Identifier
Created
Classification
Origin
07CARACAS135
2007-01-22 22:14:00
CONFIDENTIAL
Embassy Caracas
Cable title:  

CHAVEZ TO U.S.: "GO TO HELL"

Tags:  PREL PGOV ECON VE 
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TAGS: PREL PGOV ECON VE
SUBJECT: CHAVEZ TO U.S.: "GO TO HELL"


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Classified By: POLITICAL COUNSELOR ROBERT DOWNES,
REASON 1.4 (D)

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 CARACAS 000135

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TAGS: PREL PGOV ECON VE
SUBJECT: CHAVEZ TO U.S.: "GO TO HELL"


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Classified By: POLITICAL COUNSELOR ROBERT DOWNES,
REASON 1.4 (D)


1. (C) Summary. An extremely confident President Chavez
resumed his weekly "Alo Presidente" television broadcast
January 21 after a four-month campaign/inauguration hiatus.
During the nearly six-hour broadcast, Chavez lashed out
against a USG expression of concern about a pending Enabling
Law, as well as the Secretary's efforts to advance peace in
the Middle East. Attacking the USG is a favorite Chavez
pastime, but the Venezuelan president had made others,
including OAS SecGen Insulza and the Catholic Church, his
favorite bogeymen in recent weeks. Chavez also ordered his
telecommunication minister to immediately install a
BRV-controlled board of directors at CANTV and defer
decisions on compensation. He also declared he would raise
local prices at the gas pumps by an unspecified amount, the
first hike in over eight years. Moreover, Chavez announced
plans to dissolve the Caracas mayoralty and convert the
capital back into a Federal District, as well as to impose
ceilings on government salaries. With each successive speech
since the January 8 cabinet ceremony, the Venezuelan
president continues to reinforce his untethered determination
to advance the "socialist" phase of his "Bolivarian
revolution" and to brook no opposition or criticism. End
Summary.

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He's Ba-a-a-ck
--------------


2. (SBU) President Chavez relaunched his televised Sunday
talk program "Alo, Presidente" January 21. Chavez, dressed
in his open-collar "revolutionary" red sports shirt,
dedicated his broadcast to his deceased grandmother. Chavez
had dropped the weekly broadcasts in September 2006 when he
took to the campaign trail in the run-up to the December 3
presidential election. The Venezuelan president convoked his
27-member cabinet to be part of his studio audience. New
Vice President Jorge Rodriguez also traveled to the Amazonian
state of Delta Amacuro and participated in the broadcast from

there. Consistent with the tradition he established over the
previous 262 weekly broadcasts, Chavez made a number of
significant announcements over the course of his five hour
and fifty-minute telecast from Caracas. He also lashed out
against the United States.

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Gringos Go Home
--------------


3. (U) Responding to Department Deputy Spokesman Tom Casey's
January 19 comment that the Enabling Law that President
Chavez has requested is "odd" in a democracy, Chavez said the
United States could "go to Hell" (a charitable translation of
the vulgar phrase "Vayanse al cipote, gringos"). The
National Assembly passed the first draft of the Enabling Law
on January 18 and is expected to give it final approval this
week. The Enabling Law will give Chavez the authority to
issue executive decrees in 10 broad areas for 18 months; the
decrees will have the force of law. Noting that he shook
hands with HHS Secretary Leavitt and WHA A/S Shannon at
Nicaraguan President Ortega's recent inauguration, Chavez
reiterated that he hoped bilateral relations would improve,
but the USG must "understand what is happening here in Latin
America and respect this continent."


4. (U) Chavez also used the broadcast to criticize the
Secretary's efforts to advance peace in the Middle East,

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alleging that the U.S. is rying to remove "our brother
Bashar al-Asad." Chvez also criticized the hanging of
Saddam Hussei and pledged that if the United States wr to
invade Venezuela, "we would be on the front lines" fighting
to the end. The Venezuelan president subsequently chatted
with visiting Syrian Information Minister Dr. Moshen Bilal
and Syrian Ambassador Mohammed Khafif on the program. Bilal
conveyed President Assad's personal greetings between
"companions in the fight against the same enemy" and
announced that the Syrian President would visit Venezuela in
the second half of 2007.


