Forwarded from Michael Lebowitz (Venezuela report)
Louis Proyect <lnp3 <at> panix.com>
2003-12-01 00:52:12 GMT
My days as an international observer in Venezuela-- my 7th note (I think)
from the front. (Some of these have been picked up on
www.venezuelanalysis.com, an invaluable source of information about what is
happening.)
After unofficially observing part of the first day's signature campaign to
recall Hugo Chavez, on Saturday I joined about 50 others in a group of
official observers. Our group (which includes Italian and Spanish
politicians, European journalists, Latin American activists and
legislators) is hustled into a bus and several vans, and we go off on a
mystery trip to locations selected by the National Electoral Commission.
After about an hour's ride, we were disgorged somewhere in the state of
Vargas. As we approached the signature table (located in a barrio) , we
were cheered and chanted at by about 20 Chavists (many redshirted) to the
right of the tables. To the left of the tables, there were around 50 happy,
singing people accompanied by loud music coming from a nearby bar. It was a
bit like a party. Even though language-challenged, it soon became clear to
me from the 'yo no soy chavista' sung by this 2nd group that the
positioning around the table was no accident. At the tables themselves,
though, only two of the tables were occupied by someone who wanted to sign,
and there was no queue. One of military men there to protect the process
indicated that it was a bit busier there yesterday but not much more so. As
we left, the crowd of anti-chavists dissipated.
At our second location in Vargas, we saw people come to the tables with a
narrow strip of paper filled out on one side. After they signed the forms,
the opposition person taking signatures signed the other side of the paper.
This was a frequent pattern--- except that older people coming to the
tables did not bring a slip. (One might speculate that this latter group
did not need to bring proof to their employers that they had signed). There
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