N***@blythe.org
2007-05-29 19:52:01 UTC
Venezuela: Cartoon Coup d'Etat
Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit
Dissident Voice - May 28, 2007
http://www.dissidentvoice.org/2007/05/cartoon-coup-d%E2%80%99etat/
Cartoon Coup DâEtat
by Paul Haste
âThe Presidential Palace is in our hands; why donât you show that?â
Chávezâs supporters shouted to the journalists⊠instead, RCTV was
broadcasting Looney Tunes cartoons.
Venezuela takes an important step towards democratizing its media on 28
May when a billion dollar media corporation loses its television
broadcast license to âthose who almost never have a voice,â in
President Hugo Chávezâs words.
Radio Caracas Television â RCTV â and its multi-millionaire owner,
Marcel Granier, who are about to lose their unceasing political war
against Chávez and Venezuelaâs BolÃvarian revolution, are claiming that
âindependent media are being closed down,â that Chávez is a dictator
intent on ârestricting freedom of expression and democratic rights.â
Reporters without Borders declares that RCTV losing its license is âa
serious attack on editorial pluralismâ, while editorials in US
newspapers have predictably misrepresented the controversy, claiming
Chávez is retaliating against his critics in the opposition media who
âdisagreeâ with the BolÃvarian revolution.
The reality is rather different. As Reporters without Borders doesnât
mention, perhaps understandably so, given its financing by the US State
Departmentâs National Endowment for Democracy â which also finances
rightist opposition political parties in Venezuela â RCTV was an active
participant in the violent coup dâetat that deposed President Chávez
for almost 48 hours in 2002.
On the day of the coup, RCTV abandoned all pretense to report news
impartially, calling opposition supporters to illegally demonstrate at
the Miraflores Presidential Palace in Caracas while showing the
constant on screen message âNi un paso atrasâ: âNot one step back.â
It deliberately showed film from one angle to falsely claim that Chávez
supporters were firing on opposition demonstrators, when another camera
angle would have shown that Chávez supporters were defending themselves
from sniper attacks â no opposition demonstrators were in sight. The
constant repeated broadcasting of this film was then used as
justification for some military officers to declare their
âdisobedienceâ to the president, and these declarations were faithfully
broadcast to attempt to legitimize a military takeover.
The American editorial writers who fail to mention all this, also fail
to comment on the Venezuelan mediaâs support for the subsequent fascist
junta that took control in Caracas and proceeded to dismiss the entire
Supreme Court and the Congress, suspend the constitution, arrest the
democratically elected president and then sent armed police onto the
streets to suppress any resistance.
A junta member, Admiral Victor RamÃrez Pérez, thanked journalists on
live TV the day after the coup, saying that the organizers âhad a
weapon â the media â let me congratulate you,â and the businessman the
junta chose to be âpresidentâ, Pedro Carmona, summoned media executives
to Miraflores to ensure that opposition to the coup was not reported.
RCTVâs boss, Granier, denied he ever met Carmona during the coup,
despite film showing his presence at Miraflores, and while Granier
still refers to the junta leader as âPresident Carmonaâ, RCTVâs
subsequent actions demonstrated that no instructions were necessary to
keep it on message.
As Venezuelans took to the streets to demand the return of President
Chávez, fighting the police and demonstrating at Miraflores in their
thousands against the coup, RCTV, contrary to the constant coverage it
awarded the opposition demonstration that led to the coup,
intentionally blacked out this breaking news, and as RCTV production
manager at the time, Andrés Izarra, later related, Granier himself
ordered journalists ânot to broadcast information on Chávez, his
supporters or anyone connected to him.â
The Chávez demonstrators coming down from the poor shanty towns on the
mountains above Caracas encouraged soldiers loyal to the president to
take back Miraflores and arrest the junta. Helicopters were sent to the
Caribbean island where the president had been kept prisoner, and barely
48 hours after the right had attempted to take Venezuela back to the
military dictatorship of the Fifties, the coup had failed and Chávez
had returned to an ecstatic welcome.
