Venezuela: a difficult new choice
On the night of 5 on 6, March, after a long illness, Hugo Chavez, the Venezuelan president, died. The military command of the country declared its loyalty to the vice-president N. Maduro and to the parliament. People called to remain calm.
Over the next few days, two presidential candidates were identified in Venezuela. The date of the election was also appointed: 14 April.
Nicolas Maduro, who, in anticipation of a quick death, appointed Comrade Chavez as his successor, will speak out against Enrique Capriles Radonsky, a representative of numerous opposition groups.
50-year-old Maduro is a former bus driver, a member of the Caracas public transport union and a strong supporter of Chávez, the “mouthpiece” of his ideas. Six years, Reuters agency reminds, he worked hard as minister of foreign affairs. Since October last year, Comrade Maduro - Vice President. “Look where our Nicholas is heading, because he once worked as a simple bus driver, how the bourgeoisie mocked him,” Hugo said about him.
Nicolas Maduro is very popular among many poor supporters of Chavez.
Enrique Capriles Radonsky is a relatively young candidate. He is forty years old. He is a law school graduate and governor of Miranda, the second largest state in Venezuela. Capriles became the youngest legislator in Venezuela (at the age of twenty-six), then managed to win the election of the mayor of the municipality of Caracas. In 2008, he became governor of Miranda.
At last year’s presidential election, Capriles acted as a candidate for the coalition of Democratic Unity, which consisted of more than two dozen parties and organizations. All these organizations and parties are the Venezuelan opposition. He lost by typing 44% votes.
The energetic governor is known among other things for his trips to the Venezuelan slums - on a motorcycle. During the election campaign, he visited hundreds of cities and villages, trying to create an image of a person concerned about the problems of ordinary citizens. Argued that Capriles purposely created the image of "under Chavez." During his campaigns, he even sent kisses and shook his fist in the "Chavez" style. According to Capriles himself, if he were the leader of Venezuela, he would have copied the Brazilian economic model of the “modern left wing”.
It is difficult to say who will win the election. Many analysts are inclined to think that Maduro will become president. This man promises to continue the social programs that Chavez has implemented (he implemented 27). During the years of Comrade Chavez’s rule, the unemployment rate in the country fell from 14,5% to 8,0%, and the proportion of the poorest population fell from 47,0% to 27,2%. Therefore, Maduro, as a continuer of the Chavez case, has a high chance of winning.
During the mourning days, Mr. Capriles behaved very restrained - unlike the top of the United States, who did not express condolences to the relatives and friends of Chavez and Venezuela. If “Furious” at one time spoke about Capriles rather expressively, if not to say harshly (even called his opponent unkindly “pig”), then the opponent of Chavez on these sad days I did not recall past disagreements: “President Hugo Chávez and I were opponents, but we were never enemies. I would like to express now respect for him and solidarity with all Venezuelans without exception. We understand the pain of the family of the late President and people throughout the country and express our condolences to them. We had differences, everyone knows about it, but now is not the time to talk about what separates us. ”
Smart move. Now is not the time. The time will come after April 14, more precisely, after the inauguration.
None of the analysts have any confidence that Maduro will follow the line of Chavez, and not his own. Many consider him a much more left-wing politician than the “Comandante”. Opposition members of the right flank generally call him “red”, “Bolshevik” and so on.
In addition, N. Maduro is clearly committed to conspiracy theories. In the last days of Chavez’s life, the vice-president spoke on government television to “expose” Enrique Capriles. The latter, as journalist William Neumann told the world "New York Times", leaned on Manhattan to his relatives.
“We have to watch him closely,” said the vice president. "I have all the data about exactly where he is in Manhattan, in New York ...", - Maduro said on TV. He said that Mr. Capriles owned an apartment on the East Side, on Eighty-fifth Street. There he stopped.
In response, Capriles said that every time he leaves Venezuela, the government tries to accuse him of conspiracy. The politician added that in New York he visited his sister and her family, who live on the East Side - on the same street that Comrade Maduro had called. Capriles also explained that he did not hold political meetings during the trip.
