Venezuela Coverage

12-23-2002 ^Strike fault line divides Venezuelan capital into haves and have-nots< ^By ANDREW SELSKY= ^Associated Press Writer=    CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) _ Thousands of holiday shoppers throng the streets of working-class western Caracas, where a general strike designed to oust President Hugo Chavez seems a figment of the imagination.    Meanwhile, in well-to-do eastern Caracas, the work stoppage is very much real, with shops and restaurants closed, the sidewalks mostly devoid of pedestrians.    Entering its fourth week on Monday, the strike has cut a fault line through the center of the capital, creating two cities that look nothing alike and underscoring political divisions.    Western Caracas is a Chavez stronghold, and its bustling streets help explain why Chavez is certain the strike will fail. Merchants here gave up the strike within days after it began Dec. 2 _ if they heeded it at all.    Many shop managers and stree...

8-16-2004 ^Venezuelan president claims victory in recall referendum; opposition claims fraud< ^By ANDREW SELSKY= ^Associated Press Writer= ¶   CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) _ President Hugo Chavez survived a referendum to oust him, according to results Monday, and former U.S. President Jimmy Carter and other election observers urged the opposition to accept the vote, deflating claims of fraud. ¶   The victory stunned opposition figures who have fought for years to oust and will likely give Chavez an even broader mandate for his "revolution for the poor." Chavez is seen as a hero by Venezuela's majority poor but as an authoritarian by his critics, particularly among the wealthy. ¶   Though the opposition swiftly rejected the results, saying they were fraudulent, Carter and the head of the Organization of American States, who led observer teams, said the voting appeared clean. ¶   Carter said the partial results announced Monday morning by election officials showi...

8-19-2004 ^BC-Venezuela-Recall, 2nd Ld-Writethru,0604< ^U.S. firm embroiled in Venezuela referendum controversy defends its exit poll< ^By ANDREW SELSKY= ^Associated Press Writer=    CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) _ A U.S. pollster whose firm wrongly predicted President Hugo Chavez would lose a recall referendum on Thursday defended the exit poll, which has landed in the center of a national controversy.    The poll by Penn, Schoen & Berland Associates has become such a hot issue because the opposition, which spent more than a year mounting the drive to force Chavez from office, insists it shows the results from Sunday's referendum itself were fraudulent.    Former President Carter and the secretary general of the Organization of American States, Cesar Gaviria, both monitored the vote and endorsed the referendum results.    The exit poll, released 4 1/2 hours before voting stations closed, said 59 percent would vote Chavez out of offic...

11-20-2004 Venezuela's president vows to track down killers of top prosecutor< ^By ANDREW SELSKY= ^Associated Press Writer=    CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) _ President Hugo Chavez vowed to track down the killers of a state attorney whose death in a car bomb has shaken the oil-rich South American nation and renewed the specter of violence.    However he appeared to back away from a claim by his spokesman that "terrorists" training in Florida were responsible for the assassination of Danilo Anderson.    Anderson, known to many Venezuelans as the "super prosecutor," was preparing a case against nearly 400 people who backed Venezuela's 2002 coup. He was killed when two explosions ripped through his SUV as he drove through the capital around midnight Thursday.    "The attack against Danilo Anderson is an attack against all of us," Chavez said in a televised address to the nation late Friday, adding that it was also an attack on Venezuelans' dr...

11-21-2004 ^Political opposition in shambles in Venezuela as Chavez consolidates power< ^By ANDREW SELSKY= ^Associated Press Writer=    CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) _ Shoppers now crowd Venezuela's shopping malls, two years after they were padlocked during a national strike against President Hugo Chavez. The economy is robust once again. The mass demonstrations that paralyzed the capital are no more.    But underneath the veneer of normalcy in this oil-rich nation is deep frustration felt by Chavez's opponents after three efforts to unseat him failed: a coup, a national strike and a referendum. They are in disarray and unable to challenge a president they accuse of steering Venezuela into a Cuba-style dictatorship.    As Chavez moves to further centralize power and advance what he calls his revolution for the poor, the risk that extremists will turn to violence was underscored by the assassination Thursday of a state attorney who was intending to prose...