Venezuela President Hugo Chávez promised on Saturday to tackle poor garbage collection and high crime in a bid to win back support for his socialist ”revolution”, which was hurt in a poll defeat a few weeks ago.
Seemingly taking on board common criticism of his performance, Chávez said it was unacceptable that garbage was piling up uncollected in some parts of capital city, Caracas, and acknowledged people were worried about crime.
”Yesterday [Friday] I had to call the vice-president and order an emergency meeting about the garbage situation,” he said. ”How is it possible that a government can’t collect the trash?”
Caracas’s garbage problem overflowed in December, with drifts of rotting rubbish blocking sidewalks.
Chávez also made reference to protests this week against violent crime, a issue his government has often claimed is exaggerated by the opposition.
Widespread gun ownership and inept policing contribute to Venezuela’s murder rate, which is one of the world’s highest.
Chávez spent much of 2007 working on political ”reforms” that would have allowed him to run for re-election indefinitely and given him sweeping powers to build a socialist state.
His plan was defeated in a referendum earlier this month, in part because of growing dissatisfaction among his supporters with corruption, insecurity and even shortages of products like milk in the oil-rich nation.
In an unannounced telephone call to a chat show on state television, Chávez promised things would be different in 2008.
”We are going to make this year one of truly deep revision, of rectification and of revitalising the revolutionary process,” he said.
Corruption is ‘a cancer’
Chávez is still hugely popular among Venezuela’s poor, about half the population, who are grateful for new health clinics, pension schemes and subsidised food.
He has enjoyed a boost in the last few days with international attention to his efforts to secure the release of hostages held by Colombian Marxist rebels. Three hostages may be set free in the next few days.
Chávez, an outspoken critic of the United States, has long faced fierce opposition from middle-class and wealthy sectors of society, including a coup that briefly expelled him from power in 2002.
But anger has also been rising among traditional supporters, including some who are uncomfortable with apparent corruption and the ostentatious wealth of some of Chávez’s colleagues and allies.
”It’s a cancer,” he said in reference to corruption. ”We inherited it but we cannot stay with this cancer our whole lives. Either we defeat it, or it defeats us.”
The US arrested three Venezuelans two weeks ago in a case involving $800 000 cash that an American-Venezuelan businessman tried to smuggle into Argentina.
The US alleges the money was sent by the Chávez government as a secret contribution to the election campaign of recently sworn in President Cristina Fernandez. — Reuters