness of their enterprise and that if they wanted to be successful, they should think about not giving space to such a story. Their reaction? Outrage! Don’t newspapers have horoscope sections, they said? Wouldn’t restricting this guy’s space be a limitation of his freedom of speech, they said? Wouldn’t that be censorship, they said?

So, annoyed, I gave up on trying helping these guys. If they don’t understand why newspapers have horoscopes or why the meteorite story puts their website in a bad light, this is certainly their problem, not mine. Unfortunately, and to my utterly annoyance, the same can not be said of populism. If populism wins, everyone loses, including me. Moreover, I have to live with it. I can ignore Astrology, but I definitely can not ignore populism. So I won’t

Going back to work to start the year was no different than working last week; most Venezuelans are certainly not working and will likely not go to work for at least another week, a phenomenon that I have always marveled at. It is in fact pretty amazing that a country with such low productivity practically shuts down for three weeks every year at Christmas. And let’s not talk about Easter week and carnival week when similar slowdowns take place. But maybe I should lighten up.

The slowdown is general. The best part is that politicians also disappear from view for equivalent periods of time, so that real news is hard to come by. Reporters also disappear, I have always found it amazing how virtual newspapers like Descifrado, simply shut down for two weeks and a “real” newspaper like Tal Cual Digital simply shuts down. I guess they must have done an economic study, but there is something about it their absence that bothers me, if doesn’t truly annoy me.

Same thing with Op-Ed writers and those that contribute to the opinion pages. Most of their articles at this time of the year are reviews of the year or pieces that you know for a fact were written only to fulfill their duty. Most of them I can skip over without any problem. But the worst part is that much of this also leaves me with of feeling of isolation, as most of those that “know” what is going on, also go away. Thus, regular sources of good information or interpretation of what is going on, also are missing in action and this makes it sometimes hard to figure out what is happening. For example, I have not been able to verify yet why Chavez came home from China a few days early. And this is important to know, as Chavez is clearly playing his own China card of attracting Chinese investment vis a vis US investment. To me, this is actually a good development, since Venezuela needs lots of investments and Chavez was doing almost nothing to try to attract American one.

Quite annoying that people leave, given that I do exactly the opposite. To me, Caracas at Christmas and New Year’s is at its best. No traffic, no lines, few people. The air seems crisp and clear, so why do people go away? Maybe only to annoy me. But I certainly will not let them.

There is something else that is quite annoying. Besides newspapers having daily reviews of what happened last year just to fill space, they also have huge sections about your horoscope in 2005. They not only have them. They flaunt them! They advertise them! Astrology, much like populism, really sells. Populism is right as often as Astrology, but people seem to forget the misses and concentrate on the promises. Which is also quite annoying, at least to me.

I still remember when I first got back to my country after graduate work, how annoying it was to have a radio program called “Nuestro Insolito Universo” (Our Amazing Universe), which despite its scientific sounding name, devoted itself to the supernatural, myths, superstitions and the like. I marveled at the fact that serious private organizations would sponsor such a well produced program only to propagate half-truths, the paranormal and the unexplained, while devoting no funds to explaining the basic facts of scientific phenomena. The truth is, the paranormal sells, the scientific fact is only of interest to a very limited part of the population.

Recently, a good friend was annoyed by a website I recommended in this same pages as having good news, for propagating the “news” that a Venezuelan “researcher” was saying the recent Tsunami in Asia was actually caused by a meteorite hitting the Pacific. According to this wise Venezuelan researcher (Venezuelans love to use the word “sabio”), world powers wanted to hide the fact that this was the cause, as they had sponsored movies to make people believe that the world could actually defend itself from such an impact. How did this researcher know? Easy, he had predicted the meteorite impact based on his careful work in decoding the prophecies contained in the Bible. Moreover, he has a whole range of additional predictions based on his decoding of the whole Bible, including the fact that the Bible foresaw the Danilo Anderson assassination. As if the Bible did not have more important things to predict on a cosmic scale!

But if this annoyed my friend, it annoyed me even more when I wrote to the Editors of this website suggesting that such an article was not in line with the seriousness of their enterprise and that if they wanted to be successful, they should think about not giving space to such a story. Their reaction? Outrage! Don’t newspapers have horoscope sections, they said? Wouldn’t restricting this guy’s space be a limitation of his freedom of speech, they said? Wouldn’t that be censorship, they said?

So, annoyed, I gave up on trying helping these guys. If they don’t understand why newspapers have horoscopes or why the meteorite story puts their website in a bad light, this is certainly their problem, not mine. Unfortunately, and to my utterly annoyance, the same can not be said of populism. If populism wins, everyone loses, including me. Moreover, I have to live with it. I can ignore Astrology, but I definitely can not ignore populism. So I won’t

Sometimes it is truly hard to know what is going on. On the same day that the Governor of Yaracuy, not exactly Daniel’s favorite person, issues his own decree “rescuing” lands in his state, the Land Institute issues a communiqué saying that the intervention of lands requires a presidential decree. (El Nacional, page A-14, by subscription). Thus, three decrees intervening land and now a step back?

