A Conversation with President Hugo

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M: First I would like to try to set the record straight. This is for a U.S. audience. I have spoken with almost all of the journalists who report for U.S. newspapers from Caracas, and they agreed that people in the United States have a distorted view of Venezuela -- they think it some sort of dictatorship, and has a repressive government.

Can you respond to this, and explain why you believe that Venezuela is a democracy?

H: Well we can try to measure democracy, just as you measure temperature with a thermometer, or pressure with a barometer. In light of everything that's happened here, is there a single journalist imprisoned here? In four years of government, can anyone point to an imprisoned or persecuted journalist? Has there been a single media outlet closed for even a second? Well, yes, there was Channel 8, the state television, during the coup that they carried out. We can measure whether there is real repression of the media or of speech...

...Democracy is also about representation -- from the parties, for example. You could ask how many political parties there are here. In a true dictatorship, you would have one party in the National Legislature, among state governors, city mayors. But if you look at Venezuela today, a coalition does have a simple majority in the National Assembly with about 52%, but the rest of the parties combined have about 48% of the seats -- all opposition parties voicing opposition opinions.

You could also measure the number of marches and protests against the government, and measure over days and months, and you would see a measurable tally of protests that were allowed to take place and they were not repressed. I believe that there are a lot of ways to conclude objectively that we are a democracy. We're not perfect, but we do have democracy.

I believe that our constitution is among the most advanced in the world in terms of its observance of human rights. It observes the principles of human rights in all the theoretical depth that implies [inaudible], and also attempts to sketch out the theory's implications in a pragmatic and socially just and relevant context. Indigenous rights are one example, but also women's rights, where we are trying to establish more gender equality and eliminate all unearned privileges -- economic, political or social privileges. On the point of indigenous rights, which you already mentioned, indigenous representatives are gathering as we speak in Puerto Ayacucho, where they are preparing a document that will outline mechanisms for implementing the rights outlined in the constitution. This involves demarcating the indigenous territories and restituting their constitutional rights.

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