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Editorial Commentary
VeneEconomy: Unperturbed,
he’s walking off with everything
Anyone who still refuses to accept that Hugo Chávez’ project is of a totalitarian communist cut should watch Sunday’s Aló Presidente (N° 309) in which Hugo Chávez threatened to expropriate anything that got in his way.
To begin with, he threatened to expropriate and occupy Siderúrgica del Orinoco (Sidor) the following Tuesday if the Argentines failed to reach an agreement with the government and refused to accept a ridiculously low price for their shares.
“ Stop fooling around!” he berated them, “I’m not going to pay $4 billion, the company’s not worth it!” But then everyone already knew that he has not been willing to pay a fair price for any of the nationalized companies so far. Witness what happened to CANTV, ExxonMobil, and ConocoPhillips, just three out of hundreds of cases. Empresas Polar also came in for their share when Chávez warned them that he would expropriate the company if they tried to stop the production of precooked corn flour. It is already common knowledge that Chávez has been harassing Empresas Polar on a number of flanks through different agencies, among them Seniat, Indecu, and Procompetencia.
His rapacity in grabbing any productive company reached a new high when he announced the setting up of a committee to investigate the cacao plantation El Tesoro owned by the Englishman William Harcourt-Cooze. El Tesoro successfully produces premium Venezuelan Black-100% cacao for export, a product that is highly prized in London. However, a BBC report praising this cacao drew the President’s attention to the plantation, and one does not have to be a fortuneteller to forecast that the slightest of pretexts will be sufficient to leave Harcourt-Cooze without El Tesoro and Venezuela without the London market.
However, it is not only on the economic front that Chávez is forging ahead with his revolution; he is picking up the pace on the military front too. Signs are enactment of the National Police Law, the reactivation of the people’s reserve, and, to top it all, the insults hurled by Defense Minister Gustavo Rangel Briceño at military officers who have an institutional vision of the armed forces, calling them “cowards and asses,” an attitude that was seconded by President Chávez with effusive words of praise for military officers like the Defense Minister, saying, “They are splendid,” as they have “embraced the people, the fatherland or death.”
Many are asking themselves why Chávez has stepped up his revolution. Some think it is because of the upcoming elections. But VenEconomy disagrees, as the opinion polls indicate that the majority of Venezuelans rejects the expropriations and the violations of property rights.
In VenEconomy’s view, Chávez’s motives are quite rational: he wants to consolidate his communist project of taking over the country’s means of production lock, stock, and barrel before PDVSA finally collapses. Chávez knows that he has neither the time nor the resources to do it gradually.
VenEconomy is a Venezuela's leading specialized publisher in the economic and financial area. VenEconomy's Points of View on the issues of the day, as seen by VenEconomy during the last week. Petroleumworld does not necessarily share these views.
Editor's Note: This commentary was originally published by VenEconomy, on 04/28/2007. Petroleumworld reprint this article in the interest of our readers.
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Petroleumworld News 05/01/08
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