In the opinion of Comrade Maduro, Mr. Capriles was supposed to meet with Robert C. Jacobson, Assistant Secretary of State for the Affairs of the Western Hemisphere. However, Ms. Jacobson herself denied everything.
Maduro is also suspicious of the activities of the US military attaches. Recently, the country expelled two military attaches of the US embassy with the wording: "For participating in actions to destabilize the situation." Speech is coming about the staff of the American Embassy in Caracas David Del Monaco and Deblin Cosale.
According to Maduro, Del Monaco "has been engaged in contacting Venezuelan soldiers for several weeks in order to propose a plan to destabilize the country." At the same time, the vice-president warned: "We are following the trail of other elements."
Such suspicion probably has grounds, since the political relations between Venezuela and the United States, unlike the more or less strong economic ones (the United States buys 15% of oil in Venezuela), are clearly limping. However, Barack Obama, who did not express condolences over the death of “Furious”, but limited instead to regular statements about the coming democracy in Caracas, and the congressmen, who screamed joyfully: “Good riddance!”, Behaved defiantly. Wish they have a good relationship, they could behave more kindly and restrained. In the end, they consider themselves to be fighters for human rights, for humanism and world peace. Obama even won the Nobel Prize in 2009 year in this direction. So why not learn to behave peacefully and decently?
For Russia, it is very important that the policy of Chavez be continued. Therefore, it is important that Comrade Maduro take the presidency: after all, it was him who “appointed” Chavez.
After the death of Comandante, Vitaly Churkin, Russia's permanent representative to the UN call the premature demise of the tragedy commander for the whole world: “I believe that Hugo Chavez was the greatest political figure for his country, Latin America as a whole and for the whole world. And, of course, he played a very important role in the development of relations between Venezuela and Russia. Therefore, we especially grieve. ”
The wise comrade Churkin did not say in vain about the particular grief of the Russians. Later Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said: “We will respect the choice of the Venezuelan people, and we hope that it will be supported by all those who are building relations with Venezuela, and that there will be no attempts to influence this choice.” Comrade Lavrov also said: "According to our estimates (and this is confirmed by the blitz polls already conducted in Venezuela), the majority of the population - more than 60 with more than one percent - speaks in favor of continuing the policy launched by Hugo Chavez.
Capriles may refuse to supply contracts with Russia weapons. Rumor has it that he intends to buy a tractor instead of weapons.
According to the forecast of TSAMTO, in 2012-2015 years, Venezuela in the structure of Russian arms exports will come in second place after India with purchases of 3,2 billion dollars. how transmits Prime agency, the change of government in Venezuela can go according to a dramatic scenario and complicate the position of Russian companies operating there. So say experts interviewed by the agency.
“In authoritarian countries that have lost a leader, events usually develop depending on the presence of opposition. If it is not, as in Libya, the country is plunged into chaos. There is opposition in Venezuela, and it is quite competitive, as we saw after the October presidential election, ”said Konstantin Simonov, head of the National Energy Security Foundation. In his opinion, a military coup is not likely to occur, but the opposition can come to power.
Vladimir Sudarev, deputy director of the Institute of Latin American Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences, states: “Maduro is even more left-winged than Chavez, preaching“ socialism of the 21st century ”. If he comes to power, then no special movements should be expected. But both the opposition and those supporting Chávez are aggressive towards each other, a compromise is unlikely. ”
A fight between supporters of the anti-American position of Chávez and his opponents is very likely, the director-general of the National Energy Institute Sergey Justice is sure. "Our companies will have to feel all the vicissitudes of this struggle, the most terrible option of which could be a civil war," he said.
In addition, for good reason, Russia at the funeral of the Venezuelan president was represented by the head of Rosneft, Igor Sechin, the Minister of Industry and Trade Denis Manturov, and the general director of Russian Technologies, Sergey Chemezov.
Russia has something to lose in Venezuela, write Pavel Tarasenko and Ivan Safronov (Kommersant). The projects, which Moscow reached an agreement with Hugo, are estimated by experts in aggregate at least at $ 30 billion. But all of them were concluded with the personal participation of Chávez. Now this guarantor is not.
