Venezuela under Chavez

[KNW]

Blogg fra venezuela:
http://daniel-venezuela.blogspot.com/20 ... leche.html
"But the other day while in Caracas I realized that even in the essential small pleasures of our life chavismo is robbing us. For example, today we cannot make "Arroz con Leche" anymore. In this respect the vain bolibanana revolution is a great equalizer: it is not a matter of money, neither the poor nor the rich can find the three basic ingredients of arroz con leche, namely milk, rice and sugar."

[Vegard Martinsen]

http://www.petroleumworld.com/sf08062201.htm

Venezuela: Rich Dictator, Poor People

Et utdrag:

The Savior of the Poor?

Chávez has claimed to be the savior of the poor. In reality, he has used them as a political tool to gain power. His neo-communist and militarist model continues to be funded by oil wealth that belongs to all Venezuelans. While PDVSA plays a major role in the Chávez revolution in Venezuela, Citgo is used as his political instrument in the U.S. The PDVSA and Citgo profits are then used by Chávez to buy political loyalty.

Before Chávez took over in 1999, when oil was selling for about $10 per barrel, PDVSA was the world’s second-largest energy company and one of the leading foreign suppliers of crude oil and refined petroleum products to the U.S. Under Chávez, with oil selling for over $100, Venezuelan oil production has fallen almost 50 percent.

Never in Venezuela’s history has there been such rampant and shameless corruption. According to Domingo Maza Zavala, former director of the Central Bank of Venezuela, “Now, in Venezuela, there is more poverty than there was before Chávez.”

There are also serious problems in the healthcare system. From the 1960s to the ’80s, my mother worked for the Instituto Venezolano de Seguro Sociales (I.V.S.S.), the public healthcare system. Even though it faced problems before Chávez took office, the I.V.S.S. was able to serve its constituency and offered outpatient medical services, surgery, and hospitalization, as well as free prescriptions. While far from perfect, the agency was innovative. My mother used to get excited about the new technology and equipment purchased by the I.V.S.S. to provide better and faster service.

In March 2003, the Chávez government adopted what they called “socialist” innovations in healthcare, but completely failed to maintain basic medical functions. Instead of supporting the existing public health programs, Chávez built a parallel health program, Barrio Adentro, which features 11,000 community modules (one-room clinics) staffed mainly by Cuban doctors. The system diverts resources and equipment from the I.V.S.S. public hospitals, where the public still goes for emergency and maternity care and for most major and elective surgeries. There are not enough beds for patients, and often two patients share a bed. Two or three newborns may share the same incubator. Supplies are no longer available, and fewer doctors work for the public system due to low wages. Patients are required to bring their own sheets and bandages. According to UNICEF, since the mid-1990s the childbirth mortality rate has risen 18 percent, to 59 in every 100,000 deliveries. Between 1998 (the year before Chávez took office) and 2007, cases of malaria nearly doubled.

Today, Venezuela’s public health system is fatally deteriorating due to lack of resources and corrupt accounting. The finances of Barrio Adentro are mismanaged and disorganized, making it impossible to determine its efficiency.

Meanwhile, the once-amicable climate of cooperation among the Venezuelan people is being extinguished by violence, a consequence of the lack of rule of law. Today the air is thick with fear as brainwashed Chavistas now differentiate among skin colors. It horrifies me to see racism and hatred dividing families where friends and family once felt free to hold different opinions and political views. It used to be we could passionately support opposing campaigns and still enjoy a meal together. This is no longer the case, as Chávez’s goal of imposing “his revolution” infects the country. I regret that my grown children cannot experience the same beauty and serenity that up to a decade ago I was so proud of.

When I was growing up I remember walking to school every morning, book-bag in hand, laughing with my friends. My biggest concern was getting to school on time. Today, children cannot step outside without worrying about being assaulted, losing a leg or even their lives over a $60 pair of Nikes. My school days were filled with assignments that encouraged creative thought. Through projects, plays, books, and foundational literature like Moral y Luces, I learned traditional subjects infused with respect and love for my country.

Today, Chávez imposes his Bolivarian curriculum, which intends to promote Chavista ideology and eliminate the democratic history of Venezuela. Instead of focusing on educational standards, schools today are becoming miniature military boot camps. It is no surprise that literacy rates are dropping. Children with green uniforms and red berets are handling guns and shouting, “Fatherland, Socialism or Death.”

This horrifying phenomenon is fueled by Chávez’s determination to condition the Venezuelan youth into believing his own skewed interpretation of history, through which they will likely become little soldiers for his cause.

