Monthly Archives: August 2010

Aug
23
2010
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Chávez Expropriates Fourth-Largest National Insurance Company

August 21

Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez continued his expropriation spree this week, announcing the expropriation of Seguros La Previsora, the fourth-largest insurance company in the country. The private company, which has been serving Venezuelans for 95 years, was taken over by the government and has been under investigation since December 2009 for alleged “irregularities.”

Chávez signed the expropriation petition against Seguros La Previsora Wednesday. In a press release, the Ministry of Communications characterized the company as “part of the rotten networks of fugitive bankers.”  Seguros La Previsora is owned by Pedro Torres Ciliberto, the main stakeholder in three banks which have been taken over by the Chávez government. The banker, whose whereabouts are unknown, faces a warrant for his arrest

 
Aug
23
2010
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Venezuela, more deadly than Iraq, wonders why

This article was originally posted by The New York Times.

Some here joke that they might be safer if they lived in Baghdad. The numbers bear them out.

In Iraq, a country with about the same population as Venezuela, there were 4,644 civilian deaths from violence in 2009, according to Iraq Body Count; in Venezuela that year, the number of murders climbed above 16,000.

Even Mexico’s infamous drug war has claimed fewer lives.

Venezuelans have absorbed such grim statistics for years. Those with means have hidden their homes behind walls and hired foreign security experts to advise them on how to avoid kidnappings and killings. And rich and poor alike have resigned themselves to living with a murder rate that the opposition says remains low on the list of the government’s priorities.

Then a front-page photograph in a leading independent newspaper — and the government’s reaction — shocked the nation, and rekindled public debate over violent crime.

The photo in the paper, El Nacional, is unquestionably gory. It shows a dozen homicide victims strewn about the city’s largest morgue, just a sample of an unusually anarchic two-day stretch in this already perilous place.

While many Venezuelans saw the picture as a sober reminder of their vulnerability and a chance to effect change, the government took a different stand.

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Aug
23
2010
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editor
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Venezuela holds mock vote ahead of elections

This article was originally posted by The Associated Press

Venezuela’s elections council has held a mock ballot to test the country’s electronic voting system ahead of legislative elections next month.

Authorities say they did not immediately detect any problems during the simulated vote Sunday using more than 4,000 touch-screen voting machines and biometric identification devices planned for the Sept. 26 election.

Some foes of President Hugo Chavez’s government have expressed concerns the system is susceptible to rigging, but most opposition parties have not raised questions. Election authorities deny tampering is a threat to the system.

Chavez’s allies have an unbeatable majority in the unicameral assembly because most opposition parties boycotted the last legislative elections in 2005.