In article <c1nvrp$1v4g$1@pencil.math.missouri.edu>, nyt@blythe.org says...

Via NY Transfer News Collective  *  All the News that Doesn't Fit

VHeadline.com - 26 Feb 2004
http://www.vheadline.com/readnews.asp?id=15979

VENEZUELA'S VP WARNS A "RADICAL COUP" IS UNDERWAY

By David Coleman

Executive Vice President Jose Vicente Rangel says radical forces in the
opposition are attempting a coup d'etat against Venezuela's democracy ...
"the third coup against the Constitution and democracy is underway in
Venezuela ... the warning lights are on!"

Rangel was speaking after opposition reactions to a National Election
Council (CNE) Wednesday decision to submitting 148,000 recall referendum
petition forms that contained the same handwriting for further scrutiny.  He
warned the opposition: "All you have to do to corroborate that the
opposition was instigating a coup d'etat days before April 11 and December
2002 is just to read the newspapers or watch (opposition-loaded) TV."

Rangel, who battled corruption as a leading TV investigative journalist
before joining President Hugo Chavez Frias' reform government, emphasizes
that "once the CNE made its decision to send the forms containing
signatures with the same handwriting to be revised -- which is an impeccable
ruling from a legal and procedural point of view -- the opposition
immediately started to announce that they will not recognize the CNE and
launched a fierce campaign against it ... just like they did on April 11 and
December 2, 2002 ... this is just another coup d'etat and terrorist
venture."

"This is why I am sending this message to the whole Venezuelan population
... I responsibly warn all Venezuelans that there is a plot underway against
democracy and I demand that the Carter Center, as well as the Organization
of American States (OAS), make a pronouncement on the opposition reactions
against the CNE and about opposition spokespersons like (rebel Miranda State
Governor) Enrique Mendoza."

The Executive Vice President adds that "the tone of voice used by the
opposition is similar to that of April 11 ... their call not to recognize a
government which is governed by law and to substitute, by any means, the
authorities' constituted legitimacy is identical ... the content is the same
... in addition to their calculated programming ... all they want is
violence as an alternative and to take a grab for power."

Rangel recalls that civil rights were converted into a coup d'etat on April
11, 2002 ... "they unleashed a coup, abolished the Constitution and the
power of the state ... now the country is in an identical situation as when
the opposition tried to convert the consulting referendum and instead led
Venezuela into a national stoppage that later turned into sabotage of the
oil industry causing tremendous damage to country's economy."

"The opposition is taking anti-democratic advantage of the recall referendum
issue to once again try to oust the President and exterminate democracy ...
they are engaging in fraud and the CNE was a witness of it. And now, the
very people who committed the fraud in the first place, are now those who
are saying that it was the CNE who did it...."

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