Hugo Chavez

by Cristina Marcano

  In a similar way, from very early on in his presidency, Chávez began to attack the idea of alternation in Venezuelan political life. The very notion that “finally the revolution has become the government” began to introduce a new social sensibility, a perception that this was not just another administration but a different exercise entirely, with different aspirations. In fact, Chávez has suggested the possibility of reforming the Constitution to permit unlimited presidential reelection. With a majority in the assembly and control of all the public powers, the government’s party may well be able to pull it off. According to the historian Elías Pino Iturrieta, “2021 is the denial of republican alternation, the denial of democracy, the denial of civility and disrespect for the people…. It is the denial of all civic cohabitation that we have enjoyed since 1945, or at least, without a doubt since 1958. Alternation and coexistence no longer boast the chronology they once did. The republican clock, the almanac, is entirely disrupted when it is decided that the fate of a society will be handed over to one single person until the year 2021.”

  Some have stated that this plan is in fact not new, that it does not represent a change in mentality or strategy, and that it is simply the result of the concupiscent indulgence in power. Nedo Paniz says he clearly remembers something Hugo Chávez once said to him several years ago: “If I get to Miraflores, nobody is going to take our power away.” His comrade in arms Francisco Arias Cárdenas recalls an anecdote that is perhaps less categorical but certainly suggests intent: During the final event of the 1998 electoral campaign in Caracas, some voices began to chant Arias’s nickname: “Pancho! Pancho!” they cried. Chávez had him climb up to the stage and brought him to his side. The two men, overcome with emotion, looked out at the crowds. As Arias Cárdenas recalls, “I said to him, ‘Damn, Hugo, what a tremendous commitment, what change. From the days when the two of us were stuck under some tree in Paraguaipoa, waiting for those lieutenants who never showed up, to this mass of people that just make your heart leap, all these people so full of hope. What a huge responsibility!’” Arias Cárdenas then remembers how Chávez moved closer to him and whispered, “Pancho, ten years for me, ten years for you, and then we’ll see how to keep it going until we’ve got this whole process wrapped up.”

  In Latin America, part of the enchantment of the word “revolution” has to do with the idea of staying in power. The example of Fidel Castro is perhaps too close. In this regard, once again we see a combination of populism, or neopopulism, and the military ingredient, part of a foundational saga in Venezuelan history, a mythology in which men of action are the people who make history.

  “The last representation of this myth,” states Pino Iturrieta, “is Chávez and the helmets and military boots that surround him. Chávez is a moving military fortress that is very attractive for the element of Venezuelan society that is not a republic, that does not depend on civic citizenry but on the arrival of a messiah. And if that messiah uses a military uniform and a combat tank, then that part of society will feel more secure.” At the bottom of it all, it seems that the issue has reopened an old and very complex debate that many thought was long since settled: the difficult, belligerent coexistence between the civilian, republican culture and the caudillo, praetorian, military culture. It is from that juxtaposition that Hugo Chávez Frías has emerged.

  The writer Ibsen Martínez has repeatedly pointed out that the opposition has failed every time it has tried to ponder, judge, and react to the Chávez movement by viewing it and acting as if it were an old-style dictatorial, fascist government. To quote the American Mark Lilla, there are presently “few functioning democracies, only a variety of mixed regimes and tyrannies that pose new challenges to our understanding and our policies. From Zimbabwe to Libya, from Algeria to Iraq, from the Central Asian republics to Burma, from Pakistan to Venezuela, we discover nations that are neither totalitarian nor democratic, nations where the prospects of building durable democracies in the near future are limited or nil.”15

  Hugo Chávez has created a country where everything is legal but inadmissible. A country where, in the year 2004, the president cried out at a public rally that the opposition would never return to power, “no matter what.” There is a massive sector of the country that had been waiting for someone like Chávez for a long time. These people appear happy to believe that Bolívar has been resuscitated, that history is an exercise in salvation, and that Hugo Chávez is an emissary sent to complete a job that the Father of the Nation left unfinished. And it is no coincidence that the president selected 2021 as the year of his supposed retirement: it marks the bicentennial of the Battle of Carabobo, the decisive event in the war of independence against Spain. Perhaps, in his own version of Venezuelan history, Chávez sees himself in that same vein, as part of that same saga begun by the Liberator, a saga that would reach its climax two centuries later, with him.

  Who is Hugo Chávez, really? Where is he going, that little boy who was raised by his grandmother in a hut with a dirt floor and a roof made of palm leaves? Is he a true revolutionary or a pragmatic neopopulist? How deep is his social conscience, and how great is his vanity? Is he a democrat trying to build a country where certain people will no longer be excluded and marginalized, or is he an authoritarian caudillo holding his country and its institutions hostage? Is he, perhaps, both things at the same time? Who is this man who waves a crucifix in the air as he quotes Che Guevara and Mao Tse-tung? When is he truly himself? Of all the men we know Hugo Chávez to be, which is the most genuine? It is very hard to tell. What does seem evident is that they all have something in common. It is a desire, a craving, that drives him and keeps him awake at night. An obsession that, like all obsessions, is self-evident, impossible to hide. No matter which Chávez he is, he will always, obsessively, seek power. More power.