However, none of the resistance to the coup, the juntaâs arrest or
Chavezâs return could be seen on television screens. Amid the coupâs
complete collapse, and on probably the most dramatic day in Venezuelaâs
recent history, RCTV was showing Warner Bros. Looney Tunes cartoons.
Other opposition media followed its lead. No rightist newspapers were
printed or distributed the following day, but the leftist Ãltimas
Noticias in Caracas told Venezuela what had happened, and the Chávista
Panorama newspaper published four editions in 20 hours as its
journalists reported on the coupâs stunning defeat.
It is not difficult to imagine that had CNN or the New York Times acted
in the United States as RCTV had done in Venezuela, their executives
would now be in Guantánamo, but President Chávez responded with
restraint, imploring the media to think about the fascist nature of the
junta it had supported: âReflect a little, for Godâs sake! Itâs your
country too!â
No journalists or media executives were jailed or persecuted after the
coup, and once the opposition dominated Supreme Court declared that, in
their opinion, âno coup had taken place,â Pedro Carmona and other
putchists were released, and the right once again went on the offensive
against Chávezâs BolÃvarian revolution.
Marcel Granierâs RCTV had abandoned any pretense at professional
journalism, concerning itself with the political impact of its
propagandistic ânewsâ broadcasts, rather than adhering to anything that
resembled journalistic ethics. In all, five private television
stations, reaching 90% of Venezuelaâs viewers, and nine of the ten
national newspapers, support the opposition.
Despite US newspaper editorialists claiming that the state is
restricting criticism of President Chávez, it is clear to anyone who
reads these newspapers or watches Venezuela TV, that the vast majority
are implacably hostile to the revolution and critical of the president.
There is no censorship, as there is in US client states such as Saudi
Arabia, and journalists are not intimidated or assassinated as in
México and Colombia.
US President Bushâs recent inaccurate claim that Venezuela has
ârepressive lawsâ that âseverely restrict the liberty of the press,â
hardly stands up to scrutiny, especially when, as Venezuelan
Vice-President Jorge RodrÃquez pointed out, âthe only television
channel closed down for political reasons during this BolÃvarian
administration was the pro-Chávez Canal 8 in 2002. It was taken off the
air on the first night of the coup by Pedro Carmonaâs fascist junta.â
The disproportionate criticisms have more to do with Chávezâs challenge
to the unaccountable elite that clearly limits âeditorial pluralismâ by
using its ownership and control of the media to present its own
privileged interests as those of all Venezuelans. Accustomed to
operating their lucrative commercial television channels for decades
without democratic oversight, this elite has come to believe this
privileged position is their âright.â
Chávez has pointed out that broadcasting licenses are concessions, and
are not granted in perpetuity. In fact, Venezuelan law and the
BolÃvarian Constitution confer certain responsibilities, such as
ensuring the public receives âtrue and accurate information,â on the
media corporations that are granted these concessions, as does the
respective media laws in the United States and most other countries.
RCTVâs concession to broadcast on Venezuelaâs terrestrial Canal 2
frequency expires on 28 May. The government has decided not to renew
RCTVâs concession, citing, among other crimes such as not paying taxes,
the stationâs failure to provide âtrue and accurate informationâ during
the 2002 coup, when its executives intentionally refused to report
breaking news and critical information to the public and imposed its
âcartoon blackout.â
âThis decision is an irreversible fact,â William Lara, Venezuelaâs
Communications and Information Minister declared, âthe Constitutional,
legal and regulatory basis for the decision is solidly
incontrovertible.â For the first time in Venezuela, the privileged
media elite has come up against a government that cannot be bought,
bribed or intimidated.
Moreover, the BolÃvarian revolutionâs originality doesnât stop with
challenging elite interests. A new television service, Televisora
Venezolana Social (Venezuelan Social TV or TEVES), will take over the
Canal 2 frequency, Chávez has announced. It will be run by an
independent foundation and have independent, community and alternative
programming and participation, promoting Venezuelan film and program
production.
