US embassy cable - 04CARACAS945

C O N F I D E N T I A L  CARACAS 000945 
 
SIPDIS 
 
 
NSC FOR CBARTON 
USCINCSO ALSO FOR POLAD 
STATE PASS USAID FOR DCHA/OTI 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 03/17/2014 
TAGS: PGOV, ELAB, PHUM, VE 
SUBJECT: VENEZUELA ON THE VERGE OF A PURGE 
 
Classified By: Abelardo A. Arias, Political Counselor, for Reasons 1.4( 
b) and (d). 
 
------- 
Summary 
------- 
 
1. (C) The GOV appears to be engaged in a broad effort to 
ensure loyalty and punish opposition using the list of 
persons who signed the recall petition against President Hugo 
Chavez.  Since the beginning of March, reports have emerged 
of GOV offices and state enterprises using signature data 
from the National Electoral Council (CNE), accessible by 
internet, to vet employees, new hires, and beneficiaries of 
various government services such as identity cards.  Threats 
of dismissal against public employees are rife, though 
specific cases are difficult to confirm.  Labor 
representatives are protesting loudly but hold out little 
hope that the Attorney General and Human Rights Ombudsman 
will intervene.  The new push appears aimed at intimidating 
people into retracting their signatures, reinforce the GOV's 
theory of "megafraud," and, in the long run, cleanse the 
bureaucracy of those who do not support President Chavez's 
political agenda.  End summary. 
 
----------------------------------- 
The Threat Is Mightier Than the Pen 
----------------------------------- 
 
2. (C) President Hugo Chavez made clear in October 2003 that 
those who signed the opposition's petition to recall him 
would be remembered "for 100 generations" and would have to 
face the consequences of their actions.  Reports abounded 
during the November 28 - December 1 signature drive of 
threats against public sector workers who intended to sign. 
With the prospect of a signature appeals process on the 
horizon, during which people can retract their signatures, 
the GOV seems to be throwing out all the stops to force 
signers to recant.  Fifth Republic Movement (MVR) Deputy and 
member of the pro-GOV campaign committee Willian Lara 
reportedly urged party loyalists to "locate, counsel, 
convince, organize, and transport to appeals centers" at 
least 200,000 petition signers.  This so-called "Victory 
Plan" would be carried out by GOV vice ministers and other 
high-level officials on the national, state, and local level. 
 
 
3. (U) MVR Deputy Luis Tascon has posted the National 
Electoral Council's (CNE) signature data on his website, 
www.luistascon.com, purportedly for people to lodge fraud 
complaints against the opposition.  The website, however, has 
become a ready resource for Chavistas to check the loyalty of 
government workers and recipients of government benefits. 
Another source for the petition data is the pro-Chavez weekly 
tabloid "Temas." The newspaper has published supplements over 
the past four weeks containing the more than three million 
identity card numbers of persons who signed. 
 
-------------------- 
The Wages of Signing 
-------------------- 
 
4. (C) Poloff met on March 17 with a group of labor leaders 
of the Confederation of Workers of Venezuela (CTV) and 
Unapetrol, comprised of ex-PDVSA workers, to hear an array of 
complaints of threats and dismissals related to the 
presidential recall referendum signatures.  The labor 
representatives showed poloff a list of several hundred 
workers of the Guyana Corporation of Venezuela (CVG) that is 
reportedly being used by a new office in the state-run 
corporation charged with identifying petition signers.  CTV 
Executive Secretary Antonio Suarez told of a new hire at the 
Ministry of Education who was told she could not begin work 
until she went to the personnel office to file a complaint 
against the opposition for allegedly "stealing" her 
signature.  A hospital director in Falcon State reported that 
the GOV had circulated a list of health workers and their 
family members who had signed the petition.  The labor 
repreasentatives also linked the dismissal of some 17 
 
professionals of the Vargas State development corporation to 
the signing of the petition.  Workers unwilling to recant, 
they assert, have also been denied vacations, food stipends, 
and scholarships for their children as well.  A March 15 
press report also alleges that 200 Caracas Metro workers have 
been fired. 
 