At the same time, analysts note that Capriles has, according to recent polls, a rating lower than that of Maduro, by 14 percentage points (36% versus 50%; interview sociological center "Hinterlaces"), and to play this big gap in the remaining time is difficult.
The Kremlin hopes for a stable relationship with Caracas, but the deputy head of the Russian-Venezuelan business council, Vladimir Semago, seems to doubt this. “After Chávez’s departure, the whole camouflage of the so-called friendship with Venezuela will go away,” he told Kommersant. “We didn’t have any real cooperation, but there were only attempts to convince the Russians that Moscow imperially entered the countries of Latin America, as it did in Africa during the Soviet era.” According to him, the creation of the Russian National Oil Consortium for the development of the Orinoco belt together with the Venezuelan PDVSA is a “big myth.” “The consortium still does not produce anything and does not produce anything. And on the Russian side, only two companies really remained - LUKoil and Rosneft.
And what about contracts for the supply of weapons and military equipment? During Hugo Chavez’s visit to Moscow in 2004, the first two major contracts were signed - for the supply of X-NUMX combat helicopters Mi-40, their service and personnel training (35 million dollars) and the purchase of 500 thousand AK-100 assault rifles (103 million . $). “The work was hard, but as soon as Chavez joined the talks, mutual understanding almost immediately arose,” a source close to Rosoboronexport told Kommersant. “And he took the most direct part in all subsequent arms deals.”
In 2011, again, Chavez himself managed to sign an agreement on the allocation of a loan of $ 4 billion by Russia for the purchase of Russian arms by Venezuela, which Moscow provided to Caracas to strengthen friendship. Again, Chavez acted as a guarantor.
Earlier, Director of the Center for Analysis of the World Arms Trade (TSAMTO) Igor Korotchenko expressed the opinion that Russia can forget not only about the planned contracts: “Moscow has already supplied Caracas with arms worth more than $ 3 billion. it Tanks T-72B1, BMP-3M, BTR-80A, Msta-S self-propelled howitzers, Su-30 fighters, Pechora-2M air defense systems. Now we may not see money for these deliveries. ”
And the expert of the Center for political conjuncture Dmitry Abzalov says the following: “The election of Maduro, who promised to keep the course of Chávez, remains ideal for Moscow. If Capriles comes to power, then the minimum program will be to preserve the agreements reached. In any case, these transactions will not be so easy to cancel, since they were not only signed by Chavez, but also approved by Parliament. In addition, Caracas is waiting for a budget deficit this year, so the authorities are unlikely to decide to cancel the previous contracts and urgently look for new partners for them. ”
Thus, to panic and build pessimistic scenarios about all Russian projects in Venezuela, probably not worth it. Maduro’s popularity is much higher than that of Capriles, and the supporter and conductor of Chavez’s ideas, elected by Chávez himself, is unlikely to curtail his programs and turn away from cooperation with Russia (especially when cooling political relations with the United States). Therefore, the most balanced is the assessment of the situation after the change of power in Venezuela, "Voice of Russia" expert in Latin America, former deputy editor-in-chief of Latin America magazine Mikhail Belyat.
According to him, if events go in line with the constitution, there will be no big changes. Russian oil contracts in Venezuela will remain intact - simply because they are mutually beneficial and designed to develop the Venezuelan economy. True, with the procurement of weapons the situation is more complicated. If the opposition comes to power, Venezuela is unlikely to buy weapons "with such intensity and on such a scale as the government of Hugo Chávez did."
Therefore, as notices Comrade Prokhanov, "Russia vigilantly and painfully follows the processes in Venezuela."
We are not afraid to make several predictions: in the event of a victory in the election of Comrade Maduro, the Russian contracts will be strictly implemented; oil cooperation will continue; Venezuela will buy not a tractor, but tanks and weapons, for the White House doesn’t expect good, and the wary Maduro understands this more acutely than others. The Bolivarian Revolution demands protection!
Observed and translated by Oleg Chuvakin
- especially for topwar.ru
- especially for topwar.ru
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