[Vegard Martinsen]

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articl ... ished.html

Chavez's Mission Not Accomplished
By Alvaro Vargas Llosa


For years, supporters of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez have touted his social programs known as "missions" as a model of social justice. But this narrative is a myth, according to a comprehensive study by the Latin American Institute of Social Research.

The authors, Yolanda D'Elia and Luis Francisco Cabezas, are not ideological adversaries of Chavez's government. They don't even question the need for government-funded social programs. They simply trace the history of the missions and measure the results against the stated objectives. Their conclusion is devastating.

The mission project started in 2003, five years into Chavez's government, with a political objective in mind -- for Chavez to win a recall referendum. In a speech given at a military academy, the president explained that in a moment of desperation he had called Fidel Castro, who offered 20,000 Cubans to help boost the existing social programs.

From the beginning, the new programs were set up outside the formal channels of the state, constituting a parallel structure unaccountable to anyone but Chavez. The missions had different purposes. The goal of the Barrio Adentro mission was to place one Cuban doctor for every 250 poor families. Missions named Robinson, Sucre and Ribas promised to provide education at different levels starting with literacy courses, while Mercal aimed to make basic food accessible at very cheap prices. And so on.

After Chavez won the disputed 2004 recall referendum, he announced that the missions would serve as the basis for a revolutionary order that would supplant the republic. They are "nothing less," he said, "than the seed of the new institutions." The funds came from the government-owned oil giant, Petroleos de Venezuela (PDVSA): "Thanks to the control we now have of PDVSA ... we have the necessary resources." Then the short-term objective turned to winning re-election in 2006. The long-term objective, revealed immediately after he won that vote, was to build a permanent socialist state. Yet when in 2007 Chavez lost a constitutional referendum that would have given him the right to seek permanent re-election, he had to slow down his plans a bit.

The government claims that Barrio Adentro and Mercal, the two most important missions, cover 70 percent of Venezuela's poor. But D'Elia and Cabezas found that even at its peak in 2004, Barrio Adentro reached no more than 30 percent. Today, it reaches no more than one in five poor Venezuelans, while six of every 10 citizens supposedly fed by Mercal are not really benefiting from that program.

Incompetence and corruption intrinsic to the politicization of poverty, not the lack of funding, are to blame. PDVSA has seen its revenue increase systematically thanks to the price of oil. It is estimated that Venezuela's oil generates more than $50 billion a year (exact numbers are hard to come by because the books have been kept out of public view for years.)

There is an inversely proportional relationship between the increase in oil-related revenue and the drop in the reach and the quality of the social services paid for with that money. In the latter part of 2007, with oil at almost $90 a barrel, 30 percent of the clinics set up under Barrio Adentro were shut down. The drop in the number of Cuban doctors manning the clinics is staggering -- 60 percent of them have deserted. It would seem that many of the Cubans were pursuing emigration rather than altruism when they traveled to Venezuela to help Chavez establish Barrio Adentro.

In the case of Mercal, 96 percent of the supermarkets for the poor are private property -- the ultimate socialist irony! The flaws in the storage and distribution systems, and the inability of the government to prevent its own workers from stealing the food and selling it under the counter at higher prices, have caused official sales to drop by more than 50 percent in the last couple of years. These problems are compounded by shortages arising from price controls and inflation. Chicken, meat, eggs and milk have become a luxury. One in five supermarkets has shut down in the last year. Today 65 percent of poor Venezuelans acquire their food -- if they can find it -- in retail outlets that do not participate in the Mercal network.

It has been my belief for some time that Chavez lost the constitutional referendum not so much because the masses want democracy but because the missions that tapped the populist mind-set of so many Venezuelans turned out to be a disaster. This study confirms my belief.

[Bent A.]

På http://www.islamargarita.no/index.php?o ... Itemid=162 finner man følgende informasjon angående veksling for turister som drar til Isla Margarita, taxfree øye utenfor Venuzuela (jeg har vært der 2 ganger, siste gang årsskiftet 2000-01).

Den offisielle vekslingskursen benyttes om du veksler USD kontant i offisielle vekslingskontorer (på flyplassen, i enkelte turistområder og på store handlesentre), om du veksler inn reisesjekker eller bruker kredittkort (Visa, Mastercard, Diners Club, American Express) i offisielle vekslingsbyråer, restauranter, butikker eller i minibanker. Minibanker finner du for øvrig på flyplassen, i Porlamar, i større handlesentre og også ved noen av de større turisthotellene. Merk at du ofte må betale 10% mer enn prisen viser ved bruk av kredittkort i butikker grunnet høye omkostninger.