Although the new TEVES station will initially receive government
financing, which the British state financed BBC rather ironically
claimed âmight affect its independenceâ, it will not be required to
broadcast government programmes such as Chávezâs ¡Alo, Presidente!, and
it will be able to take commercial advertising to eventually allow it
to be self financing.
Corporate media in almost all countries is often unresponsive,
unaccountable and inaccessible, permitting virtually no popular
participation in film production and programming. Venezuelaâs attempt
to start to democratize the broadcast media has been met with
predictable criticism from that corporate media, who continue to insist
that a tiny, wealthy elite â and not a democratic government elected
time and time again with a massive popular vote â should have the right
to control what is seen and heard on the airwaves.
As for Granier and RCTV, some in the opposition believe it is no loss
to have the station lose its license. âRCTV wasnât even good at
propaganda,â wrote one anti-Chávez columnist citing Chávezâs return
after the coup and massive election win in 2006, âthe point of giving
up journalism is to increase the political effectiveness of what is
broadcast, and on that score RCTV has certifiably failed.â
But all is not lost for the anti-Chávez opposition â RCTV can still
broadcast on cable and satellite, and should there be news it doesnât
like, it will be free to black it out with as many Looney Tunes
cartoons as it likes.
Sources
La no renovación de la concesión a RCTV es irreversible, |Agancia
BolÃvariana de Noticias report in Aporrea.org, Caracas, 2 de enero de
2007
Bush critica restricciones a la libertad de expressión, headline report
in El Nacional, Caracas, 4 de mayo de 2007
Publicados en Gaceta Oficial estatutos de Televisora Venezolana Social,
Radio Nacional de Venezuela report, Caracas, 15 de mayo de 2007
El periodismo de Venezuela en 2002, Eleazar DÃaz Rangel, Ãltimas
Noticias report in BBC Mundo, Caracas, 4 de abril de 2007
Venezuela, National Endowment for Democracy report at grants/Venezuela,
United States, 2005
RCTV: Censorship or broadcaster responsibility, PR Watch report, Center
for Media and Democracy, United States, 19 January 2007
Not about free speech, George Ciccariello, Caracas report in
Counterpunch, United States, 12 January 2007
The 47 hour coup that changed everything, Gregory Wilpert, Venezuela
Analisis, United States, 13 April 2007
Chávez/RCTV: ¿censura o decisión legÃtima? Salim Lamrani, Progreso,
United States, 7 February 2007
¿Una revancha polÃtica? article in El Espectador, Bogotá, 13 de mayo de
2007
Hugo Chávez, the media, and everybody else, Nicki Mokhtari and Larry
Birns, Council on Hemispheric Affairs report, United States, 19 January
2007
US papers hail Venezuelan coup as pro-democracy move, report in
Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting (FAIR), United States, 18 April 2002
Lara: Granier patea los derechos de los usarios, Prensa Ministro de
Comunicación e Información statement on Aporrea.org, Caracas, 6 de
enero de 2007
Media accused in failed coup, David Adams and Phil Gunson, St.
Petersburg Times, United States, 18 April 2002
Las perlas de un fascista mediático, Lubriorama Stereo film, director:
Luigino Bracci Roa, Venezuela, released: May 2007
Venezuela investiga el âCarmonazo,â Carlos Chirinos, BBC Mundo,
Caracas, 5 de octubre de 2004
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, Bórd Scannán na hÃireann film,
directors: Bartley and OâBriain, Eire, released: September 2003
Venezuelaâs press power, Maurice Lemoine, Le Monde Diplomatique, ParÃs,
August 2002.
