DEVELOPMENT: Int’l Forum on Venezuela’s Reconstruction

By Tito Drago Reprint | | Print |

Alicia Fraerman, Tito Drago and Luis Córdova

MADRID, Feb 21 2000 (IPS) - Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez received pledges of support from Spain Monday for the reconstruction and development of that South American country, parts of which were devastated by heavy flooding that killed tens of thousands in December.

Chávez, Spanish crown prince Felipe, and Enrique Iglesias, president of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), presided over an international informational forum on Venezuela in the Spanish capital.

As many as 30,000 people were killed and 150,000 left homeless in Venezuela – a country of 23 million – by the mid-December flooding and landslides, considered one of the world’s worst natural disasters of the 20th century.

The international community began to send emergency humanitarian aid after the catastrophe. Two months later, a few areas are still in need of emergency aid, but efforts are mainly focused now on the urgent restoration of services and roads in the affected areas.

Venezuela needs to rebuild roads, hospitals, schools, irrigation and sewerage systems, and thousands of dwellings destroyed by the mudslides and flooding.

The country has received around 35 million dollars in donations, and more than 500 million dollars in credit have been pledged so far. But total losses were estimated at 3.2 billion dollars.

Monday’s forum, organised by the IDB and the Spanish government, was designed to raise awareness on the situation in Venezuela, and Chávez presented a detailed analysis of the country’s needs, including a documentary on the disaster.

A report on damages drawn up by the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) was also presented, as well as 57 short-term projects designed by UN agencies, requiring 35 million dollars in investment.

Worst hit was the state of Vargas, on the coast 40 kms north of Caracas, where rubble is still being removed.

Venezuelan officials hope that Vargas, which draws the greatest number of tourists, could awaken interest among private investors interested in capitalising on the state’s tourism potential.

The special government commission named for the reconstruction of Vargas announced a “master plan” involving improved urban planning and living standards. Losses in that state alone amounted to 1.7 billion dollars.

Although experts blame the unusually heavy rainfall on the La Niña weather phenomenon – the flipside of El Niño, which hit hard in 1998 – they also warn that poor urban planning aggravated the effects. Most vulnerable were shanty-towns along the slopes and middle-class communities along the coast and river banks.

UN experts stress that reconstruction efforts must focus on prevention of future tragedies. Chávez has trained attention on slums built in high-risk areas, and has proposed the resettlement of people left homeless in the uninhabited southern part of the country.

Paying testimony to the tragedy in Vargas are the enormous piles of mud where rivers flow into the sea, containing the bodies of thousands of victims – areas that may be converted into cemeteries or parks.

Foreign Minister Alfredo Rangel said last week that the foreign aid received would be handled in an “absolutely transparent” manner. With United Nations support, the Foreign Ministry set up a special Internet website to coordinate international aid: http//www.emergencia99.org.ve.

Monday’s gathering was arranged in January, when visits to Venezuela by IDB president Enrique Iglesias and the crown prince of Spain Felipe coincided.

At Monday’s forum, Chávez spent two hours describing the catastrophe, relating it to the situation in the rest of Latin America and the Caribbean, thanking Spain for its solidarity, and outlining his ideas on how the region should tackle its economic and social problems.

He stressed that he had not travelled to Madrid to seek solidarity and investment for Venezuela alone, but for all Latin America, “a region with deep-running ties to Spain.”

Chávez pointed out that Venezuela was three times the size of Spain, with half the number of inhabitants, oil “everywhere” and “natural gas and petroleum of all levels of quality,” huge rivers, the most extensive Caribbean coastline, millions of hectares of fertile land, “mountains of iron ore,” gold and bauxite, virgin jungles, snowy peaks and unmatched natural splendour.

“But it has all amounted to 80 percent of the population steeped in poverty, in a country dominated by an insensitive elite” – the social situation that led to the profound political reforms he is promoting, said the president.

Some 400 people attended the forum, including large official Spanish, French, Portuguese, and Italian delegations, representatives of the European Union and the European Investment Bank, the delegates of around 20 multilateral and international entities, and the heads of 10 Spanish non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and their coordinator, Carmen de Miguel.

Also participating was a large delegation of Spain’s business community, including the presidents of the largest business associations.

Prince Felipe, who visited Venezuela immediately after the catastrophe to express Spain’s solidarity, recalled that the First European Union-Latin America and Caribbean summit, held in Rio de Janeiro in June 1999, agreed on the need for a strategic alliance between the two regions.

That alliance, he underlined, should contribute to reconstruction, “for Venezuela to exercise its right to a future of peace, democracy and prosperity.”

Chávez described that alliance as “vital,” and emphasised that “peace means the functioning of justice. It is not the peace of a cemetery, but of equality, research, progress and equity.”

“The economic aspect cannot be separated from the social,” added the president, a retired lieutenant-colonel who burst onto the Venezuelan political scene in 1992 with a failed coup attempt aimed at overthrowing what he termed a “rancid oligarchy.”

Besides expressing his gratitude for Spain’s solidarity, Chávez addressed the business representatives and investors present. “I guarantee you full security for your investments, monetary stability and tax incentives,” he said.

After the forum, the Spanish business delegation, Chávez and the Venezuelan officials and business representatives accompanying him headed over to the Confederation of Spanish Business Organisations, where they met members of that association interested in investing in and doing business with Venezuela.

The president left Madrid Monday, but Venezuelan government and business delegates will stay two more days to discuss specific projects.

Chávez also had cross words with the press in Spain, complaining that the mass media refused to understand and clearly reflect what is happening in Venezuela.

He recalled that after the disaster, a team from the US Cable News Network (CNN) spent an entire day with him visiting the hardest-hit areas. At the end of the day, the head of the team said he would like to ask the president a question before the cameras. Chávez agreed. “Is it true that on the day of the catastrophe you were with Fidel Castro on an island in the Caribbean, getting drunk?” he was asked.

At the press conference in Madrid Monday, a reporter of CNN+, the Spanish subsidiary of CNN, asked Chávez about an accusation of corruption supposedly filed against him by a lieutenant-colonel of the Venezuelan armed forces.

“Where did you get that? Out of the trash can?” quipped Chávez, with a smirk, before explaining that no such charges had been brought against him.