Kursen har på grunn av en statlig styrt valutakontroll vært den samme hele 2006 og 2007. Veksling fra Dollar til Bolivar i vanlig bank er på grunn av denne kontrollen faktisk ikke mulig.

Ut fra en norsk beregning med dollarkurs på 5,50 og offisiell Bolivarkurs (2,15) er 10 Bolivares Fuerte ca. NOK 26.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
MEN vær klar over følgende:
Da US Dollar er en relativ stabil og attraktiv spare- og utvekslingsvaluta i forhold til Bolivares, foregår det en stor uoffisiell veksling mellom US Dollar og Bolivares i velkjent og alment akseptert form.
Den uoffisielle vekslingskursen har vært opp mot 5,8 Bs.F per 1 USD, noe som gjør at 10 Bs.F kan tilsvare ca NOK 10 med dagens dollarkurs.

Du får altså mer enn dobbelt så mange Bolivares ved å veksle lokalt enn om du velger å bruke kredittkort eller reisesjekker i ferien din.

Det var også uoffisiell veksling tidligere, men overhodet ikke med de forskjellene i vekslingspris som i dag, forskjeller jeg kun tidligere har opplevet i Øst-blokken og Sovjet.

Da jeg har det i januar 2001 fikk jeg høre at Disney World planla en stor park der. Denne ser ut til å være skrinlagt. Jeg husker også at mange av øyas innbyggere begynte å få vanvittige forestillinger om hvor rike de skulle bli bare Disney World åpnet og rike turister fra hele verden skulle invadere Isla Margarita.

Pussig nok er det fortsatt noen som drar dit. Kanskje øya fortsatt har en stor grad av selvstyre?

[Vegard Martinsen]

"Hugo Chávez Effect Finally Wears Off in Venezuela and Around the World," Vanessa Neumann, Daily Telegraph, November 19

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main ... do1905.xml

For a decade, Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez has been the poster boy of Left-wing politics….
The Chávez effect may, finally, be wearing off. In regional elections on Sunday, the "people's president" seems certain to find that his revolution is not as in vogue as it once was. He is expected lose control of the country's three most vital areas: the capital Caracas, oil-rich Zulia and industrial heartland Carabobo.

His daily rallies are still televised across half a dozen state-run channels, but they are not as popular as they seem. The thousands of poverty stricken ''supporters" have allegedly been bribed with alcohol and cash to don the revolution's red shirts and listen to their president harangue what he claims are the thieving wealthy who want to oppress the masses….

Meanwhile the Chavistas, as the president's fans are known, buy so many Hummers that the vehicles have their own assembly plant in Venezuela….

The apparent Chávez cronyism that is the target of mounting popular resentment has been exemplified by "Suitcasegate", the illicit delivery of $800,000 in a suitcase to the campaign of the new President of Argentina, Cristina de Kirchner, allegedly on behalf of Chávez….

Faced with crucial poll defeats, Chávez is showing the strain. As the elections near, he is lashing out in a manner more commonly associated with the continent's Right-wing dictators. Not content with disqualifying and threatening to imprison the most promising opposition candidates, he has warned he might send the troops into regions that don't back him at the polls….

Chávez's situation gets grimmer by the day. The price of oil has crashed well below that projected for the 2009 budget. Far from helping foreign friends, Venezuela will struggle to keep itself afloat.

[Skatteflyktning]

Var innom Venezuela tidligere i aar (foer oljeprisen gikk ned).

Kan bekrefte mye av det som sies, nesten gratis bensin (subsidiert), dollar veksles paa "svarteboersen" (dvs paa det frie marked), mangel paa endel hverdagsvarer (priskontroll), etc.

Selv da var det veldig mange som snakket daarlig om Chavez, regner med at det er verre naa! Antar at han begynner aa tenke paa kupp igjen naa, ettersom det er tvilsomt at han vil kunne holde paa makten uten ett kupp.

[QIQrrr]

Interessant dokumentar produsert av pbs.org:

The Hugo Chavez Show

PBS Frontline - november 19, 2008

He's been portrayed as a savior and an autocrat; a hero to his nation's poor and a bombastic, would-be dictator eager to dominate the world stage. He forges controversial alliances while inventing a new kind of revolution he calls 21st-century socialism. He calls George Bush a devil and Castro a god. Who is this man Hugo Chávez, and where is he headed?

In The Hugo Chávez Show, FRONTLINE producer Ofra Bikel travels to Venezuela to offer an illuminating portrait of the Venezuelan president. Through interviews with former government officials, Chávez associates and ordinary Venezuelans, FRONTLINE chronicles Chávez's ascent to power and his efforts to use the powers of the presidency to stay there.

