A new media law has been proposed in Venezuela which several people in Venezuela see as aimed at having the media self-restrain from publishing "harmful" materials, as they could face 6 months to 4 years of imprisonment for it. Interestingly enough a leftist parliament member mentioned that "this new law corresponds to the era of Mussolini, Pinoche, Hitler and other Argentinian military, but never to our revolutionary process" (link in Spanish)

Also yesterday (Saturday August 1st) the government has taken 34 radio stations off the air (more at El Universal), which based on comments I received seemed to be a targeted attack to the stations that re-transmitted several opinion programs criticized before by the government as opposition centric. Nevertheless the argument presented is that these stations did not manage to submit a necessary paperwork on time. El Universal (link in Spanish) mentions that out of the 656 existing AM and FM ration stations, 360 are at risk of being closed, that's a whooping 55%.

Chavez insists that the radio stations were not closed but "recovered" (link in Spanish) and the Minister in charge of doing this said that "almost all of these circuits had to do with illegal actions that allowed a family or group to take ownership of 10 and even 15 stations" (link also in Spanish).

Interestingly enough the Venezuelan community took twitter by assault and vented their opinions using the #FreeMediaVe hashtag which apparently made it to the top 10 topics in twitter and made the "Bolivarian News Agency" post an information accusing opposition tweeters of this with an article titled "Ultra-right media campaign has repercussions on social networks in Internet" (link in Spanish).

I am intrigued at how twitter with its short posting has played a central role lately in allowing communities to share their opinions and views, thus allowing the global community to get a glimpse of what is happening on the ground of the events.

Labels: news, Venezuela

MIAMI (Reuters) - A "relaxing, calm, beautiful place" may not be everyone's description of Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where the United States holds about 240 prisoners in a detention centre that has drawn condemnation from around the world.

But this was the opinion of reigning Miss Universe Dayana Mendoza of Venezuela, who visited the U.S. naval facility in eastern Cuba this month on a trip organized by the United Service Organizations (USO) which supports U.S. troops.

the rest is here

Labels: Venezuela

Chavez has done it one more time, now by putting forward a new Intelligence Law which will create 2 new agencies, the General Intelligence Office and General Counterintelligence Office, both under his control.
"The new law requires people in the country to comply with requests to assist the agencies, secret police or community activist groups loyal to Mr. Ch�vez. Refusal can result in prison terms of two to four years for most people and four to six years for government employees." mentioned the New York Times
The new law for instance authorizes his new intelligence agencies to use ?any special or technically designed method? to intercept and obtain information.
Ram�n Rodr�guez Chac�n mentioned "Basically, we are talking about secret organizations. If someone is part of the intelligence agency, well nobody should know it. On another topic, it also means high level of academic and ideological education is required for those involved" (Read here in Spanish)
Chavez has already talked about the resistance showed by the opposition and media, saying that the media has tried to sabotage the law, and that they are under the influence North American Empire (as he calls the US). That the Empire has a plan "a good strategy, let's not underestimate the Empire, US has experts in psychological war, several centers for psychological operations working 24/7" (Read more here in Spanish)

Wonderful right? I wonder if we will soon go back to the time of the "Seguridad Nacional" secret police, used by Marcos Perez Jimenez during his dictatorship.

Labels: politics, Venezuela

It has definitely been an interesting week for my country (Venezuela), after the first partial results were given by the CNE (National Elections Committee) stating that the constitutional reforms were not approved by the people (check prior post).
Venezuela saw Chavez accept the defeat without the rage or angry message a lot of people expected from him(Check BBC news).
Then Venezuela saw that expected reaction from Chavez while broadcasting with the Military. He qualified the victory of the opposition as a "Shitty victory", and mentioned that he didn't want to win in that way, and that he will put the reform through once more, even if it is not constitutional to do so. During his speech (check the video in Spanish) he mentions "Shit" 4 times, which is against the law; and then Venezuelans saw our "Communications Minister" say that the fact that the President did use the word will allow for it to be permitted in the future(check the video in Spanish).
Venezuela also heard his speech saying that "Here, the S� lost, you let the S� loose, Miranda owes me one, people of Miranda and Caracas you are in debt with me, I have it written down in my planner, let's see if you will pay your debt to me or not", while addressing the facts that his followers did not go vote massively on Sunday, as in prior occasions (best review in English I have read is in Caracas Chronicles blog)
To finish the week, Venezuelans wait for the CNE to give the full and final results of Sunday's polls in the next hours, while some analysts made note that the difference between "No" and "Si" might be significantly smaller that initially thought (Check Caracas Chronicles blog). And also Venezuelans are expected to roll back their clocks by 30 min next Sunday, as the "New Time Zone" for Venezuela gets into effect (Check Reuters for more details)

How much longer will this craziness continue? Well for that I recommend you read The Economist's article "The wind goes out of the revolution" it's worth the read!!

Labels: politics, Venezuela

Although I try to avoid posting or discussing online about my country's Presidency, their decisions and the country's Political, Legal and Economical reality, I can't just avoid blogging this note in Nomadlife, in order to give a different perspective and insight to our community into what is currently happening with my country's Freedom.
Last May 27th one of the oldest TV station in Venezuela (RCTV) was shut by President Chavez (Read more on BBC), their license was not renewed based on accusations that this TV station plotted against him and supported a coup attempt in 2002.
This particular TV station had been broadcasting since 1953 and it started as a Radio Station (Radio Caracas) moving later on into the TV sector. RCTV has had historically a very high (not to say blindly the highest) audience and they had many programs that commonly topped the national ratings
This has open a debate on Freedom of Speech in Venezuela (Read more on BBC) and has created many protests and strikes as Venezuelans look for ways to express their frustration with the regime's decision (Read more on BBC). And furthermore Chavez has already mentioned to Globovision that they should be careful or he will do whatever is needed. Globovision is a 24/7 news station which he called an enemy of the state because of the coverage of the protests against RCTV's closure, during that broadcast he also called Venezuelans to be alert of new unstabilizing plans and to be ready to defend the Revolution (Read more on BBC).

So where will this end? Will all the TV and Radio Stations that speak against the government be closed or silenced? Will the people continue to protests against the decision even if it does not seem to make any difference? Or will things just go on and people adjust to whatever decision is done by the regime?
I can only note that from the comments I received from the friends and family who still live in Venezuela, that already the other National TV stations are reserving themselves to broadcast any news against the government, and as a matter of fact during the last weekend only Globovision broadcasted any news about the demonstrations in Caracas (Read more on BBC), all the other National TV Stations only showed their scheduled programs.
So where will Venezuelans look for news in the near future? What will happen when the next TV station is also shut? Where will this end? Will he be able to continue his revolution bringing Venezuela towards the new Communism of the XXI century? Towards Cuba?
Only time will tell.

Labels: politics, Venezuela