Editorial. Published Thursday, November 2, 2000, in the
Miami Herald
Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez's behavior is fast moving from the
merely annoying to the potentially dangerous. And the danger isn't so much to
the United States and to other neighboring countries -- although it can't be
overlooked that Venezuela sells the United States 1.4 million barrels a day of
oil -- but to Mr. Chávez's fellow citizens and Venezuelan democracy. He
bears close watching.
In the year since Mr. Chávez, a cashiered army colonel and
self-described revolutionary, has been in power, his regular jabs at the United
States and other democracies have been tolerated by the Clinton administration
because his actions didn't match his hostile rhetoric. ``Watch what he does, not
what he says,'' is the way The Herald's Andres Oppenheimer described the U.S.
line.
But now, in the wake of Fidel Castro's visit to Venezuela as Mr. Chávez's
pampered -- actually idolized -- guest, separating Mr. Chávez's words
from his deeds is difficult and possibly naive. Tolerance must have a limit.
This is not just about the Venezuelan president's shameless toadying this
week to the Cuban dictator, although that is cause enough for real concern.
Castro departed Caracas on Tuesday with an agreement that Venezuela would
provide about a third of Cuba's oil needs at a bargain-basement price of about
$20 a barrel. That deal is valued at $3 billion -- money that will now prop up
the destitute Cuban regime.
Moreover, Cuba can pay its debt through a barter arrangement wherein it will
trade doctors, athletic coaches and ``sugar technology'' for oil. This would be
laughable were it not true. Fact is that Cuba has an abundance of athletes and
doctors -- many of whom are unemployed and eager to drive taxis for tourists. As
for teaching Venezuelans something about the sugar business, doesn't Mr. Chávez
know that Castro's policies have so devastated Cuba's sugar industry that it
produces today about what it did in the 1930s? He may as well ask Castro's
advice on free elections.
The deal with Cuba follows by just a few weeks Mr. Chávez's visit
with another ruthless dictator, Saddam Hussein, a direct insult to those
countries that delivered Kuwait from Hussein's barbarity. And the Venezuelan
president followed that by trying to persuade OPEC to further gouge the world's
oil consumers.
On the domestic front, his restructuring of the Venezuelan Congress and the
judiciary, his restrictions on the press and an upcoming referendum that would
cripple independent labor unions further stifle opportunities for organized
opposition to his idiosyncratic rule. Such steps provide ample warning that Mr.
Chávez may share more with Castro than a romantic tie to revolution.
Venezuelans already suffer repercussions from Mr. Chávez's policies.
The economy last year shrunk 7.2 percent and $4.6 billion in investment capital
has fled. If the oil market cools -- as it must -- Venezuelans may be less
willing to watch billions in potential revenues go across the Caribbean to prop
up an aging dictator's cruel regime.
Copyright 2000 Miami Herald | 