[R-G] BBC TV's 'The Trillion Dollar Revolutionary' was neither fair nor accurate!

[Anthony Fenton]

http://www.vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=77102

BBC TV's 'The Trillion Dollar Revolutionary' was neither fair nor  
accurate!

'This World' on the BBC dedicated its most recent program to  
Venezuela. British journalist John Sweeney presented 'The Trillion  
Dollar Revolutionary' on Monday, November 19, 2007, at prime time on  
BBC 2

     * Unfortunately, the program portrayed a vision of Venezuela  
that has no basis in reality and totally misrepresented the process  
of change happening in the country.

It was neither fair nor accurate and was littered with dishonest  
smears that would be laughable if they weren't so dangerous.

For example, Sweeney quotes the so-called "watchdog" International  
Transparency to claim that Venezuela has the second-highest level of  
corruption in the Americas. He neglects to mention, however, that the  
group itself does not provide any hard data or conclusive figures to  
back this up -- instead, it grades Venezuela based on public opinion.

Board members of its Venezuelan chapter include Mercedes de Freitas  
and Robert Bottome, who are both fully committed to the overthrow of  
President Chavez. The former receives funding from the US through the  
National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and the latter is the brother  
of the director and main shareholder of RCTV, a Venezuelan television  
network that played an active role during the 2002 coup d'etat  
against Chavez. They are not credible sources yet their propaganda is  
presented as fact.

Just as seriously, Sweeney distorts the reality surrounding the  
student demonstrations in Venezuela. He implies that all Venezuelan  
students oppose Chavez when in fact the Venezuelan student population  
is composed of approximately 1,500,000 people, of which roughly  
40,000 actively protest against the government ... a very loud, well- 
funded and violent minority.

Sweeney criticizes Venezuelan social policies and mistakenly claims  
that 60% of the Venezuelan population live under poverty line.  
However, according to the most recent study by the Economic  
Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean, Venezuela has lowered  
its levels of poverty from 37.1% to 30.2% and extreme poverty from  
15.9% to 9.9% since President Chavez took office.

These are just some of the more blatant examples of sloppy journalism  
that fall well below the professional standards expected of the BBC.

By the end of the program, it was clear that Sweeney went to  
Venezuela to do a hatchet job on President Chavez and the script  
sounded like it had already been written before he'd even set foot in  
the country.

The international community and people all over the world can help  
Venezuelans construct an egalitarian and democratic society by  
getting objective information and learning about this South American  
country and also condemning this type of irresponsible journalism,  
which is little more than carefully targeted propaganda produced to  
undermine support for the Venezuelan government abroad.

     * Hands Off Venezuela encourages supporters to complain about  
misleading journalism in a polite and constructive manner. The  
producers of 'This World' can be contacted via thisworld at bbc.co.uk or  
on IK (020) 8752-7500.