5. (U) Chavez's blasts against the United States came on the
heels of the National Assembly's passing of a resolution also
attacking the Deputy Spokesman's January 19 comment. The
one-page resolution calls his statement "an unacceptable
intervention in the internal affairs of our nation." It also

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urges the USG to pay more attention to "its own internal
affairs, the needs and suffering of the American people and
the American soldiers killed because of a genocidal war
launched unilaterally by the government against Iraq and in
contravention of the United Nations (sic)." The penultimate
paragraph of the resolution states, "the only thing really
rare in this world is that the government that says it is
defending democracy has transformed into one of the horseman
of the Apocalypse, of death."

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CANTV/Oil
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6. (U) Chavez criticized newly named Telecommunications
Minister Jessie Chacon for not moving faster with the
"nationalization" of CANTV, Venezuela's largest
telecommunications firm, in which Verizon is a 28 percent
owner. He ordered Chacon to install a BRV-governed board of
directors, asserting that investors were practically "given"
shares of CANTV when privatized in the 1990's. He told
Chacon not to buy into "that old story" that the Venezuelan
government has to pay the fair international market value to
expropriate CANTV, and that investors would be compensated
when the BRV decided. "This is an order," Chavez told
Chacon, "you have to act."


7. (SBU) The Venezuelan President also announced during the
broadcast plans to increase the price of gasoline sold in
Venezuela (currently at less than 20 cents a gallon). He
asked Energy and Petroleum Minister Rafael Ramirez to
implement an unspecified increase in such a way that it not
affect inflation or the price of transporting food (sic).
Chavez asserted that cheap gas prices primarily benefit
wealthy persons "who fill up their BMW's" and not most
citizens who ride buses or take the Caracas subway. Chavez
has never raised local gas prices during his first eight
years in power. One commentator said the price hike may just
be a subterfuge, which he will use to distract public
attention from other changes, but not implement.

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Redistricting/RCTV
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8. (U) Chavez also announced his intention to dissolve the
capital mayorship of Caracas and to convert the Venezuelan
capital back into a Federal District. Referring to Juan
Barreto, the Metropolitan Mayor and a hard-line Chavez
supporter, Chavez said, "Juan, you are dissolved." Two
prominent opposition politicians are also mayors of two of
Caracas' five boroughs, so converting the current structure
would presumably eliminate their job. Picking up on comments
he made about excessive government salaries during his
inauguration and state-of-the-union addresses, the Venezuelan
President said he intends to approve salary caps. If any
senior government officials disagree with this proposal,
Chavez said, they should resign.


9. (SBU) The Venezuelan president yet again reaffirmed his
intention to close the independent broadcast station RCTV.
Counting the months until the May on his fingers until the
BR's "non-renewal" of the broadcaster's license, Chaez
urged Telecommunications Minister Chacon to "speed up the
process." Chavez dismissed RCTV (and others') criticism that
he has become a "tyrant," and huffed that RCTV "is finished."


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Comment
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10. (C) Chavez's first "Alo Presidente" broadcast in some
four months both reflected and reinforced the Venezuelan
President's firm determination to accelerate his plans to
institute "Socialism in the 21st Century." His new Vice
President Jorge Rodriguez is readily amplifying and
implementing the instructions Chavez has given him to move
forward with executive decrees. In addition, Chavez and
Rodriguez continue to try to accelerate separate, but
simultaneous, efforts to make significant changes to the 1999
constitution and form a United Socialist Party of Venezuela.


11. (C) In the wake of his re-election and in control of all
branches of government, an extremely confident Chavez appears
to believe he can now take draconian "revolutionary" measures

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without paying a political price. He stands determined to
move ahead even though a number of his proposed measures are
going to have a negative impact on core supporters.
Massively subsidized domestic gasoline prices have
traditionally been the third rail in domestic politics, but
Chavez is now proposing his first price hike. The 25% price
hike in local gas prices in 1989 was the spark that caused
major riots, looting, and deaths in Caracas (the "Caracazo").
According to Chavista lore, this was the precipitating event
for Chavez' unsuccessful 1992 coup. Moreover, numerous loyal
Chavistas would be adversely affected by government salary
caps and redistricting, but Chavez' merely is telling them up
front "that they can leave."


12. (C) After leveling personal insults against OAS Secretary
General Insulza and Catholic Church leaders during his
January 8 cabinet ceremony and January 10 inauguration
speeches, Chavez has also returned to his favorite bogeyman:
the United States. The vehemence of Chavez' and the National
Assembly's response to the Deputy Spokesman's comment on the
Enabling Law is consistent with Chavez' increasingly
thin-skinned and hot-headed response to any criticism, no
matter from whom it emanates.

BROWNFIELD