VHeadline News Editor Patrick J. O'Donoghue reports:
President Chavez has reminded those who criticize his constitutional amendment proposal that they seem to have forgotten that it is the people that will decide whether he will continue or not as President via democratic elections. Speaking to graduate military cadets at the Military Academy in Caracas, Chavez says the constitutional amendment he seeks wants to open the possibility of continuous reelection to the presidency as in European countries, such as France and the UK. The President insists that the current Constitution is immune to the personal whim of any President because nobody, only the people, can amend it through a national referendum, unlike in the times of the Fourth Republic when Congress made changes without consulting the people.
The proposed constitution amendment has been handed to the board of the National Assembly (AN) and the first reading will take place on December 18 after the end of the signature-collecting phase.
The public ministry will formally charge ex-State Governor of Guarico and former government ally, Eduardo Manuitt for alleged corruption during his term in office. Two state prosecutors have been assigned to the investigation and Manuitt has been summonsed to a hearing on December 16.
National Guard (GN) General, Pedro Celestino Perez has been given five years prison for violating the security law in 2005 when he was chief of the coastguard command and commander of the Nueva Esparta Garrison in Margarita. The presiding judge sentenced that Perez had not complied with special security zone regulations after he ordered the coastguards in Tucupita (Delta Amacuro) to lift controls set up to prevent the illegal trafficking of gasoline.
The new Communication & Information (MIJ) Minister, Jesse Chacon has called on private media to respect their role as intermediaries of information and not to become news themselves. At his first press conference, Chacon, the losing candidate in (Caracas) Sucre municipal elections, states that people should be allowed to decide themselves about constitutional reform.
Chacon has made NO changes to the structure left by his predecessor, Andres Izarra, insisting instead that Izarra's projects will be consolidated. Mauricio Rodriguez will continue as communications administration deputy minister and Freddy Fernandez as communications strategy deputy minister. It is certain that VTV lame duck director, Yuri Pimentel will continue as director of the State VTV channel, which, Chacon says, will become a 24-hours news and opinion channel, while the unfortunate Teves channel that replaced the opposition Radio Caracas Television (RCTV) with great promise and turned into a resounding flop will become the "entertainment channel that all Venezuelans have been waiting for." The Minister has announced that Izarra will return to run Telesur and that a new branch of the channel will be opened next year with better technology.
According to alternative website Aporrea, two Cuban doctors working in the government Integral Health Attention Centre (CDI) scheme have been brutally attacked by unknown elements, who also set about destroying one CDI center. The incident is an indication of a series of attacks that have been taking place against people working for government social programs and especially Cuban doctors recently. The attack took place in Valencia (Carabobo) where the opposition recovered the state governorship.
Economy & Finance Minister, Ali Rodriguez Araque has announced that Venezuela will be the main contributor to the proposed Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA) Bank, providing 85% of the initial capital. Rodriguez says only Cuba and Venezuela have received authorization from their respective parliaments and other members are in the process of getting parliamentary approval. The source of Venezuela's funding will come from a budget assigned specially for that purpose with money either from the National Development Fund (Fonden) or the Treasury Bank. President Chavez will take the final decision at a Council of Ministers meeting. The ALBA Bank will start off with around $1 billion of capital.
Well-known Uruguayan author and thinker, Eduardo Galeano has added his grain of salt pointing out that he has attended many meetings announcing the burial of Capitalism but he argues that Capitalism will continue to have nine lives. Worse still, the thinker muses, Capitalism feeds on the loss of prestige of alternatives. "The word Socialism, for example, has been emptied of meaning because of the bureaucracy that uses it in the name of the people and Social Democracy that in its name modernized Capitalism's look." Capitalism, Galeano says, " privatizes its profits but socializes its losses." referring to China, the writer sees that country as a " successful combination of political dictatorship, old style Communism with an economy that provides cheap labor to the likes of US companies, such as Wal-Mart which bans trade unions."
Patrick J. O'Donoghue
patrick.vheadline@gmail.com
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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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