[DEBATE] : The Trial (And Errors) of Hugo Chavez

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

Here's another, on different problems from a different perspective
than Edgardo Lander's.

<http://www.inthesetimes.com/article/3296/the_trial_and_errors_of_hugo_chavez/>
The Trial (And Errors) of Hugo Chavez

Venezuelans are debating whether Chávez is putting the windfall of
revenue from oil revenues to good use or squandering it through
disorganization, corruption and misplaced priorities

By Steve Ellner	August 27, 2007

In April 2006, after a failed attempt to demolish the structurally
unsafe bridge on the highway connecting Caracas with the Port of La
Guaira, the Chávez opposition expressed outrage at government
incompetence. Manuel Rosales, the opposition candidate in the December
2006 presidential elections, accused President Hugo Chávez of
"allowing the Caracas-La Guaira bridge to collapse" and "having
inaugurated scores of public works projects without completing them."

However, on June 21, 2007, President Chávez inaugurated a new bridge
that is 180 feet high and half a mile long--longer than the original
one. The construction was on schedule and in time for the kickoff of
the America Soccer Cup. In a jab at the opposition, the main
state-controlled TV channel declared, "You can't cover up the
accomplishment with a finger." In another plus for Chávez, nine
modern, well-designed stadiums were constructed or remodeled for the
games, which Venezuela hosted for the first time in the Cup's 90-year
history.

Although the government won this round, the issues raised by the
opposition resist easy answers. Oil prices are at record highs. And
the nationalist Chávez has driven a hard bargain with the oil
companies. They now pay 33 percent in royalties for the massive
deposits of the Orinoco River region, up from 1 percent paid during
the neoliberal years of the '90s. Chávez not only counts on increased
oil income to finance his experimental programs, but vigorous
enforcement of the income tax system.

But Venezuelans are debating whether Chávez is putting this windfall
revenue to good use or squandering it through disorganization,
corruption and misplaced priorities.

The debate over government performance is significant because much of
the country's oil wealth is being invested in novel social programs to
help the poor. Indeed, Chávez calls the model he aspires to create
"21st century socialism," which stresses solidarity and democracy from
below and prioritizes social over economic goals.

In some ways, the current debate over government programs replays a
conflict Venezuela faced during the oil boom of the '70s. Neoliberals
have bashed the '70s and particularly the first government of Carlos
Andrés Pérez for using the increased revenue to expand the role of the
state in the economy without producing concrete results. Stanford
political science professor Terry Karl refers to the experience of the
'70s as the "Paradox of Plenty." Rather than foment development, she
says the spike in oil revenue led to greater handouts, aggravating
both dependence on the state and a climate of paternalism. Ironically,
Pérez, who nationalized the oil and iron industries during those
years, returned to power in 1989 to impose neoliberal formulas that
were a fiasco and resulted in his ouster.

In the case of Chávez, both sides have overstated their case in regard
to government spending. The Chávez government has made mistakes in
administering social programs that cost huge sums and involved many
people. Nevertheless, the programs that are working have begun to
transform the lives of Venezuela's poor, who were previously all but
ignored by politicians.

Some of the opposition attribute alleged government ineptness to the
lower-class makeup of the Chavista movement and the modest
participation of educated middle-class professionals. In what could be
interpreted as a slur on poor people who are viewed as dependent on
handouts, Rosales referred to Chavistas as "parasites," a remark that
one of his allies, Leopoldo Puchi, considered inappropriate. Chávez,
however, has inadvertently strengthened this charge by making
disparaging remarks about government "bureaucrats," and appointing
ministers who lack professional experience.
State-nurtured cooperatives

More than any other program under Chávez, the balance sheet for the
government's new worker cooperatives is mixed.