5. (C) Unapetrol President Horacio Medina said threats had 
been renewed against PDVSA employees who signed.  PDVSA 
President Ali Rodriguez said during a press interview on 
March 15 it "could not be discounted" that a persecution 
campaign was underway in that state-owned oil company. 
Medina said a list at one PDVSA site in Caracas identifies 
employees who signed as "traitors to the nation."  Some 834 
active employees and 1,200 contractors have been identified. 
Medina said they knew of 34 employees who have gone to the 
Attorney General's office to complain.  The lists reportedly 
identify some 5,000 retired PDVSA workers, whose continued 
pension payments have been threatened, according to the labor 
representatives. 
 
6. (C) The harassment is not limited to the GOV and state 
enterprises.  Pro-Chavez western Venezuela regional daily 
"Diario Panorama" Human Resources Manager Francisco Ferrer 
(protect), whose family has minority shares in Panorama, told 
IO March 13 that the GOV had asked Panorama to provide it 
with a list of Panorama employees and to cross-check the list 
with the list of presidential referendum recall petitioners. 
Francisco found that about 75 percent of Panorama's employees 
signed the petition.  He fears that the GOV will press 
Panorama to "convince" its employees to recant their 
signature or face unemployment.   While Panorama President 
Esteban Pineda is openly pro-Chavez (most interlocutors, 
including Ferrer, think Pineda's loyalty is driven by 
monetary interests, not by ideology), Ferrer opposes the 
Chavez government. 
 
---------------------------- 
Litmus Test For GOV Services 
---------------------------- 
 
7. (C) The labor representatives cited several additional 
examples of pressure tactics in government services.  They 
said, for example, identity cards, which are necessary to 
vote, are often inexplicably delayed for people that signed 
the recall petition.  Foreigners, they claimed, were 
receiving express naturalization on the condition they not 
participate in a presidential referendum.  They said the 
enrollees in the GOV's unemployment program "Mision Vuelvan 
Caras" ("Mission About Face") are routinely cross-checked 
against the Tascon website.  The wife of a driver in the 
Embassy was told she was not eligible for a slot in a public 
university because she had signed the petition.  There have 
been allegations in the press that passports are also being 
withheld from signers, but anecdotal evidence indicates this 
problem is routinely circumvented by paying higher prices to 
facilitators. 
 
-------------------------------- 
Labor Groups Make Symbolic Stand 
-------------------------------- 
 
8. (C) The labor representatives noted that Labor Minister 
Maria Cristina Iglesias turned the table on them during the 
signature drive, arguing that anti-Chavez private companies 
threatened their employees into signing.  This latest round 
of threats, the labor representatives said, has primarily 
targeted contractors and untenured workers, who have been 
ostensibly fired due to "restructuring."  Organized labor's 
response has thus far been limited to public denunciations. 
They hope to bring some cases before the Attorney General and 
Human Rights Ombudsman, though they believe that both 
institutions are subordinated to GOV politics and will not 
intervene. 
 
------- 
Comment 
------- 
 
9. (C) These firings and harassments complement the large 
fines assessed this week against opposition media, and the 
arrest warrant for opposition Baruta mayor Enrique Capriles. 
To be effective, the GOV's intimidation campaign needs to cow 
enough signers while not drawing a backlash of resentment 
during the appeals process.  We think it is likely, 
therefore, that the firings of mostly small pockets of 
workers will continue.  Obsessed with regime survival and 
willing to trample labor rights, the GOV may achieve some 
short-term goals with its strategy.  First, forcing recanters 
to file complaints with prosecutors supports President 
Chavez's allegations that the opposition fraudulently 
collected the signatures.  Second, the GOV will need to erase 
as many signatures from the opposition's petition as possible 
if there is an appeals process.  Third, it will make the 
bureaucracy more loyal, and more pliable, in the long run. 
SHAPIRO 
 
 
NNNN 
 
      2004CARACA00945 - CONFIDENTIAL