One Washington-funded tactic in their strategy to bring down the Chávez government has been an ongoing attack on the nation's food supply and distribution system. The failure of the voter referendum on Constitutional Reforms last December was due in part, to this part of the opposition strategy.
We have been witnessing the counter-attack by the Chávez administration as they have begun to fight these tactics with renewed vigor. Concrete gains are being made by the central government in the housing sector (see Ron Ridenour's report
Chávez Strikes Back at the Local Level); in rebuilding infrastructure (street, highway and bridge maintenance) and the new modern national train system; and now in a counter-attack by the government to enforce laws against the hoarding, smuggling and destruction of food.
Large anti-government, food distribution companies have been; (1) destroying large quantities of food in landfill dumps*; (2) illegally smuggling large quantities of Venezuelans’ price-controlled, basic foods into Colombia for profit and (3) hoarding food in secret warehouses in order to create food shortages for Venezuelan’s poor. For example, every day shoppers at their local Super Mercado hear "No Hay" (We don't have it!) when asking for milk, butter, eggs or even rice which is grown here in abundance. One basic food is missing from the shelves one day and something else another - only to be found at times in a small panaderia on some city side street by "those who know" where its been moved. It may sound petty, but it is just another tactical brick in the building constructed by Washington and some wealthy Venezuelans to turn the people against Chávez. The combination of all tactics of this strategy have come to be known as "the creeping coup". The Chávez administration is responding with two lines of defense of the nation’s food supply: (1) Law enforcement and (2) Launching PDVAL, the Venezuelan Food Production and Distribution Company. Here we will address law enforcement.
The Colombian Border: Venezuela’s first line of defense against this attack on the food supply has been law enforcement. It is illegal to take discounted food meant for the poor and sell it for profit in another country – in this case, Colombia. Recently, President Chávez sent 3,000 members the Venezuela National Guard to stop the food smuggling operation, raid secret warehouses and stop the destruction of food. They have confiscated 5,000 tons of contraband food nationwide and are giving the food to the nation’s poor at affordable prices. Those who criticize Chávez’ attempts to stop this smuggling of food should be asked, “Would Arnold Schwarzenegger, Governor of California, enforce laws to stop smuggling of food-stamp purchases into Mexico, depriving the local poor of their sustenance?”
AP's Attack on Venezuelan Food: Yesterday, the capitalist media (Associated Press) stepped up its attack on Venezuela’s food supply in an article written by Frank Bajak (Paycheck) and distributed around the world. Bajak used a 2-pronged assault, stating:
“President Hugo Chavez's drive to halt food-smuggling into Colombia is hurting thousands of his own countrymen whose livelihood has depended on the free flow of goods across one of South America's most porous borders. ... The anti-contraband campaign enforced by stepped-up vehicle searches is designed to combat shortages in Venezuela. ... Instead it has badly affected the poor — Venezuelans and Colombians alike ...”
Bajak also cites merchants and factories (wealthy, anti-Chavez food distributors) in the Venezuelan border town of San Antonio who said their sales dropped 85 percent as a result of the smuggling crackdown and Isabel Castillo, president of San Antonio's chamber of commerce, who said that about 40 stores have closed as a result of the government’s defense against food smuggling.
AP's Sin of Omission: However, AP does not comment on the rich benefits that price-controls on food have had for the poor throughout Venezuela’s population of 27 million. Instead, AP takes a snide stab at food price controls and the booming Venezuelan economy, stating,
“The price controls on many basic food items — an attempt to rein in 23 percent annual inflation — have contributed to shortages of everything from milk to cooking oil in this petroleum-rich nation.”
In an attitude characteristic of the most cynical tactics of the corporate-capitalist media, Bajak is defending the people who are (1) breaking local laws and (2) using the artificially-created shortages to double or triple the price of government subsidized food.
Blaming Price Controls for Inflation: While glibly blaming inflation on price-controls, the writer does not examine the real causes of inflation, rooted in other Washington-backed attacks on the Venezuelan economy. These attacks include a parallel money market scheme developed by the opposition and manipulations of the monetary system by the Central Bank, still under the control of counter-revolutionaries. One article in the Constitutional Reforms, narrowly defeated by the opposition, would have given the government some power to disrupt the manipulations by the Central Bank. Instead of discussing these realities, Associated Press chooses to blame inflation on price-controls of a few basic foods for the poor. After 16 consecutive quarters of 11.5%+ economic growth, any economy is going to suffer from some inflation and even moreso in Venezuela where price speculation is an endemic feature of the entrepreneurial class.
Chavez and Uribe**: The AP reporter also implies that somehow, the anti-smuggling operation is due to the conflict between President Chavez and Colombia’s president Alvaro Uribe over whether or not FARC should be classfied as “Terrorists” or “Insurgents”. In a nutshell, this is a question of enforcing Venezuela’s laws for the benefit of the marginalized sectors of society. By definition, Bajak’s non-sequiturs belie the truth.
The philosophy of the Bolivarian Revolution is to place people first and business-interests second. It would appear that corporate hacks like Bajak have absolutely no understanding of the basic philosophy of the Bolivarian government. The key question here is whether AP’s Bajak is writing from total ignorance or by Washington’s “intelligent design” to overthrow the democratically-elected government of Venezuela.
Notes:
*Recently, a local newspaper in La Victoria showed a photo of truckloads of milk and eggs dumped in a landfill in Maiquetia and during the national lockout of 2003, workers on the large dairy farm of a leader of the coup against President Chávez were ordered to pour milk into a river.
**Alvaro Uribe Velez- A Colombian politician and senator dedicated to collaboration with the Medellin Cartel at high government levels. Uribe was linked to a business involved in narcotic activities in the U.S. His father was murdered in Colombia for his connections with the narcotics traffickers. Uribe ... has worked for the Medellin Cartel and is a close personal friend of Pablo Escobar Gaviria. He has participated in Escobar's political campaign to win the position of Assistant Parliamentarian to Jorge Ortega. Uribe has been one of the politicians from the senate who has attacked all forms of the extradition treaty (with the U.S.). Source: Confidential declassified document of the DIA (U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, September, 1991. (http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB131/)
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