Venezuela, Honduras, Peru, Ecuador:
Media Lies and "Oversights"
by Eric Toussaint
http://globalresearch.ca/, October
23, 2009
It may be useful to assess the dangers
of the systematically hostile attitude of the overwhelming majority
of major European and North American media companies in relation
to the current events taking place in Ecuador, Bolivia and Venezuela.
This hostility is only matched by an embarrassed, complicit silence
with regard to those involved in the putsch in Honduras or the
repression enacted by the Peruvian army against the indigenous
populations of the Amazon.
In order to demonstrate this statement,
here are a few recent facts:
1) On 5 June 2009, the Peruvian army massacred
over 50 Amazonian Indians who were protesting against the land
concessions made by Alan Garcia's government for foreign, mainly
European transnational companies. The repression aroused no disapproval
among the major global media groups. [1] These groups gave almost
exclusive priority to the protests occurring in Iran. Not only
did the press fail to condemn the repression in Peru; it did not
even bother to cover the story. And yet in Peru, so great was
public discontent that the government had to announce the repeal
of the presidential decree which the Amazonian Indians had fought
against.
Once again, media coverage of the government's
backtracking was almost non-existent. We must ask ourselves the
following question: if a Venezuelan or Ecuadorian army or police
intervention had caused the deaths of dozens of Amazonian Indians,
what kind of media coverage would such events have received?
2) When the constitutionally elected president
Manuel Zelaya was ousted by the military on 28 June, the overwhelming
majority of media groups declared, in total contradiction of the
truth, that the soldiers were reacting to Zelaya's attempt to
modify the constitution, thus ensuring he could remain in power.
Several other media groups added that he was following the example
of Hugo Chavez, who is presented as an authoritarian populist
leader. In fact, Manuel Zelaya was proposing to the Honduran citizens
that they vote in favour of the organization of general elections
for a Constituent Assembly, which would have represented real
democratic progress being made in this country. This is well explained
by Cécile Lamarque and Jérôme Duval on their
return from a CADTM mission in Honduras: __"The coup d'Etat
was carried out on the same day Manuel Zelaya had organized a
non-binding "consultation" asking the Hondurans whether
or not they wanted to convene a National Constituent Assembly,
after the elections which were due to take place on the 29 November
2009. The question went like this: "Do you agree that at
the next general elections of 2009, a fourth ballot box be installed
so as to allow for the people to express their point of view on
the convocation of a national Constituent Assembly? YES or NO?"
If this consultation had resulted in the majority voting "yes",
the president would have issued a decree of approval before Congress
so that, on 29 November, the Hondurans would formally make known
their decision on the convocation of a Constituent Assembly through
this "fourth ballot box" (the first three ballot boxes
would be for the election of a president, deputies and mayors,
respectively). In order to give an air of legality to the coup,
Congress and the Supreme Court, associated with the putsch, deemed
the ballot box to be illegal and asserted that president Zelaya
had "violated the Constitution" by trying to modify
it "so as to set his sights on serving a new mandate",
in the manner of an "apprentice Chavist dictator". And
yet, Manuel Zelaya, through this consultation with the people,
was not seeking to renew his presidential mandate of four years
which cannot be renewed. Zelaya would therefore be unable to be
a candidate for his own succession." [2]
Whilst the popular movements opposing
those involved in the Putsch increased, with protests and strikes
in July, August and September, the big media names only dedicated
a couple of lines to these events. On the rare occasions when
the leading daily newspapers dedicated a feature article to the
situation in Honduras, they adopted a policy of slander against
the constitutionally elected president by presenting the military's
actions as a democratic military coup. This is the case with The
Wall Street Journal, which in its editorial on 1 July 2009 wrote,
"the military coup d'Etat which took place in Honduras on
June 28th and which led to the exile of the president of this
central American country, Manuel Zelaya, is strangely democratic."
The editorial adds, "the legislative and judicial authorities
will remain intact" following military action. On its part,
perhaps in a more subtle manner, the famous French newspaper Le
Monde participated in a smear campaign against Manuel Zelaya.
Here is one example. On 12 September 2009, Jean-Michel Caroit,
the paper's special correspondent in Honduras, quoted the words
of a French expatriate living in the country and then associated
these words with the systematically repeated lie regarding Zelaya's
supposedly sinister intentions, " 'For the Hondurans, Zelaya's
return is unacceptable as that would mean there would be twenty
years of a Chavez-style dictatorship,' states Marianne Cadario
in reference to the Venezuelan president who - as his ally Manuel
Zelaya tried to do (underlined by me) - modified the Constitution
in order for him to be allowed to be re-elected. Marianne Cadario,
a Frenchwoman who has lived in Honduras for over thirty years
states that she is "very shocked by the reaction of the international
community who condemned the putsch." [3] The tone of newspapers
like Le Monde and Libération began to change at the end
of September after those involved in the putsch began to increase
their repressive measures. The tone became more critical of those
involved in the putsch. Having said this, the daily newspaper
Libération deserves a prize for its use of euphemisms.