  EPILOGUE

  THIS BIOGRAPHY WAS ORIGINALLY COMPLETED IN AUGUST 2004. HUGO Chávez’s victory in the recall referendum seemed like an exceptional opportunity to end a book that ran the risk of doggedly following a process that is far from finished. Two years later, it seems important to offer, even if only superficially, a general account of what happened between August 2004 and December 2006.

  During this time, Hugo Chávez consolidated his power inside Venezuela and through a broad international agenda fashioned himself as an enemy of George W. Bush. He also began in earnest to develop an ideological definition, summoning the world to a war against neoliberalism and a crusade in support of a new “twenty-first-century socialism.” As for his more personal plans, his political future seems to be looming larger than ever.

  Hugo Chávez is another man now, one who is edging closer and closer to the myth. His image is reproduced on posters and photographs that adorn government offices, it has been sculpted into small busts and statues that are popular altars; there is even a little doll with batteries that was one of the more memorable toys sold during the 2005 Christmas season. But the more his presence is felt in the public life of Venezuela, the more remote his private life seems. It is known that on one of the upper patios of Miraflores Palace there are a hammock and a desk, a personal space to which he retreats when he wants to read, visit with close friends, or play with his grandchildren. His romantic life is always something of a whisper. They say he is involved with a famous soap opera actress, although both have denied this claim. Publicly he declares that he is wedded to his homeland, and the rings of security only seem to grow in number and breadth.

  For local journalists who do not work for pro-Chávez media groups, it is impossible to get an interview with the president. For the majority of foreign correspondents, it would take a miracle. In public, he continues to be charismatic and unpredictable. One minute he might insult the president of Mexico, and the next minute he will head out to a rally wearing a charro hat and singing the ranchera song “Sigo siendo el rey” (I Am Still the King) with a backup mariachi band. Nevertheless, one thing does seem to have changed. He is in another league now. He has different chall
enges. He sees himself with a different destiny.

  “Our task,” he said on August 15, 2006, “is to save the world, planet Earth. Our task is much greater than the one Bolívar took on, the commitment is much greater.”1

  HE TOOK HIS TRIUMPH in the recall referendum as a great boost to the Bolivarian project, a turning point that would allow the process to continue evolving. Beneath the slogan “The Revolution Within the Revolution,” on November 13 and 14, 2004, in a military fortress in Caracas, Chávez gathered together all the government leaders in his party. The upper echelons of Venezuelan officialdom were summoned behind closed doors to participate in a workshop in which they were divided into working groups with the goal of designing a “New Strategic Map.” This plan, colloquially known as “the great leap forward,” is fueled by the president’s demand to hasten and radicalize the process that Venezuela is presently living through.

  This is not a hidden agenda. The web page of the Ministry of Communication and Information offers plenty of news about this workshop. It is based on a series of proposals aimed at building a new societal model, with different modes of economic production that transcend capitalism and establish new social and political relations. The idea is to create a system governed by a new set of laws and institutions, a system that will wield greater control over communications, develop a new kind of educational and cultural fabric, and foment the civilian-military union.

  “We have a new map in front of us,” Chávez announced a month later. “The actions that we articulate can be summed up in a verb: accelerate.”2

  Accelerate, yes. It is an “offensive” action, as Chávez himself has put it. On the legal front, the Land Law was approved in 2001 and has been implemented, and a number of large tracts of privately held land have been expropriated. Other laws that came into effect include the much-disputed Law of Social Responsibility, which controls and regulates the media, and the equally controversial penal code,3 which severely sanctions defamation. But perhaps the most momentous reform of all is the political reengineering operation that Chávez has designed so that he may direct the Supreme Court of Justice. It was expanded from twenty to thirty-two magistrates, thus packing a court favorable to the president.

  One of the first jobs of this court was to revoke the sentence that, using the “power vacuum” argument, absolved the military officers implicated in the 2002 coup d’état that briefly expelled Hugo Chávez from the presidency.

  The government has achieved an even more hegemonic level of authority within the National Electoral Council. Not only does Chávez enjoy tremendous popularity, but it is becoming clear that he also has quite an advantage among the electoral authorities. Four of the five members of the new electoral board are Chávez sympathizers.

  A few months after the recall referendum, the president openly promoted his candidates for the regional elections, without even a sidelong glance from the National Electoral Council. On October 31, 2004, the Venezuelan map would turn red as Chávez continued winning elections and cornering the opposition. Of the 22 governorships at stake, the pro-Chávez candidates secured 20. Almost half of the new governors, all handpicked by Chávez himself, were military officers. Of 335 mayoral posts, the Chávez party took 231.4

  In the 2005 parliamentary elections, an almost serendipitous turn of events validated the demand for impartial electoral observers and gave the opposition leadership the reason it needed to withdraw from the election entirely. OAS observers, while inspecting the voting machines, determined that the ballots would not be cast anonymously and that it was possible to determine exactly how each voter had cast his or her ballot. In light of this, the opposition candidates decided to withdraw from the parliamentary elections. The withdrawal surprised the country barely a week before the elections were to take place.

