Tuesday, September 09, 2008

The Miami Venezuelan Maletagate trial part III: Let the Duran trial and the fireworks begin! (In Spanish here, en español aqui) It was the first actual day of the Maletagate trial in Miami and both the prosecution and the defense began their arguments. The fireworks have begun and it is clear that there will be interesting revelations in the upcoming days if the initial skirmishes are any indication. Prosecutor Thomas Mulvihill presented his case and said the money carried by Guido Antonini into Argentina, in the suitcase in the PDVSA leased airplane, was a favor to accused Franklin Duran and that Duran himself had told Antonini that the money was intended for the campaign of Argentinean President Cristina Kirschner. The Prosecution also charged that the money came from PDVSA. Prosecutor Mulvihill sad he would present tapes showing not only that Duran and friends were acting as agents of the Venezuelan Government, but that they called Guido Antonini in Miami from the headquarters of the Venezuelan Intelligence police (DISIP). He added that there was a strong participation of the Venezuelan Intelligence police in the case all the way up to its Director Henry Rangel Silva. Duran’s defense countered by saying that it was Antonini who asked Duran and his brother Pedro to give him a hand in the case and that they went to the now Minister of the Interior and Justice Tarek Al Aissami, seeking for assistance, but that Duran never contacted the Head of the DISIP whom he does not know and never tried to force Antonini to lie.The defense also said that Duran told Antonini to get a lwayer in Argentian to defend him in that country. The defense tried to put the blame on Antonini seeking a solution to the case and charged that Guido Antonini tried to cover up the facts and was requesting that the Venezuelan Government pay him US$ 2 million in order to cover up the case. He charged that Antonini wrote a letter to President Hugo Chavez under the coaching of the FBI requesting the money and that such letter was sent to the President via the Venezuelan Consul in Miami. The defense suggested the case was simply political in order to make the Hugo Chavez Government look bad by turning the case of a friend trying to help another into a case of spying. The first witness in the case was one of the accused men who pleaded guilty, lawyer Moises Maionica. Maionica, know to have strong ties to then Vice-President Jorge Rodriguez (He was the lawyer for fingerprint company Cogent), testified that initially the case was left in the hands of PDVSA President Rafael Ramirez, but he was later relieved of his control of the situation. According to Maionica’s testimony, Hugo Chavez directly assigned the task of dealing with the problem to the DISIP and that Rangel Silva, the DISIP Director told him the President was upset about the matter from an operational point of view. Meanwhile in Caracas, newly appointed Minister of the Interior and Justice (sic), said he would not respond to the garbage of the US Empire and that "he has held many positions but it is only now that he is in charge of the Ministry this campaign begins…less than 24 hours after being named, this garbage comes out" I guess the Minister does not read this blog, which published the information that he would be involved in the case, well before anyone knew he would be appointed Minister. Thus, the first day began with lots of fireworks on both sides. It is clear that Duran’s strategy is to say he was helping a friend, but he does not intend to help the Venezuelan Government in the process. The Prosecution, on the other hand, seems to have a lot of evidence in the form of tapes and the like which could severely bring into question the arguments of the defense. Stay tuned!!! 9:41:46 PM    comment []

Hugo Chavez' perverse and undemocratic logic Using his customary perverse and undemocratic logic, President Hugo Chavez gave proof to the world that he does not believe in democracy nor does he have respect for the laws. Moreover, if there were Rule of Law in Venezuela, his words yesterday would be sufficient to overturn many of the 26 Bills approved in the eve of the deadline for the Enabling Bill, which allowed him to legislate, by decree for 18 months. Chavez’ perverse interpretation was that he did not violate the Constitution, because what he did was to legislate what the voters did not want to have become part of the Venezuelan Constitution.  He could not be more dense and autocratic than with this sentence: “One thing is that it was not approved to include this or that proposal in the Constitution and another one to do it as part of a Law” Chavez even said that the vote was by a small minority, as if democracy required a large majority. What is clear is that Chavez refuses to respect what the people decided in December 2007 and will continue to do so, unless people fight it and you can be sure that the November elections will not be much of a fight.  The voters may be able to rebel and elect half of the Governors of the country from opposition candidates and Chavez will find a way to ignore that victory and boycott them. What am I saying? He does not even need to do that, he can just use one of the 26 Bills and create a regional authority above each elected opposition Governor and short circuit and block them. Which by the way, was one of the proposals rejected in December... Absurd? Just wait and see... 1:58:57 AM    comment []