Watch this:
If you have no idea what Justin Timberlake is singing about, read on!
Venezuelan President Hugo Rafael Chavez Frias has died.
As the only Venezuelan on the Hewitt Times (and one of the only six in the school), I feel obligated to cover this monumental event.
If you decide to stick with me throughout this article, please be advised of two things: I do not ever celebrate someone’s death, this is a once-in-a-lifetime exception, and I am talking without any real expertise on this topic. I am no economist or historian, just a passionate Venezuelan.
Chavez was Venezuela’s President for 14 years (and he was set to hold the position for an additional six years), but, as the NY Times puts it, “in the end, [he was] an awful manager.”
For those of you unfamiliar with Venezuelan politics, Chavez was quite a character, to say the least. He doesn’t qualify as a dictator per se because, technically, he was elected democratically by his “people”–the Chavistas, who astoundingly make up over 50% of the population. You may be wondering, then, why he’s considered a dictator if he has the support of over half the country.
In order to get a large percentage of those votes, Chavez spent millions of Bolivares Fuertes to appeal to the lower classes. He created this new currency in order to devaluate his previous currency (the Bolivar), skyrocketing the already-high inflation in turn. Essentially, he bought his votes by giving away washers and driers and free apartments, among other things. In doing so, he deprived the country of basic needs–roads went unpaved, people became accustomed to power outages, and Venezuelans would be lucky to find sugar at one of the first three grocery stores they visit.
This kind of long-term activity has persistent influence, continuing to set back the country into debt despite the constant increase in oil price. Venezuelans could literally bathe in oil daily and still maintain an abundant supply for international export.
As a result of Chavez’s death, the government declared seven official days of mourning, including a three-day period of no school so that children, too, could lament this “loss.” It’s ironic, though, that when Carlos Andrés Pérez (a former, controversial Venezuelan president) died in 2010, Chavez decided that “There [would] be no national morning, because a corrupt dictator [had] died.”
So what happens next? On Thursday, government officials announced that Nicolas Maduro, a former bus driver who inexplicably rose to the position of Chavez’s vice president, will become president until an election is called. The constitution forbids an active vice president to become president; however, Venezuelans are so used to a fraudulent government that this didn’t come as much of a surprise.
Why should Americans care what happens next? Well, according to Ms. Gallin:
When there is such a huge gap between different demographic constituencies in a country so rich in human and natural resources, that’s a source of concern on economic, political, social, and moral levels. Right here in our own hemisphere, it seems that US interests are not being served by the Obama administration’s policies at this critical time in Venezuela. No clear position has been established, and that itself is a big mistake. Chavez’s death opens the door for new initiatives, but simply expelling Venezuelan diplomats in response to their policies is inadequate.
His legacy? A country that’s divided into two groups that hate each other, the disappearance of a middle class (former middle-classers are now members of the lower class), an increase in murders (by a factor of three), and the loss of 90% of the Bolivar’s value over a 14-year time period. Chavez had the possibility of utilizing the profits from our oil reserves to improve the country, but that didn’t happen. In fact, in 1999 (when Chavez took power), Venezuela was producing 3 million barrels of oil a day, and it was projected that by 2012 we would be producing 6 million barrels a day. Not only did the oil production not increase, it decreased! Venezuela is now producing a meager 2.2 million barrels of oil a day.
How does he still have followers? Chavez appealed to the lower classes. He also attracted a lot of attention. By controlling all but one of the national news channels, he was able to plaster his face on everyone’s televisions. He’s well known for having interrupted scheduled programing and appearing on long cadenas. During these improvised shows, every channel (even the non-governmental ones) was forced to keep the cameras on the President as he talked endlessly (four hours was short!) about anything except politics and how to fix the country. Chavez was a master at putting on an appealing show while distracting from his much more important, political performance. He often denounced the US and even went so far as to blame us for poisoning him with the cancer that led to his death. Other distractions included exhuming Simon Bolivar’s body to see if he was murdered and changing the official time in the country by half an hour so that Venezuela would have its own time zone.
What happens next? The opposition has chosen Henrique Capriles, the man who ran, and lost, against Chavez to be on the ballot in the upcoming elections. Maduro, the bus-driver-turned-vice-president-turned-president, will run on the ballot for the Chavistas, Chavez’s followers.
So, do I celebrate Chavez’s death? No, but I do celebrate the opportunity for my country to advance, to rid itself of the corruption that plagues it, and to, one day, be secure enough for me to move back with my family and friends.