Well, as usual, it is unclear. All the Land Institute is saying is that it will have a meeting tomorrow about these issues. The Land Institute did say that Governors and Mayors have the duty to fulfill with the requirements of legislation, but is qualifies the need for a presidential decree to do it.

Thus, it is not as easy as the Governor of Cojedes suggested, saying that legal formalities have to be bypassed in the name of social Justice. Even if Governor Yanez had the backing of the President it is clear that there are some divisions on the issue. First of all, there is the Head of the Land Institute Eliezer Otaiza who obviously feels threatened as the interventions by the Governors certainly make his Land Institute useless. Moreover, all of the Governors have been saying they acted because of the slowness  by the Land Institute in executing its mandates, something that affects Otaiza directly as he may go out of favor in the eyes of President Chavez.

But the most significant problem appears to be that the Governor of Cojedes included the land of the El Charcote farm, owned by British Group Vestey and that Embassy has not only expressed its concerns about the intervention, but apparently the Vice-President of Venezuela José Vicente Rangel had made promises to British authorities about their land being protected.

So, this is simply another reflection of improvisation, disregard for the law and the fear by the Chavista Government of international repercussions to their actions. A true revolution would simply not care about the British and some rich British family with investments in Venezuela. But this is a revolution based on the manipulation of the media and information, particularly the foreign media, thus this issue may hurt because of the inclusion of foreign land.

In the days ahead we should have a clearer picture of what is going on. Our suspicion is that we will see some form of unifying concept to try to give these gubernatorial decrees some legality followed by a promise of coordination by the Institute of Land.  Ninety days from now, as the decrees term expires, the issue will once again be revived with full force.

Sometimes it is truly hard to know what is going on. On the same day that the Governor of Yaracuy, not exactly Daniel’s favorite person, issues his own decree “rescuing” lands in his state, the Land Institute issues a communiqué saying that the intervention of lands requires a presidential decree. (El Nacional, page A-14, by subscription). Thus, three decrees intervening land and now a step back?

Well, as usual, it is unclear. All the Land Institute is saying is that it will have a meeting tomorrow about these issues. The Land Institute did say that Governors and Mayors have the duty to fulfill with the requirements of legislation, but is qualifies the need for a presidential decree to do it.

Thus, it is not as easy as the Governor of Cojedes suggested, saying that legal formalities have to be bypassed in the name of social Justice. Even if Governor Yanez had the backing of the President it is clear that there are some divisions on the issue. First of all, there is the Head of the Land Institute Eliezer Otaiza who obviously feels threatened as the interventions by the Governors certainly make his Land Institute useless. Moreover, all of the Governors have been saying they acted because of the slowness  by the Land Institute in executing its mandates, something that affects Otaiza directly as he may go out of favor in the eyes of President Chavez.

But the most significant problem appears to be that the Governor of Cojedes included the land of the El Charcote farm, owned by British Group Vestey and that Embassy has not only expressed its concerns about the intervention, but apparently the Vice-President of Venezuela José Vicente Rangel had made promises to British authorities about their land being protected.

So, this is simply another reflection of improvisation, disregard for the law and the fear by the Chavista Government of international repercussions to their actions. A true revolution would simply not care about the British and some rich British family with investments in Venezuela. But this is a revolution based on the manipulation of the media and information, particularly the foreign media, thus this issue may hurt because of the inclusion of foreign land.

In the days ahead we should have a clearer picture of what is going on. Our suspicion is that we will see some form of unifying concept to try to give these gubernatorial decrees some legality followed by a promise of coordination by the Institute of Land.  Ninety days from now, as the decrees term expires, the issue will once again be revived with full force.

Interesting, it is January 2^nd. And a number of Government promises for the end of the year 2004, have failed to take place:

-There has been no resolution of the Danilo Anderson case as promised before the end of the year by the Minister of Justice and the Governor of Miranda (Who has no official connection to the case)

-There has been no announcement of a devaluation as announced by the old Minisiter of Finance.

-The new Government airline has yet to fly once.

-We are still waiting for the PDVSA financials

by the way, where is Silvino Bustillos?

Oh yes! There is some good news, inflation in December was 1.6% making the year end CPI 19.4%, even below Government estimates. Two caveats about this number: One, it was announced in the morning of the 31^st. of Decembers as if the last two days of the years did not matter. Two, foodstuffs were up 28.4% and transportation was up 24.2%, these are the two items in which poor people spend the most money.