5 myths about the Venezuela crisis

[RobertEarl]

1. Maduro speaks

MADURO: That’s an excellent question, because indeed the opposition… there’s been a debate, and different positions. At first majority of the opposition is part of the mood, the democratic group, and through electoral means they have tried to change the government. They have participated in elections, they have deputies, the opposition have 40% of the deputies of the assembly. They have governors, they have majors, they have participated in all presidential campaigns of the last years with the single presidential candidate, with all the forces of the opposition behind and they have tried through democratic means to present their programme to the country. However, the opposition participated in the coup attempt against Hugo Chavez in 2002 in April. They attempted another coup d’état in December 2002, 2003, they attempted a similar action like today to provoke violence for another coup d’état in 2004. They tried to get rid of that past, of that record, but I say today you should know in the US and your audience of this prestigious show that those who have started this violence plan is a minority, is a tiny group belonging to the opposition, and they are put the rest of the opposition in a dire situation, and this is a criticism I made publically, and do not say they are in agreement with these attacks. In the US for instance, just give me an example, the case of the US, a political group, they call to offer President Obama, and then they have a road map and say “this day we’re going to do this and this to get rid of Obama, we’re going to the White House this day for President Obama to go”. What would the US do if a tiny group would say they’re going to generate a revolution or a revolt to change the constitutional government of the US? I guess the state will react, will then resort to the tools to restore order and peace and to intact (?) those who are against the constitution, and that’s exactly what happened in this country over the last weeks.
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MADURO: I think that we need is cooperation. Cooperation. Venezuelans have a long history. So we are able to listen to each other, to talk to each other. From here were born the liberators of the region, and they said before and after that process we have a culture of political action. We are not in despair. That’s the image broadcast to abroad. To try to hit morally a revolution that we are conducting in favour of the poor, of the workers, of the disenfranchised, a revolution that has given public education, free education, good at all levels. You can go to the streets and you find children in the free schools, universities, young people they don’t have to ask for loans to go to the universities to study engineering, law, etc. a revolution that gave back the right to health to the people, to the poor, to the humble, a revolution that has special plans, and guarantees food to all the people so Venezuela is not in despair situation as some people try to portray and sell to abroad. We have problems, as any other country. We have economic problems of course we have. Do you have problems in the US? Do you have problems in the US? You have a huge debt, a colossal debt, as never, ever before. How come you have a huge fiscal deficit, you have increased in poverty in the US, an awful figure of poverty in the U.S. You had a very good level of life and now you have people in the streets without their houses. You have problems in the U.S. All countries have problems, social problems, economic problems, challenges. Venezuela has its own problems, but the problems that we don’t have are the problems of poverty… and culture that we had in the past and have been solved thanks to the effort that we have made over the last year
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MADURO: That is correct. And we have denounced this. Capitalism works in this manner. In Venezuela we are overcoming a capitalism that is dependent solely on rent, and that was very harmful for the exchange rate. I can give you a list. Very soon we are going to publish the list of the owner of companies, capitalists, that stole the money, the dollars, to, that we gave them to meet the needs, and they took the dollars and took it to the US. They have big mansions in the US. And we denounce that. They consider themselves political people, prisoners, etc. But I can tell you this, as a framework of question, because you are overwhelmed by information and you are in anguish with so much information. I can tell you this. over the last years, Venezuela has had... over the last 15 years, a process of expansion. We went from a GDP of 90 billion dollars to a GDP of 400 billion dollars, including last year. We were the target of economic war, because the right-wing sectors in Venezuela they thought that since President Chavez had died is was the end of the revolution. They started an operation to destroy our economy. And we have maintained even last year a programme of growth, of protection, Venezuela has…
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MADURO: I can tell you something very simple. Go to the streets, talk to the workers… Our children have public and free education guaranteed. In the United States, did you have a public education for the children or the youth in the US? No. Our people have public health guaranteed free of charge. Did you have that in the US? Our people have the higher minimum wage in the whole of Latino America. Our people have housing through a special process. Guaranteed housing we have given, and as soon as I finish this conversation we’re going to a special show of a Venezuelan housing programme. We’re going to deliver 600,000 housing to people. There are going to be 3 million housing units to solve the deficit. Of the 180 million dollars that we have received over the last decades, we have invested 65% of the oil rent in education, housing, food, culture. It’s another (inaudible). That’s what I told you when we started. Try to understand in the US. Try to understand a little bit that here we are building a different social economic model, different from yours. Try to open your mind to the dialogue of culture, of civilization. Try to understand what we are doing here is different.

Read more: http://amanpour.blogs.cnn.com/2014/03/07/full-transcript-nicolas-maduro/