AFP (with additional material by Reuters). 23 January 2002. Chavez opponents, supporters mass in twin marches amid tight security.
CARACAS -- More than 200,000 supporters and detractors of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez launched twin marches in the capital Wednesday, amid high security. The marches, marking the 44th anniversary of the fall of Venezuelan dictator Marcos Perez Jimenez, were held streets apart, with a strong police presence for the opposition group, and some 150 military police and detectives guarding the presidential parade. The populist Chavez, 48, wearing his habitual red beret, marched with his supporters from the rough "23 de Enero" district toward the National Assembly building. Supporters professed their "love" for Chavez. Chavez promised to do away with "immoral" giant estates of Venezuela, which have large stretches of unused terrain and which he said had "halted Venezuela's development." "We have demonstrated once again the Venezuelan people is willing to defend its revolution," Chavez, in his trademark red paratroopers beret, boomed from the podium in a live address on all television and radio stations. "Some say Chavez is weak and he is on his way out. And I am going -- but in 2013!" He underlined that Venezuela's poorest people living in the shantytowns of Caracas and other parts would soon be given their own property rights. His new land law, he said, would be launched with the distribution of documents among the poor allocating property ownership. The law, the most controversial of a package of 49 new economic policies enacted by presidential decree November 13, tighten state control over agriculture. Since he embarked on his "peaceful revolution" to redistribute Venezuela's natural wealth and fight corruption, former coup leader Chavez has split one of Latin America's oldest democracies along class lines, with tirades against "squalid oligarchs" and promises to carve up wealthy estates. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Barry Stoller http://groups.yahoo.com/group/ProletarianNews
