[R-G] Did Venezuela's Opposition Meet with US Officials in Puerto Rico?

[Anthony Fenton]

Did Venezuela's Opposition Meet with US Officials in Puerto Rico?
January 16th 2009, by Miguel Tinker-Salas - NACLA
http://www.venezuelanalysis.com/analysis/4115

Even by Venezuelan standards, the story seemed implausible. On January  
9, a young reporter Pedro Carvajalino, from community television  
station Ávila TV, filmed four leading figures of Venezuela's right- 
wing opposition returning from Puerto Rico. They had just arrived by  
private jet from the U.S. territory, where they had purportedly met  
with representatives of the U.S. Department of State.

According to emails obtained by the reporter, officials held the  
meeting to plan strategy and secure funding aimed at defeating a  
proposed amendment to the Venezuelan constitution that would allow  
elected officials, including President Hugo Chávez, to seek reelection.

The story first broke on Venezolana de Televisión (VTV), a government  
television channel. The brewing scandal has quickly become a  
centerpiece of a debate over U.S. interference in the internal affairs  
of the country as it prepares to vote on the re-election referendum in  
February.

Visibly surprised by Carvajalino's presence, the four individuals  
included three members of opposition parties: Jorge Borges a leader of  
Primero Justicia; Luis Planas, Secretary General of the Christian  
Democratic Party (COPEI); and Emilio Barboza, President of Un Nuevo  
Tiempo. The fourth was Alberto Federico Ravell, the director of  
Globovisión, a more strident local version of Fox News in Venezuela.  
Globovisión's editorial line and 24-hour programming are vehemently  
opposed to the Chávez government.

Ravell refused to give responses to Carvajalino's questions and then  
proceeded to verbally spar with the young reporter who repeatedly  
asked about the purpose of the trip to Puerto Rico. When Carvajalino  
labeled Ravell a “palangrista” (a journalist who receives bribes in  
exchange for published materials), the media mogul exploded and  
started yelling obscenities at the reporter, threatening him  
physically and reportedly blurting out homophobic comments. While this  
exchange unfolded, the other three leading figures of the Venezuelan  
opposition remained largely silent; one opted to take pictures with  
his cellular phones.

During the VTV interview that broke the story, Carvajalino produced an  
email allegedly from Ravell to Borges, Plana, Barboza, and another  
opposition leader, Henry Ramos Allup from the Acción Democrática (AD)  
party, who did not accompany the others on the trip. The email  
supposedly shows the meeting had been in the works for some time and  
was originally planned for Miami; though, it was subsequently moved to  
Puerto Rico. Carvajalino has not disclosed how he obtained the email  
and its authenticity remains a mystery.

Patrick Caulfield, the leading diplomat at the U.S. embassy in Caracas  
had left for Puerto Rico a few days earlier. An embassy spokesperson  
has confirmed that the Caulfield traveled to Puerto Rico, but insists  
that he was there on unofficial business to attend a wedding and take  
a few days of vacation.

According to Carvajalino, Ravell's email states “our friend from the  
embassy will leave one day earlier.” It also makes reference to a  
group of “advisors who have been working very hard these last few  
days" and “will outline a strategic campaign with ideas about TV  
commercials, events and speeches.” The email further states that they  
have “bounced ideas with major league advisors in the United States …  
everything is ready to confront this reform.” Finally, Ravell brings  
up the $3 million needed to pay for the campaign's costs, “which will  
have to be shared by all.”

On Sunday, the mainstream print media paid scant attention to the  
incident. This all changed, when Chávez on his first broadcast of Aló  
Presidente for 2009, his regular Sunday show, decided to retransmit  
the Ávila TV broadcast on cadena nacional, a nationwide transmission  
that all government-licensed media must carry.

The next day, Minister of Communication Jesse Chacón held a press  
conference in which he confirmed the existence of Ravell's email and  
said the government is collecting further information to ascertain if  
US government officials have illegally intervened in the internal  
affairs of Venezuelan.

The United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) has called on the  
Minister of Foreign Relations to also investigate the matter. Jorge  
Rodríguez, the PSUV Mayor of the Libertador district of Caracas has  
insisted that Globovisión should register with the National Electoral  
Commission as an opposition party.

Ravell has acknowledged the trip to Puerto Rico, but he insists the  
purpose of the trip was to meet with Chileans leaders, who had helped  
defeat Pinochet in a national referendum—a rather transparent effort  
to cast Chávez as a dictator.

William Echeverría, president of the National Association of  
Journalists, who has an early morning show on Globovisión, condemned  
the young reporter's aggressive tactics and language, claiming that it  
unduly incites passions. And Yon Goicoechea, a former “student leader”  
and recipient of the right-wing Cato Institute's Milton Friedman award  
for freedom who now serves as an advisor to Primero Justicia, also  
came to Ravell’s defense.

Beyond the fact that Ravell, Borges, Barboza, and Planas all traveled  
together to Puerto Rico, little more has been confirmed at this point.  
However, if the allegations are proven, then the opposition will once  
again find itself on the defensive, trying to disprove that their  
funding and strategy are not "Made in U.S.A." Even just the  
possibility of the charges being true is likely to stoke the fires of  
the referendum battle, which already promises to be one of the most  
heated elections in Venezuelan history.

The alleged US government link to the Puerto Rico meeting is  
particularly sensitive given Washington's past financial support to  
the Venezuelan opposition through the National Endowment for Democracy  
and other analogous institutions. Domestically, the Puerto Rico  
meeting undermines efforts by Un Nuevo Tiempo and Primero Justicia,  
parties to distance themselves from the policies of AD and COPEI,  
which governed Venezuela from 1958 through 1998. Finally, the meeting  
is one more bit of evidence that corroborates allegations by the PSUV  
and other leftist forces that the commercial mainstream media in  
Venezuela—especially Globovisión—are simply an extension of the  
opposition.


Miguel Tinker Salas is a professor of History and Latin American  
studies at Pomona College in Claremont, California. He is co-author of  
Venezuela: Hugo Chavez and the Decline of an Exceptional Democracy and  
author of Under the Shadow of the Eagles. His new book, The Enduring  
Legacy, Oil, Culture and Society in Venezuela will be published by  
Duke University press in the spring. Born in Venezuela, he holds  
Venezuelan and US citizenship.