In fact on 28 September 2009 (3 months to the day after the coup)
the title "The Scent of Dictatorship" (underlined by
me) of a paragraph explaining how the government involved in the
putsch had declared, "'the banning of "any public unauthorized
meeting," the arrest of "anyone putting their lives
or anyone else's in danger" "evacuation" of areas
where there are protesters and those who interfere with "any
broadcasting of programmes by any media that endanger public order."
[4]
3) At the beginning of August 2009, the
Venezuelan authorities' intention to question the right of 34
radio and television channels made the headlines in the international
press: "It is further proof of the almost total disappearance
of the right to expression and criticism in this authoritarian
country." The way in which the major news publications treat
the subject of the media in Venezuela is one of unilateral hostility,
despite the fact that 90% of the Venezuelan media is privately
owned, a large number of which actively support disinformation
campaigns. Globovisión, one of the main privately-owned
TV channels, actively participated in the military coup d'Etat
against Chavez on 11 April 2002. A documentary made by Globovisión
made its way around the world on 11 April 2002 and the days following
the military coup. It was actually a set-up, designed to distort
the truth. One can see people posing as Chavez supporters on a
bridge, firing their guns in an unidentifiable direction. The
voice-over of the Globovisión journalist states that the
Chavez supporters are about to kill opposition protesters who
were protesting peacefully in the streets below the bridge. The
Venezuelan prosecution has been able to reconstruct the exact
chain of events, having analysed the reports and photographs made
by certain individuals on the day of 11 April. In fact the pro-Chavez
militants, who, according to Globovisión, were shooting
at protesters, were actually responding to gunfire coming from
an armoured vehicle of the metropolitan police, allied to the
putsch. The opposition protesters were no longer in the streets
when those guns were fired. Several sources can prove without
a doubt that the assassination of the anti-Chavez protesters was
used as a set-up so as to attribute these crimes to Chavez, thus
justifying their coup. On 11 April 2008, the Venezuelan viewers
were able to see again the images of the press conference given
by the military involved in the putsch at a time when no protester
had been killed yet. And yet the military announced at that time
that they were taking power following the murders carried out
by the Chavez supporters. This clearly supports the theory that
these murders were planned deliberately so as to be able to justify
their seditious plan.
In the days following the putsch, on 12
and 13 April 2002, when hundreds of thousands of unarmed citizens
surrounded the barracks of the putschists to demand the return
of Hugo Chavez, then in prison, Globovisión failed to broadcast
any coverage of these protests, explaining that the country was
back to normal and that Hugo Chavez had tendered his resignation
and was on his way to Cuba. During the last hours of the putsch,
this channel broadcast only cartoons and variety shows [5]. Globovisión
in fact connived with the putschists on several critical occasions,
a fact which led the parents of victims and injured survivors'
associations to demand the channel's conviction. Up to now the
Chavist government has refused this demand in order to prevent
further escalation of the international smear campaign being waged
against him. Several human rights associations are dissatisfied
with the passive attitude of the Venezuelan authorities in this
matter.
More recently, Globovisión has
been sympathetic towards the authors of the 28 June putsch in
Honduras. Several programme presenters at Globovisión have
supported the putsch from the very beginning, at the same time
accusing the Chavez government of interference in condemning it.
For example, Guillermo Zuloaga, the president of Globovisión,
stated on 17 July that "the government of Micheletti complies
with the Constitution, and we would like, indeed we would be delighted,
if here in Venezuela, the Constitution was respected in the same
way that it is in Honduras", thus making clear his support
for the putschist government.
Globovisión has never been prohibited
from broadcasting. What major European or North-American media
has even mentioned this fact? What major European or North-American
media has ever informed the public that the overwhelming majority
of Venezuelan media are controlled by the private sector? Or that
they account for over 90% of the viewing audience? Or that they
are extremely aggressive towards the government, presenting it
as a dictatorship, or that some of them played an active part
in ousting a constitutionally elected president, and have continued
to broadcast freely for seven years? Can one imagine General de
Gaulle failing to take repressive measures against a newspaper,
radio or TV station that was seen to actively support an OAS coup
during the Algerian war? Would it not be considered normal for
the Spanish government to take measures against the media that
actively supported - in real time - Colonel Tejero when he burst
into the Cortes [6] with a group of military putschists and held
(up) at gunpoint the MPs who were there? If Manuel Zelaya were
restored to office as constitutional president, would he and his
government not be in their right to demand accountability and
take measures against the Honduran media owners who deliberately
supported the putschists by systematically deforming the truth
and covering up the many human rights violations committed by
the military?