[Paul Haste is a union organizer from London who is currently living in
Bogotá to improve his Spanish. He can be reached at
***@hotmail.com ]
*
================================================================
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Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us
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Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit
Dissident Voice - May 28, 2007
http://www.dissidentvoice.org/2007/05/cartoon-coup-d%E2%80%99etat/
Cartoon Coup DâEtat
by Paul Haste
âThe Presidential Palace is in our hands; why donât you show that?â
Chávezâs supporters shouted to the journalists⊠instead, RCTV was
broadcasting Looney Tunes cartoons.
Venezuela takes an important step towards democratizing its media on 28
May when a billion dollar media corporation loses its television
broadcast license to âthose who almost never have a voice,â in
President Hugo Chávezâs words.
Radio Caracas Television â RCTV â and its multi-millionaire owner,
Marcel Granier, who are about to lose their unceasing political war
against Chávez and Venezuelaâs BolÃvarian revolution, are claiming that
âindependent media are being closed down,â that Chávez is a dictator
intent on ârestricting freedom of expression and democratic rights.â
Reporters without Borders declares that RCTV losing its license is âa
serious attack on editorial pluralismâ, while editorials in US
newspapers have predictably misrepresented the controversy, claiming
Chávez is retaliating against his critics in the opposition media who
âdisagreeâ with the BolÃvarian revolution.
The reality is rather different. As Reporters without Borders doesnât
mention, perhaps understandably so, given its financing by the US State
Departmentâs National Endowment for Democracy â which also finances
rightist opposition political parties in Venezuela â RCTV was an active
participant in the violent coup dâetat that deposed President Chávez
for almost 48 hours in 2002.
On the day of the coup, RCTV abandoned all pretense to report news
impartially, calling opposition supporters to illegally demonstrate at
the Miraflores Presidential Palace in Caracas while showing the
constant on screen message âNi un paso atrasâ: âNot one step back.â
It deliberately showed film from one angle to falsely claim that Chávez
supporters were firing on opposition demonstrators, when another camera
angle would have shown that Chávez supporters were defending themselves
from sniper attacks â no opposition demonstrators were in sight. The
constant repeated broadcasting of this film was then used as
justification for some military officers to declare their
âdisobedienceâ to the president, and these declarations were faithfully
broadcast to attempt to legitimize a military takeover.
The American editorial writers who fail to mention all this, also fail
to comment on the Venezuelan mediaâs support for the subsequent fascist
junta that took control in Caracas and proceeded to dismiss the entire
Supreme Court and the Congress, suspend the constitution, arrest the
democratically elected president and then sent armed police onto the
streets to suppress any resistance.
A junta member, Admiral Victor RamÃrez Pérez, thanked journalists on
live TV the day after the coup, saying that the organizers âhad a
weapon â the media â let me congratulate you,â and the businessman the
junta chose to be âpresidentâ, Pedro Carmona, summoned media executives
to Miraflores to ensure that opposition to the coup was not reported.
RCTVâs boss, Granier, denied he ever met Carmona during the coup,
despite film showing his presence at Miraflores, and while Granier
still refers to the junta leader as âPresident Carmonaâ, RCTVâs
subsequent actions demonstrated that no instructions were necessary to
keep it on message.
As Venezuelans took to the streets to demand the return of President
Chávez, fighting the police and demonstrating at Miraflores in their
thousands against the coup, RCTV, contrary to the constant coverage it
awarded the opposition demonstration that led to the coup,
intentionally blacked out this breaking news, and as RCTV production
manager at the time, Andrés Izarra, later related, Granier himself
ordered journalists ânot to broadcast information on Chávez, his
supporters or anyone connected to him.â
The Chávez demonstrators coming down from the poor shanty towns on the
mountains above Caracas encouraged soldiers loyal to the president to
take back Miraflores and arrest the junta. Helicopters were sent to the
Caribbean island where the president had been kept prisoner, and barely
48 hours after the right had attempted to take Venezuela back to the
military dictatorship of the Fifties, the coup had failed and Chávez
had returned to an ecstatic welcome.
