Hugo Chávez and the private media

Guillermo Zuloaga Nuñez, CEO of private newschannel Globovisión, took an active part in the failed 2002 military coup d’état in Venezuela. He has endorsed the recent coup in Honduras, inciting in favour of a similar event in Venezuela.

On August 2, 2009, Reporters Without Borders (RWB) issued a statement denouncing the closure of “thirty four broadcast media at the government’s behest” in Venezuela. The Paris-based organization “vigorously condemns the massive closure of broadcast media” and asks: “Is it still possible to publicly express any criticism at all of President Hugo Chávez’s ‘Bolivarian’ government? This massive closure of mainly opposition media is dangerous for the future of democratic debate in Venezuela and is motivated by the government’s desire to silence dissent. It will only exacerbate social divisions.” [1]

RWB makes reference to the decision taken by the Venezuelan National Telecommunications Commission (Conatel) on August 1, 2009 to withdraw the broadcast licenses of thirty-four radio and television stations [2]. According to RWB, this decision is motivated only by the fact that these media outlets criticized the government of Hugo Chávez. In short, it was a political act intended to silence the opposition press. The vast majority of the Western media has repeated this interpretation. [3]

However this is not the situation and RWB and the media multinationals have carefully concealed the truth in order to mislead public opinion and present the most democratic government in Latin America (Hugo Chávez has faced 15 electoral processes since coming to power in 1998 and has emerged victorious in fourteen of these elections, all praised by the international community for their transparency) as a regime which seriously violates freedom of expression.

Indeed, in similar circumstances any country in the world would have made the same decision Conatel did. Several stations deliberately ignored a summons from the Commission designed to determine the status of their licenses and bring them up to date. After an investigation, Conatel discovered numerous irregularities, such as deceased licensees whose licenses were being used by third persons, non-renewal of the required administrative procedures, or simply the lack of authorization to broadcast. Venezuelan law, like that in the rest of the world, stipulates that a media outlet that fails to renew its concession within a specified time period or that broadcasts without authorization will lose its transmission frequency, which will then revert back to the public domain. Thus, thirty-four stations that were broadcasting illegally lost their licenses. [4]

In fact, the decision by Conatel, far from restricting freedom of expression, has put an end to an illegal situation and has initiated a policy of democratization of the Venezuelan radio spectrum with the goal of putting it at the disposal of the community. In reality, 80% of radio and television stations in Venezuela are privately owned, while only 9% of them are public and the rest belonging to associations or communities. Moreover, the majority of Venezuelan private media is concentrated in the hands of 32 families. [5]

Thus, RWB and the western media have totally distorted a routine measure taken by Conatel to put an end to an illegal situation.

RWB has chosen as its modus operandi a tooth-and-nail defense of the Venezuelan opposition, which was responsible for the April 2002 coup against Chávez, a coup that the Parisian organization endorsed immediately. In particular, RWB defends the coup-supporting channel Globovisión, which RWB considers the symbol of freedom of expression in Venezuela. [6]. However, RWB fails to point out that in addition to its active participation in the 2002 coup, Globovisión supported the sabotage of the Venezuelan oil industry that same year, launched a call for taxpayers not to pay their taxes, and called for insurrection and the assassination of President Chávez. [7]

Recently, Globovisión supported the junta behind the coup in Honduras that overthrew the democratically elected president Jose Manuel Zelaya, a coup unanimously condemned by the international community [8]. The owner of Globovisión, William Zuloaga Nuñez, recognized the illegal government of Micheletti, launching at the same time a call for a coup d’état in Venezuela: “The Micheletti government is following the constitution and we wish, we would love it if in Venezuela the constitution would be respected as it is being respected in Honduras." [9]

RWB does not defend freedom of expression in Venezuela. Rather it prefers to take the side of the enemies of democracy.