4) Arms spending. When you read the European
or North American papers, you have the distinct impression that
Venezuela is indulging in huge arms expenditures (particularly
by way of Russia), which poses a serious threat in the region.
Yet according to the CIA [7] the situation is quite different:
the Venezuelan military budget ranks 6th in the region, after
the budgets of Brazil, Argentina, Chile (far less populated than
Venezuela and regarded as a model), Colombia and Mexico. In relative
terms, taking the GDP of each country, the Venezuelan military
budget comes 9th in Latin America! Is any of this published in
the leading news publications?
On another front, in August 2009 we read
in the papers that Sweden took Venezuela to task after the Colombian
government once again denounced its neighbour for supplying arms
to the FARC guerilla. Sweden had in fact informed Colombia that
SAAB missiles found in a FARC camp had been supplied by Venezuela.
But for those who read Hugo Chavez' detailed response it became
clear that the missiles in question had been stolen from a Venezuelan
harbour in 1995, four years before Chavez became president.
Conclusion __One needs to be aware of
the one-sided manner in which the leading media report the news,
and adopt a highly critical approach when appraising it. The discrediting
of Hugo Chavez, Rafael Correa and Evo Morales is so excessive
that it poses the risk of numbing international public opinion
in the event of another coup d'Etat, or of lulling the public
into approving aggressive measures taken by a government such
as the US. Among the many insidious and unfounded accusations,
we can read in the Spanish papers (for example in El Pais) that
Rafael Correa's election campaign was financed by the FARC. We
can also read that the Venezuelan authorities do nothing to fight
drug trafficking. In the case of the Honduran president Manuel
Zelaya, the discredit heaped on him is intended to prevent international
opinion mobilizing in favour of his return to power as head of
State.
Translated by Francesca Denley and Judith
Harris
Eric Toussaint is the president of CADTM
Belgium (Committee for the Abolition of Third World Debt, www.cadtm.org),
has a PhD in political science from the University of Liège
(Belgium) and the University of Paris VIII (France). He is the
author of Bank of the South. An Alternative to the IMF-World Bank,
VAK, Mumbai, India, 2007; The World Bank, A Critical Primer, Pluto
Press, Between The Lines, David Philip, London-Toronto-Cape Town
2008; Your Money or Your Life, The Tyranny of Global Finance,
Haymarket, Chicago, 2005.
1. See http://www.cadtm.org/Le-CADTM-est-pleinement-solidaire
and http://www.cadtm.org/Perou-le-massacre-de-Bagua
2. Cécile Lamarque and Jérome
Duval, « Honduras : Why the Coup d'Etat », 17 September
2009, www.cadtm.org/Honduras-Pourquoi-le-coup-d-Etat
3. Jean-Michel Caroit, « Au Honduras,
la campagne électorale s'ouvre dans un climat de haine
», Le Monde, p. 8, Saturday 12 September 2009.
4. http://www.liberation.fr/monde/0101593847-le-honduras-s-enfonce-dans-la-crise
5. It is interesting at this point to
note the initiative of Hugo Chavez' government on 11 April 2008,
six years after the putsch. The government used its right to broadcast
on the private and public TV stations to show a re-run of the
entire reportage produced by the anti-Chavist private channels
(Globovisión, RCTV...) on the official inauguration session
of the president and the putschist government in a reception room
in the Miraflores presidential palace. The complete programme,
which the whole of Venezuela could watch on 11 April 2002, was
re-broadcast without any cuts or critical commentary by the Chavez
government. Hugo Chavez relied on the critical acumen of Venezuelan
viewers to form their own opinion on the active complicity of
the private media with those behind the putsch, amongst whom the
viewer could identify the leading Catholic church authorities,
the putschist military brass, the head of the anti-Chavist labour
union CTV (Confederation of Workers of Venezuela), the chief executives
of private corporations and the president of the Venezuelan Federation
of Chambers of Commerce (Fedecámaras), Pedro Carmona. It
should be said that this president, who held power for scarcely
36 hours, earned the enduring nickname of "Pepe el breve"
(Pepe the brief).
6. On 23 February 1981, an attempted coup
d'état organized by Franquist sectors took place in the
Spanish Congress, The leader, Colonel Tejero, held up the members
of parliament present at gunpoint and took them hostage as the
new president of the government was being sworn in.
7. See https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/index.html,
consulted in March 2009
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