President Chavez ... it's time to get off the pot and stop the crap or see your country flushed down the toilet! The choice is yours!

VHeadline guest commentarist and gold investor Todd MacSween writes: After years of total destruction by illegal miners polluting the vast gold-mining district of southeastern Bolivar State, the Venezuelan government appears to have screwed up yet again ... the one hand doesn't know what the other is doing ... confusion and destruction continue to lead 'mañana-land' along its own merry way.

Months ago, the long-awaited permit to mine Las Cristinas -- and Las Brisas -- was denied. It was a denial based on a half-baked ideal that there is just too much irreversible damage to allow opencast mining in the Imataca rainforest region of Venezuela. What seemed to be a forceful statement. had about as much credibility as Mickey Mouse running for president of the United States?

Now ... not only has the irrational decision of Environmental Minister (MinAmb) Yubiri Ortega de Carrizales been completely ignored, the designated mining area has increased dramatically and mining is to begin within these areas "starting in 2009!"

• The vast gold resources will undoubtedly be mined by someone. The question NOW is who will mine, and which areas?

Chatroom speculation over the past few days, will point apparently to Rusoro being given Las Cristinas. Say ... What?

Since when does the Venezuela government just take and give ... if any media gurus use their pea brains, they would definitely see that one miner simply cannot handle such a massive task. It will be hard enough for one miner to mine Las Cristinas, so how could one (already with too much Venezuelan mining on its plate!) speed up gold production, solve all of Venezuela's social problems and eliminate the wholesale destruction of the Venezuelan environment in one fell swoop?

WHY would Venezuela start completely from scratch, approving another company for EIS and environmental permits -- not to mention where the equipment would come from within the next two years? Everyone knows how long the waiting list is for mining equipment to be built and delivered AND the impossibility of obtaining everything needed to run a mine at the drop of a hat ... even a golden one!

Newmont had such a huge demand for tires that they are said to have Yokohama build a plant specific to their demand for massive tires.

One thing that does make sense would be a buyout or a series of buyouts approved by the Venezuelan Guayana Corporation (CVG) ... possibly (considering Chavez' penchant for his new-found allies) by a Russian company such as Polyus, which is a bigger company capable of complying with every aspect as well as increasing their own reserves. Polyus is also the largest exclusively Russian-owned gold company.

• As usual investors and shareholders are the ones getting burned, investing in a country like Venezuela with such an unstable government where the one hand simply does not know what the other is doing!

Where are the clarifications from the mining minister or the environment minister? The 90-day rebuttal deadlines for both KRY and GRZ have passed long since and still no official word. Who pays these clowns? And when will the simply do the job that they're appointed to do?

President Hugo Chavez calls out for foreign investment ... he says he wants to show the world that Venezuela is open for business!

If that's the case, you have mostly Canadian companies such as Crystallex, Rusoro and a few others there to take the offer. At what point will the Venezuela government do their part, and, instead of letting their own environment and foreign companies suffer, do the proper thing.

In the case of Crystallex, it was their partner -- the CVG -- which needed to obtain the requisite permits! Maybe if there was not so much corruption within the CVG itself, these fulfillments would have been obtained years ago.

• What good is a Memorandum of Understanding (MOA) when everything is followed to the exact specification by the foreign operator if the Venezuelan government does NOT live up to its own laws?

If, indeed, Las Cristinas is to be taken away, all they have to do is to simply legally inform the company so that shareholders like myself can move on to more reliable and stable countries where they have their priorities in proper gear.

So, President Chavez ... it's time to get off the pot and stop the crap or see your country flushed down the toilet" The choice is yours!

Todd MacSween
emilytodd@netzero.net

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Venezuela is facing the most difficult period of its history with honest reporters crippled by sectarianism on top of rampant corruption within the administration and beyond, aided and abetted by criminal forces in the US and Spanish governments which cannot accept the sovereignty of the Venezuelan people to decide over their own future.

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