Goodbye to 2012 - and to Hugo Chávez?

Hugo Chávez, right, with Cuban Pres. Raul Castro back in October, when Chávez announced himself cured of cancer.

The ending of 2012 also looks like the departing of Venezuelan Pres. Hugo Chavez, who is in a Cuban hospital suffering from complications from cancer.

The long-winded Chavez hasn't been heard from publicly for more than two weeks, and his vice president says his condition is 'complicated.' The Venezuelan people don't know the details, however, since the Chavez administration has kept the details of Chavez's condition secret. That's also why he's had his treatments in Cuba, where he's safe from a nosey free press (and it's no gesture of confidence for Venezuela's much-vaunted health care system).

Chavez's suddenly critical condition has also revealed a bait and switch of historic proportions. During the recent presidential campaign, Chavez acted as tho he was recovering - even tho he undoubtely knew his prognosis was poor. Venezuelans reelected Chavez, who has already held power for a dozen years, to yet another six-year term. Now, it looks obvious that even if El Comandante survives, he'll be no more than an invalid and a figurehead.

Chavez's illness is sending his country into unknown political territory. It's not clear what will happen if, for example, Chavez cannot make it to his Jan. 10 inauguration. Chavez designated his vice president Nicolas Maduro to succeed him. Maduro has been a loyal chavista, but lacks Chavez's charisma. Will Chavistas support him, or more ideologically figures such as Diosdado Cabello, or Chavez's older brother Adan? It seems likely that no other Chavista politician could win an election against the opposition.

For Colombia, too, Chavez's illness means more uncertainty.

Chavez had seemed to be assisting with the government-FARC peace negotiations also being held in Cuba. Will a Chavez sucessor help?

Other possibilities are scarier. What if a weak Chavez succesor tries to consolidate his power using nationalism by confronting historical rival Colombia?

It also strikes me as ironic that Chavez, a larger-than-life figure who often announced supposed conspiracies to assassinate him, is in the end being felled by a mundane illness which respects no status or power.

One time, back when I was a journalist living in Caracas, Chavez announced that someone had tried to shoot down his airplane with a surface-to-air missile. I visited the beach under Chavez's landing path and talked to residents, whose accounts made it clear that no attack had happened - and that an attack probably wasn't even realistic.

By the same token, Chavez's 'socialist revolution', while denouncing politically incorrect dangers, ignored inconvenient, mundane ones. For example, it was only several years into his presidency that the Chavez government finally eliminated leaded vehicle fuel, which harms children's development. Neither has his government flouridated the drinking water, a proven way to prevent children's tooth decay. Nor does it enforce air pollution laws, but it does spend billions of dollars subsidizing gasoline down to a few cents a gallon (which keeps old smog-belching clunkers on the road).

I once attended one of la revolucion's many long-winded leftie conferences, held in concrete a tower in central Caracas. I remember looking over the event's program, which included speeches denouncing genetically modified food crops, even tho not a single study that I know of has shown GMO's to harm human health. I looked out the tower's window at one of the slums crawling up the hills bordering Caracas and saw plumes of carcinogenic smoke rising from burning garbage, a proven carcinogen. So, Chavez's revolution prioritizes populist measures such as its gasoline subsidy over measures which would save lives.
Maybe it's in bad taste to suggest that a sick man contributed to his own disease, but in this case it seems to be true.

Of course, these policies are important not only for Chavez, but for the millions of Venezuelans whose health suffers because the Chavez government chooses populist measures over healthy ones.


By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

Chavez's Campaign Against Cancer

Hugo Chavez undergoing chemotherapy. 

Tomorrow, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, who's already ruled for 13 years, is to formally register his candidacy to succeed himself yet again.

Chavez has a huge lead in the polls ahead of the october election against Henrique Capriles, a young mayor whose center-right politics would likely be much more amenable to the Colombian government. Chavez's lead is not surprising, since he's been in power for so long that many young Venezuelans probably cannot recall another president. Chavez has also muzzled much of the opposition media and turned much of the government into a campaign machine, which has handed out subsidized food and gasoline and filled the airwaves and covered walls with government propaganda. And Chavez has an unquestionable charisma, which enables him to connect with his country's poor majority.

