Hopefully Chavez will fail but I would prefer to read it in a newspaper
that was not owned and staffed by media mogul Conrad Black.

G

"Captain Compassion" <daranc@NOSPAMcharter.net> wrote in message
news:somec3tjs94tnqnajffgfr7h7dnfd0ro9f@4ax.com...

Hugo Chavez to make himself president for life
By Jeremy McDermott, Latin America Correspondent
Last Updated: 1:49am BST 17/08/2007
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/08/17/wchavez117.xml

The Venezuelan strongman Hugo Chavez has anointed himself president
for life by proposing sweeping changes to the country's constitution.

Setting out his plans for completing his socialist revolution in the
oil-rich Latin American nation, he proposing radical constitutional
reform which has at its centre indefinite re-election for himself.

'We have broken the chains of capitalism'

In a rambling televised speech reminiscent of his close ally and
friend Fidel Castro, Mr Chavez told the national assembly of 33
changes he plans to make to the constitution he introduced in 1999
which will cement his grip on power.

"We have broken the chains of the old, exploitative capitalist
system," said Mr Chavez. "The state now has the obligation to build
the model of a socialist economy."

The proposals will be debated by the 167-seat assembly, which is
unlikely to be particularly heated or drawn out as it is 100 per cent
"Chavista" after the opposition boycotted the 2005 elections. Once the
assembly has rubber stamped the proposals, they will be put to a
referendum.

Mr Chavez is unlikely to struggle in is bid to win the referendum as
he has spent millions of dollars in oil revenue in enlarging his power
base by bolstering the ranks of state employees and introducing cheap
imported goods into shops.

While the president was talking about "the death of capitalism" in
Venezuela, the opposition were lamenting what they called the death of
democracy.

"The president just tells lies," said Manuel Rosales, the opposition
leader defeated in last year's presidential elections. "All he wants
to do is turn himself into president for life."

In the new constitution Mr Chavez, 54, scraps the maximum presidential
incumbency of two six-year terms, to instead permit seven-year terms
with indefinite re-election.

"There are many lies circulating in the world, about a dictatorship in
Venezuela, about a concentration of power in Venezuela," the president
said, insisting that the new constitution realised "a transfer of
power to the people".

Part of the "transfer of power" will divide Venezuela into federal
districts, with power lying in the hands of "communal councils" allied
with "worker co-operatives".

The opposition believes that mayors and governors will become impotent
as central government will channel funding only to its appointed
loyalists in federal positions.

A key strut of the new constitution will be a six-hour working day,
which will hit Venezuela's already wobbly private sector, battered by
expropriations, nationalisations, price fixing and currency controls -
which have already affected British investment in the country.

The changes will make Venezuela yet more dependent on its oil sector,
which thanks to high oil prices and some of the largest reserves
outside the Middle East, ensures Mr Chavez is awash with
"petrodollars".

The armed forces, which have already adopted the salute "Fatherland,
socialism or death", will have their mission enshrined as being
"patriotic and anti-imperialist" in their defence of Venezuela against
the United States, which considers Mr Chavez a threat to its influence
in the region.

As Mr Chavez's speech drew to a close he said: "I doubt there is any
country on this planet with a democracy more alive than the one we
enjoy in Venezuela today."


--
The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority but to
escape finding oneself in the ranks of the insane. -- Marcus Aurelius

Wherever I go it will be well with me, for it was well with me here, not
on account of the place, but of my judgments which I shall carry away
with me, for no one can deprive me of these; on the contrary, they alone
are my property, and cannot be taken away, and to possess them suffices
me wherever I am or whatever I do. -- EPICTETUS

Joseph R. Darancette
daranc@NOSPAMcharter.net