  The ensuing political crisis left the government reeling, but not for long. An incensed Hugo Chávez attributed the political maneuver to “another one of the U.S. government’s destabilization schemes.” Rangel swore that “the American Embassy is behind all of this” and finished off by saying, “They can go to hell!”

  The chavista candidates were left without rivals. And on December 4, 2005, they went alone to a boring election with more than predictable results: the parliament that would legislate for the following five years would be chavista through and through.

  This “triumph” was clouded over by an extremely high abstention rate: 74 percent.5 The president attributed the low turnout to internal failings: “lack of debate, triumphalism, electoral campaigns based on dancing, fighting, and grandstanding; and partisanship, which is always harmful.”

  During this period, both in and out of the country, Chávez did nothing to hide his rotten mood. In the middle of a Mercosur summit on December 9 in Uruguay, he aired his displeasure with the OAS and EU observers’ reports on the parliamentary elections. Both delegations had come to the conclusion that broad sectors of Venezuelan society did not have faith in the electoral process or the administration behind it.

  One week after the elections, Hugo Chávez still thundered. “For the No [the presidential recall referendum of 2004], almost six million of us voted. Now we are barely three million. Where are all those people? What happened? Well, governors, mayors, people in the [progovernment] parties, I warn you: I do not accept excuses from anyone! In one year we will have to stick ten million votes in the mouth of the opposition,” he warned on Aló, Presidente.6

  FOR MANY PEOPLE, the so-called Tascón list is a metaphor for the Venezuelan experience of late and probably for the days to come as well. In 2003, the chavista congressman Luis Tascón posted on his website the names of all those citizens who had signed petitions soliciting the recall referendum that would decide Chávez’s future as president, exercising a right that was granted them by the Constitution. The opposition denounced the posting and suggested that certain members of the National Electoral Council had been involved. Tascón and the government officials in question defended their actions by claiming that the opposition had padded the list with forged signatures of people who were in fact government supporters. By publishing this list, said the parliament, it was simply uncovering a ruse. In any event, the confidentiality of the effort was compromised, and the path was cleared for future violations of the right to an anonymous vote.

  After the referendum, Tascón’s list became a political instrument, and complaints began to pour in: from public employees who had been fired from their jobs and from people who claimed that public assistance programs had engaged in discrimination when allotting state-assigned benefits. The motive was always the same: they had signed the petition. In the pages of his afternoon paper Tal Cual, the leftist politician Teodoro Petkoff launched a campaign of personal testimonies from the victims of what he considered to be Venezuelan-style “McCarthyism.”7 Shortly thereafter, another list was discovered, called “Maisanta,” with detailed information as to how the Venezuelan people had voted in the plebiscite.

  Statements also poured in from people who had been excluded from all kinds of state services and benefits, such as national identity cards, jobs in the public administration, loans for state-subsidized housing, and government contracts. The opposition began to speak of a “Bolivarian apartheid,” and the complaints continued to appear in the press until the president finally felt obliged to address the matter. On his Sunday television show, Chávez ordered that the Tascón list be filed and buried, saying that the “famous list certainly fulfilled an important role at a given moment, but that moment has passed.”8

  For a certain sector of society, it is not so easy to banish the ghost conjured up by the experience of living in a state that is capable of making citizens pay for exercising their political options. Along with the ever-increasing authority of state institutions; the escalating hostility toward the United States; an ideological definition that is, nominally at least, more and more specific; a military industry that has grown stronger; and the government’s desire to militarize civilian
life, one of the greatest fears associated with Hugo Chávez has been revived: the Cubanization of Venezuela.

  In January 2005, at a gathering at the World Social Forum in Porto Alegre, the Venezuelan leader stated his conviction that “socialism is the path.” Some months later in an interview, he confessed that “at one time I came to think about the Third Way. I was having problems interpreting the world. I was confused, I read the wrong things, I had some advisers that confused me even more. I actually proposed a forum in Venezuela on Tony Blair’s Third Way. I spoke and wrote a lot about ‘humane capitalism.’ Today I am convinced that that is impossible.”9

  For some, this declaration was the confirmation of a foregone conclusion. What could one expect of a leader who called Cuba “a sea of happiness,” declared himself a fidelista, and invoked Che Guevara? For others, however, the statement was the expression of a precise ideological definition that had been absent from the Bolivarian Revolution until that moment. But when Chávez was asked to offer some content to this “new” socialism, his response was vague: “In reality this is what it’s about: solidarity with one’s brother. The struggle against the demons sown by capitalism: individualism, egotism, hatred, privileges. I think that this is where it should begin. It is a daily effort, a long-term cultural and educational task.”10