However, none of the resistance to the coup, the juntaâs arrest or
Chavezâs return could be seen on television screens. Amid the coupâs
complete collapse, and on probably the most dramatic day in Venezuelaâs
recent history, RCTV was showing Warner Bros. Looney Tunes cartoons.
Other opposition media followed its lead. No rightist newspapers were
printed or distributed the following day, but the leftist Ãltimas
Noticias in Caracas told Venezuela what had happened, and the Chávista
Panorama newspaper published four editions in 20 hours as its
journalists reported on the coupâs stunning defeat.
It is not difficult to imagine that had CNN or the New York Times acted
in the United States as RCTV had done in Venezuela, their executives
would now be in Guantánamo, but President Chávez responded with
restraint, imploring the media to think about the fascist nature of the
junta it had supported: âReflect a little, for Godâs sake! Itâs your
country too!â
No journalists or media executives were jailed or persecuted after the
coup, and once the opposition dominated Supreme Court declared that, in
their opinion, âno coup had taken place,â Pedro Carmona and other
putchists were released, and the right once again went on the offensive
against Chávezâs BolÃvarian revolution.
Marcel Granierâs RCTV had abandoned any pretense at professional
journalism, concerning itself with the political impact of its
propagandistic ânewsâ broadcasts, rather than adhering to anything that
resembled journalistic ethics. In all, five private television
stations, reaching 90% of Venezuelaâs viewers, and nine of the ten
national newspapers, support the opposition.
Despite US newspaper editorialists claiming that the state is
restricting criticism of President Chávez, it is clear to anyone who
reads these newspapers or watches Venezuela TV, that the vast majority
are implacably hostile to the revolution and critical of the president.
There is no censorship, as there is in US client states such as Saudi
Arabia, and journalists are not intimidated or assassinated as in
México and Colombia.
US President Bushâs recent inaccurate claim that Venezuela has
ârepressive lawsâ that âseverely restrict the liberty of the press,â
hardly stands up to scrutiny, especially when, as Venezuelan
Vice-President Jorge RodrÃquez pointed out, âthe only television
channel closed down for political reasons during this BolÃvarian
administration was the pro-Chávez Canal 8 in 2002. It was taken off the
air on the first night of the coup by Pedro Carmonaâs fascist junta.â
The disproportionate criticisms have more to do with Chávezâs challenge
to the unaccountable elite that clearly limits âeditorial pluralismâ by
using its ownership and control of the media to present its own
privileged interests as those of all Venezuelans. Accustomed to
operating their lucrative commercial television channels for decades
without democratic oversight, this elite has come to believe this
privileged position is their âright.â
Chávez has pointed out that broadcasting licenses are concessions, and
are not granted in perpetuity. In fact, Venezuelan law and the
BolÃvarian Constitution confer certain responsibilities, such as
ensuring the public receives âtrue and accurate information,â on the
media corporations that are granted these concessions, as does the
respective media laws in the United States and most other countries.
RCTVâs concession to broadcast on Venezuelaâs terrestrial Canal 2
frequency expires on 28 May. The government has decided not to renew
RCTVâs concession, citing, among other crimes such as not paying taxes,
the stationâs failure to provide âtrue and accurate informationâ during
the 2002 coup, when its executives intentionally refused to report
breaking news and critical information to the public and imposed its
âcartoon blackout.â
âThis decision is an irreversible fact,â William Lara, Venezuelaâs
Communications and Information Minister declared, âthe Constitutional,
legal and regulatory basis for the decision is solidly
incontrovertible.â For the first time in Venezuela, the privileged
media elite has come up against a government that cannot be bought,
bribed or intimidated.
Moreover, the BolÃvarian revolutionâs originality doesnât stop with
challenging elite interests. A new television service, Televisora
Venezolana Social (Venezuelan Social TV or TEVES), will take over the
Canal 2 frequency, Chávez has announced. It will be run by an
independent foundation and have independent, community and alternative
programming and participation, promoting Venezuelan film and program
production.