In 2004, the government created the Ministry of the Popular Economy to
organize training programs and facilitate loans to encourage those
enrolled to form cooperatives. By 2005, Chávez traveled through the
country to authorize loans for cooperatives in televised "Regional
Cabinet Meetings," where beneficiaries discussed their plans and
answered questions. A large majority of the cooperatives consist of
not many more than five members (the minimum number required by law)
and engage in maintenance work for local governments and state
companies such as the oil industry. Most of these cooperatives are
made up of members of an extended family, a setup that generally
functions well due to mutual trust among associates. Government
spokesmen have hailed some cooperatives, such as those of fishermen,
for challenging the control of monopoly companies.

One of the few large cooperatives is the Fabricio Ojeda, which
consists of the 150 workers (all but one of whom are women) at the
Venezuela Advances textile plant and 75 shoe-factory workers. The
co-op's health and educational facilities serve the residents of the
surrounding lower-class community in the western part of Caracas.

Alida Bastida, one of the textile workers elected supervisor, gave a
tour and proudly pointed to the eight sewing machines recently
purchased by her cooperative, as opposed to other machinery donated by
the state oil company. Asked about worker absenteeism, she says, "If
the worker has a legitimate health problem, they can get time off and
receive the same salary as everyone else. But at the end of the year
our cooperative's 'surplus' [profits] are divided up and distributed
to each worker on the basis of the number of days worked." Bastida
says that last year the surplus that workers received almost equaled
their annual salary.

But the failure of many state financed cooperatives--due to
improvisation or misuse of government funds--has resulted in the loss
of tens, if not hundreds of millions of dollars. On the other hand,
those cooperatives that have withstood the test of time may contribute
to the transformation of society, particularly because so many of
their members come from the non-privileged sectors of the population.

The cooperatives are heavily dependent on the state. Government
incentives include generous credit, lenient terms of payment and
exemption from all taxes. One sign of independence is when the
cooperative pays off its original loan and purchases its own
equipment. At a conference sponsored by the University of Carabobo,
one co-op member said: "It gave us great satisfaction to have paid off
our loan in seven months. Now it is they [the state bank] who are
behind us, urging us to apply for new credit."

Experience has shown how difficult it is to decree such experimental
changes in people's lives from above. The government placed the number
of cooperatives at 140,000 in 2006, but this year the Ministry of the
Popular Economy announced that it counted only 74,000. Worse yet, a
more recent census indicated only 48,000. Many cooperatives never got
off the ground, and in other cases, cooperative members pocketed the
money they received from loans or the down payments for contracts. One
pro-Chávez congressman admitted, "Up until now, no one can say the
cooperative program has been successful. In fact, there is little to
show considering all the money that has been spent."

In response, the Ministry has tried to exercise greater control over
the cooperatives, but in doing so may have gone to an opposite
extreme. The cooperatives are now required every three months to
solicit a Certificate of Fulfillment of Responsibilities issued by the
Ministry's main office in Caracas. The paperwork, which includes a
balance sheet signed by a certified accountant, is extremely
time-consuming. The cooperative also needs to demonstrate solvency
with regard to financial obligations to government agencies such as
the social security system, the housing authority and the job-training
institute.

Chávez and his followers generally attribute the problems facing
cooperatives to their members' lack of social consciousness. As a
corrective, they call for a cultural transformation along the lines of
what Che Guevara called the "New Socialist Man." However, in its
promotion of cooperatives and other social programs, the government
faces a more practical problem that Chávez movement leaders haven't
recognized. Mechanisms have been created to monitor cooperatives, but
to date there no cooperative member has been penalized for failing to
comply with their legal obligations. Although Minister of the Popular
Economy Pedro Morejón announced late last year that he had taken 300
cases of cooperatives to court, it is unclear whether Chávez, who
claims to be the president of the underprivileged, will be willing to
jail, or seize the property of, poor people who have misspent public
money.

