Patrick J. O'Donoghue's round-up of news from Venezuela: January 31, 2008

National Elections Council (CNE) president, Tibisay Lucena says regional elections will take place around the third week of November. Lucena admits that the CNE board has not fixed the exact date for state governorship, municipal and local council elections but has announced that the CNE is currently preparing the technological platform and operational system for the important elections. During her press conference, Lucena insists that the CNE is no longer a monopoly of political parties and electoral processes up to now have shown that Venezuela can count on an electoral system, which is "trustworthy, modern and highly technical." One of the biggest challenges in 2008, Lucena maintains, is to improve the civil state register and to push through Parliament a definite draft on electoral processes, financing and electoral campaigns. One of the key legal instruments that the CNE wants to wrap up this years concerns the functioning of political organizations. Lucena also mentions another important objective, namely to close the electoral gap of those excluded in the permanent electoral register, people who have never had the opportunity of taking part in electoral processes because they are not enrolled in the electoral register. During 2007 the number of automated voting tables rose to 32,939, leaving just 675 tables of manual counting, compared to 10 years ago when Venezuela only had 7,000 automated tables and 13,201 manual counting tables.

Food Minister, Felix Osorio has held a second meeting or encounter with the food distributors on a national level. The Minister says the idea of the meeting was to learn where products came from and who they were being distributed to in order to control smuggling, especially in border states. According to the Minister, the current checking system is done through an integral control system and he insists that the government is tackling what is called "extraction contraband," which is damaging the people of Venezuela. The Minister is adamant that the national inventory must be controlled and an alarm system installed when any of the items begin to disappear. The government has set aside (Bs.F) 7 million bolivares to make sure that around 160,000 tonnes of food is distributed through the Mercal distribution system. The Minister has also announced the return of "pay on site" system through the exchange administration office (Cadivi) aimed at facilitating negotiations with importers. It will be strictly controlled and is only for the food sector, Osorio adds.

Families of people held hostage by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) have announced they will not take part in a march organized by young Colombian citizens against the FARC on February 4. In a brief communique, family members say they consider the slogans of the march are very aggressive and will only polarize Colombia. The main fear of the signatories is that the government of Alvaro Uribe will try to take advantage of the protest and look on it as a kind of plebiscite or manifestation in favor of its war effort against the guerrillas. The march, which will take place in the principal cities of Colombia and more than a dozen capitals throughout the world, including Caracas, was launched on the Internet Facebook as an initiative of " Colombian youth" against the FARC. Colombian families of the hostages have rejected the initiative because their objective, they feel, is to free all hostages in exchange for FARC prisoners currently in jail, in other words, a humanitarian effort that benefits both sides and not just one. The Venezuelan opposition is supporting the march 100%, continuing its policy of begrudging the Venezuelan government's humanitarian effort.

In a interesting note for our readers, Las Verdades de Miguel columnist, Jose Luis Carpio writing from Spain makes a poignant point after on a short visit to his homeland. Some Venezuelan media sources, he notes, have adopted the custom of carrying and copying many news items from Colombian news agencies. There is still no authentic Venezuelan journalism, he laments, and home journalists seem to be political actors that stick to the editorial line imposed by their paymasters, the media owners. "We see denunciations without any real proof and investigations that collapse by themselves." The majority of national papers do not invest in foreign correspondents. The sole exception is Telesur.

Organization of American States General Secretary (OAS) Jose Miguel Insulza says he hopes Colombia and Venezuela will find roads of harmony to overcome rising tensions between the two countries. Current tensions should not be magnified, Insulza adds, and agreements must be reached.