Henrique Capriles: Venezuela's next president?
Not likely. 

Chavez somehow doesn't receive the blame for severe domestic troubles such as an unstable economy, high inflation and soaring crime rates, perhaps because his trappings of leftist revolution make him seem to transcend ordinary difficulties.

But Chavez has a bigger opponent, which he hasn't been able to defeat using his oil money war chest: a mestazing cancer, which has him commuting to Cuba for surgery and chemotherapy sessions.

Chavez's exact condition is a state secret. His doctors have held no press conferences armed with x-rays and test results to let Venezuelans in on their president's prognosis. So, observers can only rely on the president's appearance and occasional statements, and supposed medical reports which journalists occassionally get their hands on. Recently, U.S. reporter Dan Rather and Spanish newspaper ABC published stories suggesting that Chavez may have only months to live. If that's true, then Chavez is committing a huge fraud against his supporters, who surely believe that they're electing their man to serve another six-year term. Chavez said yesterday that doctors found no sign of his cancer's reappearing - but offered no evidence of that.

If Chavez dies or cannot carry on, he can designate a replacement, altho no other figure in his United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) has the president's charisma or popularity. But that only compounds the uncertainty for Colombia, which has to consider either continuity under Chavez, a rightward shift under Capriles or a complete unknown.

Chavez has been a somewhat erratic collaborator with Colombia's efforts against the drug trade and guerrilla groups. He has arrested and extradited several important criminal figures, but also apparently supported the guerrillas. Pres. Juan Manuel Santos has called Chavez 'My new best friend,' but his administration would undoubtedly be much happier with someone less radical running things in Caracas.

By Mike Ceaser, of Bogotá Bike Tours

Who'll Stop the Cigarrette?

Colombia is finally taking real steps against cigarette smoking - or trying to.

A recent law requires graphic symbols on cigarette packages, which will add to or replace the existing very weak warning, which says only 'Smoking is damaging to health'. One of the new symbols, which have already begun appearing on packages, shows a cigarette curved downward to represent impotence. Bogotá also recently passed an anti-indoor smoking law, which is being respected to a surprsing degree, even by many bars. The law will also further restrict advertising and ban sales of loose cigarettes - which get kids hooked. (Tobacco interests tried defending the habit as a civil right!)

Cigarettes for 5 cents each in the public university.

Loose smokes, peanuts and candy for sale together on a Bogota sidewalk.

Colombia has a particularly ugly history in relation to tobacco. Media investigations about a decade ago documented how Philip Morris and British American Tobacco sold huge quantities of cigarettes to shady companies on the Durch Island of Aruba, which then smuggled them into Colombia. The smuggling was apparently used by Colombia's outlaw guerrillas and paramilitaries to launder their drug money - yet another connection between tobacco and terrorism.

Have a free Marlboro today. You'll pay for it forever. 

Colombia still has a long way to go. I still see attractive young kids handing out cigarette 'samples' to young people on streets near universities. And they don't ask for proof that the recipients are of smoking age. And, the Mustang brand still sponsors a professional soccer tournament - something which I'd thought was illegal.

And the question, as always, will be enforcement. Particularly destructive are the loose cigarette sales by informal street vendors. Those are favorites for high school and college kids, who, according to a recent study, can get hooked by smoking just one cigarette per month! Kids usually don't have the cash to buy a whole box, and anyway they don't want mom to discover that box in their jacket pocket. So, loose smoke sales are a convenient way for them to get hooked.

Single cigarette sales are supposed to be banned by the new law, but I'm waiting to see them try to enforce this. The best way, by having kids try to buy, doesn't seem to be in the Colombian police's toolbox.

Smoking reportedly causes 400 deaths per year in Bogotá - a number which surely doesn't include deaths by second-hand smoke. Even so, that's many more people who are killed in the city by terrorism. Yet, the United States government sends billions of dollars down here to combat terrorism, while US companies continue pushing tobacco products on young Colombians.

This blog written by Mike Ceaser, of Bogota Bike Tours.