It has. But Mr Chavez may not have bargained that the rows of lettuce, cucumber and mint now thriving amidst the traffic and high-rises of downtown Caracas would also produce a harvest of controversy.
The controversy has arisen because many of the advisers assisting with the gardening programme are Cubans. And Mr Chavez's opponents, who accuse him of desiring to convert Venezuela into a communist dictatorship similar to that led by his friend, Cuban leader Fidel Castro, suspect that the Cubans are here to do more than teach farming. ***
Castro: U.S. Exile TV Broadcast Will Fail***Cuba calls the broadcasts by TV Marti an attempt by the U.S. government and Cuban exiles to impose their political views. Castro said earlier efforts to thwart the Cuban government's jamming of TV Marti's signal have failed. "Up to now, experience has shown that it has gone badly," Castro said Friday. He commented on the new attempt by saying: "I read something about that and I was laughing. They are always inventing something."
The Miami-based Office of Cuba Broadcasting says that within days it will use a satellite located over the east Atlantic Ocean off the African coast to strengthen TV and Radio Marti signals.
TV Marti, which went on the air in 1990, broadcasts its signal from a balloon tethered to Cudjoe Key in Florida, about 20 miles east of Key West, Fla. But because of Cuba's jamming of the signal, very few people on the island have ever seen TV Marti. Only satellite dishes will be able to pick up the signal. Although Cuba prohibits most ordinary citizens from having satellite dishes, as many as 20,000 families on this island of 11.2 million are estimated to have satellite antenna and reception equipment purchased illegally on the black market. ***