On the plus side, many cooperative members have learned administrative
skills while at the same time changing their attitude toward
cooperation and solidarity. By law, co-op members must work in their
communities, carrying out maintenance service in schools, distributing
Christmas presents to children or other tasks. Furthermore, the
experience of sharing the profits of the enterprise breaks with the
tradition of wage labor and is bound to influence the cooperativist's
way of thinking.
The "massification" of education at all levels

The education "Mission" programs, which also involve hundreds of
thousands of underprivileged Venezuelans, have been more successful
than the cooperatives. The Missions, which provide primary, high
school and university education mostly to adults, use Cuban-prepared
video cassettes in the classrooms and "facilitators" who answer
questions posed by the students.

In October 2005, Chávez announced that the program "Robinson Mission"
had achieved its objective of teaching reading and writing skills to
1.5 million Venezuelans, thereby eliminating illiteracy in the nation.
Some of the participants in the program, however, have only learned to
sign their names. The "Ribas Mission" works with nearly 1 million
Venezuelans, about 200,000 of whom receive stipends of about $100 a
month. The program reaches out to the most excluded members of
society, such as the indigenous, the disabled, delinquents and
prisoners.

Videocassettes have been used in school classrooms in other countries
but never on such a massive scale. Héctor Navarro, who has headed the
Ribas Mission in the state of Bolívar over the last three years,
explains the experimental nature of the program: "We wanted our
facilitators to have a university education, but the vast majority are
merely high school graduates. They learn as they go along. Training
consists of problem-solving sessions among the facilitators with
feedback from the school coordinator who typically has some university
education."

Many Mission university students fear schools and professional
associations that object to the unconventional nature of the program
will not recognize their degrees. To avoid discrimination, the
government has reached agreements with the universities controlled by
the Ministry of Education whereby they help supervise the missions and
issue the diplomas in their own name. The nation's larger
universities, however, have refused to cooperate.

Members of the opposition claim that by lowering the quality of
education, the Mission program is depreciating the value of existing
degrees. According to them, rather than awarding grade school, high
school and college degrees, the Missions should issue special diplomas
to their students so as not to undermine the established educational
system.
The need to assimilate errors

This combination of advances and missed opportunities characterizes
not only social programs but all types of government activity.
Chávez's revolutionary rhetoric and actions have created great public
expectations that in turn account for his resounding electoral
successes. Yet his government faces a host of practical problems.

For instance, to its credit, the Chávez government has greatly
expanded public transportation. Venezuela is one of the few countries
in the world building out its rail system. In June, a trolleybus
service was inaugurated in Mérida in the Andean mountains, making it
the smallest city in Latin America to have such a system. Last year,
subway systems began functioning in the cities of Valencia and
Maracaibo, a new line was added to the metro in downtown Caracas, and
two rail lines now connect that system with neighboring towns. The
metro fare in Caracas is less than 25 cents and free for passengers
over 60.

At the same time, oil-induced prosperity has exacerbated automobile
traffic and its attendant problems. The first half of this year saw
car sales increase by 52 percent over the same period last year; 65
percent of the purchases were imported vehicles. While Chávez has
railed against SUVs, he has not placed a special tax on them or on
cars in general. Indeed, the government has encouraged poor
Venezuelans to purchase cars by exempting non-luxury from the value
added tax.

But if Venezuela is to learn from the errors that are being committed
on this untrodden path, discussion within the movement is essential.
The private media is alive and well and continues to criticize the
government, sometimes aggressively, notwithstanding the non-renewal of
the TV channel "Radio Caracas." Opposition criticism is no substitute,
however, for constructive criticism from those who support the
"revolutionary" project.

But during the eight-and-a-half years in power, the pro-Chávez parties
have failed to establish internal mechanisms of discussion. Chávez's
recent creation of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV),
which he claims will be the most "democratic party in Venezuelan
history," is designed to overcome this shortcoming by holding internal
elections and calling an ideological congress. With such considerable
resources at its disposal, the government cannot expect to avoid
mistakes, which in any case are inevitable in this trial-and-error
road to change. Rather its main challenge is to figure out a way to
encourage constructive debate in order to parlay frustrating
experiences into new, effective programs.
-- 
Yoshie