Regime Change

 Not since 1830, has a Venezuelan government been the object of an international media campaign like the current one against Hugo Chávez; and in recent months the media campaign against President Nicolas Maduro has intensified. The majority of foreign media, the dispatches of news agencies, and television services–starting with CNN—all denounce a deformed version of the Venezuelan reality. These distortions decisively influence their users.

For example, any poll that might be conducted in Spain would reveal that a very high percentage of its citizens have the worst possible opinions of our country, of Chávez, and of the Government. This situation is repeated in the majority of Latin American countries, in the United States, and many European countries.

This campaign has now been expanded by the addition of three major groups of Latin American newspapers. They have each agreed to publish a daily page about (against) Venezuela in their 82 affiliated newspapers. Such a concerted campaign has never been seen before, not in any epoch in the history of humanity, not even against Germany during World War II.

Of course, during the Second World War, they wrote about the war against the Nazis every day, but never as the product of a resolution by some organization. Now they are pressing more of Venezuela’s daily newspapers to join the campaign to devote a daily page to writing against the Government. Imagine what this will means in Latin America?

How are we to interpret this? It is certainly does not aim to better inform the public. It is evident that they propose to inflate the volume of disinformation, in an organized way, intending to go beyond journalism and beyond the truth. They are not asking themselves how long will this go on. Rather it seems that they are following the slogan,”Until the government falls.”

A decision that binds so many newspapers– those with the biggest circulation in the region–can only be explained by investigating the arteries of communication that connect some of those organizations (GDA–Grupo de Diarios America, Andidiarios–Asociación Colombiana de Editores de Diarios y Medios Informativos and PAL–Periódicos Asociados Latinoamericanos) with the centers of world power.*

*See the article by Gary Leech at http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/03/04/washington-seeks-regime-change-in-venezuela/

Eleazar Díaz Rangel is a leading Venezuelan journalist. Since 2001, he has been the Editor-in-Chief of the centrist newspaper in Venezuela, Últimas Noticias. He is also the President of the Venezuelan Association of Journalists. 

First published in Últimas Noticias (One of the largest daily newspapers of Venezuela– this was the lead item in a regular column by Díaz Rangel that includes several items.)

Translated by Peter Lackowski, edited for VA by Arlene Eisen.