Posted on 07/02/2002 7:52:25 AM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
[Excerpt] Florida International University vowed Sunday to go forward with a controversial talk by the exiled Caracas businessman who seized power from Hugo Chávez in April -- despite protests from Venezuelans.
Pedro Carmona Estanga is scheduled to be the featured guest Wednesday at the Security Roundtable sponsored by FIU's Latin American and Caribbean Center. The roundtable is a discreet organization of about 100 academics, journalists, diplomats and business people, hosted alternatively by the center known as LACC, the University of Miami's North-South Center and the Pentagon's Southern Command.
But this weekend, roundtable members thought to be on a private e-mail distribution list received two angry messages from Caracas urging the university to cancel the talk. The most provocative, signed by a Professor Reinaldo Bolívar, called Carmona ''a terrorist,'' and said the United States would protest if a Venezuelan were to host a similar event with Osama bin Laden.
Carmona, 60, turned up in Miami last month on a short-term visa issued before his brief April 11-12 takeover of the Venezuelan presidency and the Miraflores presidential palace. He had fled to political asylum in Colombia after pro-Chávez forces restored to power their elected president, who had likewise previously plotted a coup.
In defense of the Latin American and Caribbean Center, Director Eduardo A. Gamarra wrote to members that the event will be held Wednesday afternoon as scheduled because the institute known as LACC ``has always been a forum for leaders, academics, activists, and others who have openly spoken their mind about affairs in the region. To allow the presence of controversial speakers has always been the role of universities in the United States.''
Moreover, he acknowledged that ``Mr. Carmona is certainly a controversial figure and his speech will undoubtedly generate great controversy. LACC does not endorse Mr. Carmona's views nor condone his actions during the coup against President Hugo Chávez.
``At the same time, LACC does not condone the actions of President Chávez before, during or after the coup. If the opportunity were to arise, we would be delighted to host speakers who represent the views of the Chávez government.'' [End Excerpt]
(April 13, 2002) - New York Times- Manager and Conciliator Pedro Carmona Estanga -By JUAN FORERO [Full Text] CARACAS, Venezuela, April 12 - In one day, the man in charge in the presidential palace went from a strong-willed populist known for his rambling speeches to a mild-mannered businessman who chooses every word carefully.
The new leader, Pedro Carmona Estanga, 60, head of Venezuela's most powerful business group, was installed today as president of an interim government that succeeded President Hugo Chávez, who was forced to resign early today.
Mr. Carmona promised "freedom, pluralism and respect for the state of law" and said general elections would be called within a year.
"It is not a responsibility I have sought," Mr. Carmona, dressed in a sport jacket and casual shirt, told a quickly improvised news conference early this morning. "And I want to tell the country that all the actions I took as a representative of civil society were never done with the goal of reaching this position."
Mr. Carmona was tapped by military officers and leaders of the anti-Chávez movement to take the helm after he had been leading the opposition. Since last summer, Mr. Carmona has headed Fedecámaras, an association of leading businesses. Mr. Chávez's left-leaning economic policies and autocratic style antagonized much of the business class.
Mr. Carmona could not be more different from Mr. Chávez. Although Mr. Chávez cherished attention from the news media and world leaders, Mr. Carmona has never been comfortable in the limelight. Mr. Chávez sought power, even starting a failed coup in 1992, when he was an army colonel, before winning office in an election in 1998.
"This has never been his aspiration," said Rafael Sandrea, a friend who is in Mr. Carmona's business group. "He fell into it because of the circumstances."
Mr. Carmona, experts said, is a level-headed manager who is also known as a conciliator. He was chosen to head Fedecámaras as someone who could negotiate with Mr. Chávez. One of Mr. Carmona's unusual achievements was forging an alliance with the one million-member Venezuelan Workers Confederation, the largest labor group.
"He's a guy who's looking for compromises and solutions that everyone can work with," said Robert Bottome, editor of Veneconomía, a business newsletter here. "He has the style of personality that is exactly right for this moment."
As protests mounted, Mr. Carmona became the most prominent spokesman for the anti-Chávez cause. Slight and meek, he often appeared sitting behind a desk, reading a statement or giving a precise response to the reporters' microphones that surrounded his baldish head.
He would sometimes seem overwhelmed, but he always managed to remain calm. Yet as efforts to prod the government to negotiate failed, Mr. Carmona became ever more steadfast in his pronouncements against Mr. Chávez.
Mr. Carmona was born on June 6, 1941, in Barquisimeto, 155 miles southwest of Caracas. He has been married 25 years and has one child.
An economist educated at Andrés Bello Catholic University in Caracas and in Belgium, he headed a large petrochemical company, Venoco, that processes automotive oils. A major stockholder in the company, Mr. Carmona resigned as its president last summer to run Fedecámaras.
Mr. Carmona, an avid flier, is known in Caracas business society as a taskmaster who has worked hard to get where he is.
"Carmona is not a mega-industrialist in his own right," a political consultant, Eric Ekvall, said. "Carmona is a man who's always worked in and been involved in the business sector, but always as a manager. He's not one of the landed elite, with his own fortune, his own bank."
His supporters hope that his negotiating abilities will help him mend the wide gulf between Mr. Chávez's supporters, mostly poor Venezuelans, and the middle and upper classes that strongly backed the turnover.
Mr. Carmona will have to work hard. Many of the poorest people will see him as part of the "squalid oligarchy" that Mr. Chávez derided.
"There are still 15 to 20 percent of the people who think Chávez is god," Mr. Bottome said, "and the biggest challenge between now and Christmas is for this transition government to be able to respond to their needs." [End]
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