Although the new TEVES station will initially receive government
financing, which the British state financed BBC rather ironically
claimed âmight affect its independenceâ, it will not be required to
broadcast government programmes such as Chávezâs ¡Alo, Presidente!, and
it will be able to take commercial advertising to eventually allow it
to be self financing.
Corporate media in almost all countries is often unresponsive,
unaccountable and inaccessible, permitting virtually no popular
participation in film production and programming. Venezuelaâs attempt
to start to democratize the broadcast media has been met with
predictable criticism from that corporate media, who continue to insist
that a tiny, wealthy elite â and not a democratic government elected
time and time again with a massive popular vote â should have the right
to control what is seen and heard on the airwaves.
As for Granier and RCTV, some in the opposition believe it is no loss
to have the station lose its license. âRCTV wasnât even good at
propaganda,â wrote one anti-Chávez columnist citing Chávezâs return
after the coup and massive election win in 2006, âthe point of giving
up journalism is to increase the political effectiveness of what is
broadcast, and on that score RCTV has certifiably failed.â
But all is not lost for the anti-Chávez opposition â RCTV can still
broadcast on cable and satellite, and should there be news it doesnât
like, it will be free to black it out with as many Looney Tunes
cartoons as it likes.
Sources
La no renovación de la concesión a RCTV es irreversible, |Agancia
BolÃvariana de Noticias report in Aporrea.org, Caracas, 2 de enero de
2007
Bush critica restricciones a la libertad de expressión, headline report
in El Nacional, Caracas, 4 de mayo de 2007
Publicados en Gaceta Oficial estatutos de Televisora Venezolana Social,
Radio Nacional de Venezuela report, Caracas, 15 de mayo de 2007
El periodismo de Venezuela en 2002, Eleazar DÃaz Rangel, Ãltimas
Noticias report in BBC Mundo, Caracas, 4 de abril de 2007
Venezuela, National Endowment for Democracy report at grants/Venezuela,
United States, 2005
RCTV: Censorship or broadcaster responsibility, PR Watch report, Center
for Media and Democracy, United States, 19 January 2007
Not about free speech, George Ciccariello, Caracas report in
Counterpunch, United States, 12 January 2007
The 47 hour coup that changed everything, Gregory Wilpert, Venezuela
Analisis, United States, 13 April 2007
Chávez/RCTV: ¿censura o decisión legÃtima? Salim Lamrani, Progreso,
United States, 7 February 2007
¿Una revancha polÃtica? article in El Espectador, Bogotá, 13 de mayo de
2007
Hugo Chávez, the media, and everybody else, Nicki Mokhtari and Larry
Birns, Council on Hemispheric Affairs report, United States, 19 January
2007
US papers hail Venezuelan coup as pro-democracy move, report in
Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting (FAIR), United States, 18 April 2002
Lara: Granier patea los derechos de los usarios, Prensa Ministro de
Comunicación e Información statement on Aporrea.org, Caracas, 6 de
enero de 2007
Media accused in failed coup, David Adams and Phil Gunson, St.
Petersburg Times, United States, 18 April 2002
Las perlas de un fascista mediático, Lubriorama Stereo film, director:
Luigino Bracci Roa, Venezuela, released: May 2007
Venezuela investiga el âCarmonazo,â Carlos Chirinos, BBC Mundo,
Caracas, 5 de octubre de 2004
The Revolution Will Not Be Televised, Bórd Scannán na hÃireann film,
directors: Bartley and OâBriain, Eire, released: September 2003
Venezuelaâs press power, Maurice Lemoine, Le Monde Diplomatique, ParÃs,
August 2002.
[Paul Haste is a union organizer from London who is currently living in
Bogotá to improve his Spanish. He can be reached at
***@hotmail.com ]
*
================================================================
NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems
Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us
Search Archives: http://olm.blythe-systems.com/htdig/search.html
List Archives: http://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/
Subscribe: http://olm.blythe-systems.com/mailman/listinfo/nytr
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