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Chavez says he'll repay TT with love
Posted: Sunday, August 10, 2003
By RIA TAITT, Newsday/TT
Saying that he would pay "amor con amor," Venezuelan President, Hugo Chavez, spoke about and evinced love and affection, based on a deep sense of gratitude for Trinidad and Tobago's assistance in his darkest hour. As he addressed the media at the Hilton Trinidad, Chavez, who has faced serious unrest over the last year, painted a picture of a virtual rescue mission, in which 500,000 barrels of Trinidad and Tobago oil played an important role in helping to frustrate the efforts of the "terrorists". "When the terrorists in Venezuela, the coup leaders, the opposition, tried to stifle the Venezuelan economy, we received oxygen from Trinidad and Tobago so that our lungs could breathe again," the embattled President said. Chavez, speaking through an interpreter, said that that 500,000 barrels of oil at a time "when we were dying," had now been converted into softer, kinder currency - "500,000 years of thanks...and 500,000 sentiments of love and gratitude to you. We pay love with love," he concluded, blowing a kiss to his audience and eliciting applause from the officials, both from Venezuela and Trinidad and Tobago who surrounded him at the head table.
Clearly a man of passion and plenty words, Chavez was on a roll from the moment the first question was asked. So much so, that the media only managed to put in four questions. The constraints of time, and Chavez's own loquaciousness, especially on topics that he loved, denied any opportunity for probing on issues such as the domestic instability in Venezuela and whether this situation led to an increased flow of arms and ammunition between the two countries, as Prime Minister Patrick Manning alleged several weeks ago. What significance Chavez attached to Manning's statements, the media never got to find out. What seemed pretty evident yesterday was that the Venezuelan leader had his eyes on grander things and larger dreams. He waxed warm about a super-oil body, a sort of Caribbean/Latin OPEC, if you like, linking that "huge energy reservoir" of countries in the Atlantic and Pacific basin. "Trinidad and Petrotrin, Venezuela and PSDVA, Columbia... Ecuador... Peru... Bolivia... If we get together...," Chavez said, turning and touching Foreign Affairs Minister Knowlson Gift in a manner that seemed to invite Gift to conceptualise this, he (Chavez) rose to a crescendo, saying "Ay-ay-aaaay!" Everyone understood that expression. It brought the Flamingo room down.
He was equally enthusiastic about the "Bolivarian vision" of "single nations joined in freedom, justice and independence", even proposing a name for this magnificent union - Petro-american or Petro-sur. On the question of monetising Venezuelan gas in Trinidad and Tobago, Chavez said Venezuela had begun to build a complex to process its gas. But noting that it could not be built overnight, he said: "It was entirely feasible that in the meantime, we send our gas from the Deltana Platforma to be processed in Trinidad and Tobago and from there the products will be exported to the US". On Manning's idea of a gas line to Guadeloupe, Chavez took it further - a trans-Caribbean gas line which could take Trinidad and Tobago gas and Venezuelan gas up to Havana, Central and North America. Chavez said during his dinner meeting with Manning they had been able to share a common vision about what is going on in the world today, a common vision about politics, social issues, economy, and the need for integration in the Caribbean - "a firm and concrete integration." The immediate fruits of their meeting: On Tuesday there would be a signing of a memorandum of understanding for the organisation of the "single reservoir" - the cross-border reserves. Furthermore Manning would visit Venezuela in October to hammer out deeper cooperation. Chavez said he had a "marvellous idea" of Trinidad and Tobago and Venezuela working together in the energy field - in order to provide oil products to poorer nations of the Caribbean.
Chavez couldn't leave this country without weaving into his comments details about "democratisation of the Venezuelan economy." He talked about the land law, aimed at dealing with the situation where the best lands were in the hands of the few and the majority of people were landless; the fishing law, which protected small and medium fishermen, the protection from the beaches from what is referred to in Venezuela as "the black (polluted) waters." Saying that billions of bolivares were spent on building water treatment plants so that "today 92 percent of waste water" is treated, Chavez stated: "You know everything that is bad is black, so we have the black book, blacklist...we want to change that kind of perception of black..We have nothing against white people. We are all equal," he said. Shrugging off the allegations that he was a Cuban sympathiser, Chavez lamented that because Venezuela had sought the help of the Cubans to deal with a problem of salinity, "we are accused of wanting to Cubanise the country". He also boasted that there was no more kidnapping in Venezuela. There were also personal touches during his brief stay. "Something also marvellous occurred yesterday, I tried for the first time Trinidad and Tobago pastelle and it is very much like the Venezuelan 'ajaca' and I enjoyed it very much. So the meeting has been very pleasant and very productive," he said.
The general demeanour of the Venezuelan President, from the time he landed Friday night - the bear-hug for Manning, the squeeze for PNM's PRO Rose Janniere, (Airport Authority official) and the planting of a kiss on each cheek, the warm and personal greeting to every Trinidad and Tobago journalist present at the Hilton yesterday and the spontaneous embrace of activist Clive Nunez - all told the same story of appreciation. As he put it, Thursday's meeting marked the beginning of a new era in Trinidad and Tobago/ Venezuela relationship in which hopefully mutual economic benefits would flow. But having struck the right chemistry, a lot would depend on the longevity of both Chavez and Manning in office.
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