Posted on 02/18/2002 12:35:27 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
CARACAS, Venezuela - President Hugo Chavez on Sunday vowed to punish businesses that are raising prices on goods imported before the government abandoned a fixed currency exchange system last week - a decision that caused the Venezuelan bolivar to fall 10 percent against the U.S. dollar.
Chavez ordered the secret and federal police to draw up a strategy to expose and punish businesses that are illegally adjusting prices. Violators could be sent to prison, he said.
"We cannot allow a small group that controls commerce to take advantage of these necessary, just and opportune measures to try to enrich themselves," Chavez said during his weekly radio show.
On Wednesday, the government allowed the currency to float against the U.S. dollar, an initiative economists praised as necessary to stem capital flight, but warned could drive up inflation by up to 30 percent.
Then, the Central Bank spent dlrs 410 million to fend off a major devaluation - sending the currency on a roller-coaster ride that confused merchants, importers, distributors and citizens who didn't know how much their savings were worth.
The bolivar closed at 870.50 to the dollar Friday, down 10 percent since Feb. 8, the last day of controls. On Monday, the Central Bank will start auctioning about dlrs 60 million a day to banks - the amount it considers matches demand.
Chavez said stores must not raise prices on products imported before the free-float took effect and urged citizens to denounce businesses that may be increasing prices illegally.
He read out several toll-free telephone numbers that citizens can use to lodge complaints directly to the national government.
"Denounce them," Chavez said. "Visit corner stores, supermarkets, warehouses, watch for those who are adjusting prices, take notes, call us ... I call on the country ... to wage a war on speculators."
Chavez also insisted that his decisions to float the currency and cut government spending by 22 percent did not mean he had become a free-market enthusiast. He expressed annoyance at news media that compared his initiatives to an economic austerity program adopted in 1989 by then-President Carlos Andres Perez.
The 1989 program, sponsored by the International Monetary Fund sparked deadly riots in Caracas, especially the decision to raise gasoline prices. Chavez stressed that his decisions were not imposed by multinational organizations and that he will not cut spending in health and education.
"Some critics have said that Chavez has become a liberal," said Chavez. "Nothing is farther from the truth."
"There are fundamental differences between us and the liberal policies the IMF once imposed on Venezuela," he said.
That sounds so familiar….Oh yes!
"The day money is the factor behind distribution of the nation's properties is the day we will be divided into social classes. We will not allow that,'' said Juan Contino, who heads the movement of Cuba's state-affiliated neighborhood groups, the Committees for the Defense of the Revolution (CDR).
The CDRs are encouraged to keep a lookout for property ''irregularities'' and make denunciations where appropriate. ``We are the good neighbors, those who have to go out and warn people 'you're making a gigantic house','' Contino said......
That and other cases appeared in a recent article in Granma telling Cubans about the ``social use for confiscated homes.'' The article focused on four ``over-sized'' homes, allegedly built ''with the purpose of self-enrichment.'' --Source
Bolivarian Revolutionary Movement-- At a political rally Thursday, Chavez inaugurated the leaders of the new Bolivarian Revolutionary Movement, an organization composed of thousands of neighborhood committees aimed at maintaining ties between citizens and the government.
(Another familiar theme)....Chavez stressed .. he will not cut spending in health and education.
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