The film also reveals the key role of the media—or, rather, Chávez's savvy use of the media—in his rise to power.This report begins by introducing viewers to Aló Presidente—or "Hello, President"—a weekly televised show that often runs five to eight hours and features Chávez speaking directly to the people, explaining government policy and mixing in a smattering of songs, poetry and whatever else strikes his fancy.

"Chávez is easily caricatured because he can be funny; he can seem buffoonish on his Aló Presidente," journalist Jon Lee Anderson tells FRONTLINE. "He sings; he gets involved in wordplay. ... He's probably the world's first virtual president in the age of the communication revolution."

Beyond being a venue for Chávez's idiosyncrasy, Aló Presidente serves as a weekly window into Venezuelan government, with Chávez often announcing major policy decisions on live television, such as the time he ordered 10 battalions to the Colombian border, or the time he announced that Venezuela was pulling out of the International Monetary Fund. Both decisions were soon reversed off-air.

FRONTLINE investigates beyond the boundaries of the president's show, discovering grand schemes that remain unfinished and a host of public officials blamed for any dissent. FRONTLINE interviews Nelson Mora, a committed community organizer who dared to raise questions about a government relocation plan and was subsequently humiliated by the president on live television. "At that moment, I felt bad. I closed my eyes and felt tears," says Mora. "And I said, 'My God, why does the president treat me like this, the commander in chief, the leader of this process?'"

Yet it was Chávez's keen grasp of the power of the media that propelled him to power, observers say. FRONTLINE recounts how Chávez got his first taste of the media limelight when he participated in a failed 1992 coup. Much to his military compatriots' surprise, Chávez—who was commanding the group's forces in Caracas—agreed to surrender in exchange for a chance to go on the air and address his comrades and the people. The failed coup would send Chávez to prison for two years, but the media exposure planted the seeds of a folk hero in the making.

"Chávez failed militarily, totally," says Alberto Barrera, author of the international best seller Hugo Chávez. "But he triumphed in terms of public relations. The public Chávez who was born was born not out of a military or political victory, but out of the ratings."

Upon his release from prison in 1994, Chávez began laying the groundwork for his eventual rise to the presidency in 1998. The Hugo Chávez Show recounts the highs and lows of Chávez's 10-year tenure. His political successes included pushing through laws that sent Venezuelan society veering to the left and injecting billions of dollars in oil revenue into socialist government programs. Yet he faced an attempted coup in 2002 and suffered last year's stinging defeat at the polls, when Venezuelan voters rejected his attempts to pass laws that would end presidential term limits.

Cracks are also showing in Chávez's much-vaunted revolutionary programs. In The Hugo Chávez Show, FRONTLINE speaks with workers in various socialized cooperatives who say Chávez's government has failed to provide needed resources, or even to pay them for the work they have done.

"I am among the poorest people in Venezuela," says cooperative worker Maria Rengifo. "The president has to know, in order to form a cooperative, we have to have income. ... He has to know what's going on. Why aren't they functioning? Why aren't they producing? Why isn't there anything to produce?"

With frustration building and food shortages common, Venezuela's crime rate has soared, with murders, robberies and kidnappings for ransom occurring frequently. "It's shocking to come nearly a decade on and see that most of what Hugo Chávez was railing in anger about being left with—a failed society, misery, insecurity, unequal distribution of wealth—is still here," Anderson tells FRONTLINE. "That despite these surely thousands of hours of speeches and many billions of dollars of oil wealth pumped into the economy, we don't see huge changes. We see, in fact, that most of Hugo Chávez's revolutionary programs, his inventions to ameliorate and alleviate the social ills at home simply have not worked."

The Hugo Chavez Show

[Panther]

http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=5461

For years, the Canadian operator of a huge Venezuelan gold project known as Las Cristinas has been seeking an environmental permit to start digging. Well, Crystallex International Corporation can stop waiting--the mine is being nationalized as part of dictator Hugo Chavez’s long-running program of socialist takeovers. “This mine will be seized and managed by a state administration” with help from the Russians, said Mining Minister Rodolfo Sanz.

Today, nationalization is endorsed not only by third world thugs but by the United Nations, which--with America’s full agreement--declared in 1962 that the “sovereign right of every State to dispose of its wealth and natural resources” is “recognized as overriding purely individual or private interests.” Even the victims agree. Said one CEO: “We do not see the issue of nationalization as a violation of the law but as a right of a government.”

This is why power-grasping dictators like Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez and Russia’s Vladimir Putin can claim moral authority to treat foreign investors the way they treat their own citizens--as cattle to be herded, milked or slaughtered for society’s sake. Thus when ExxonMobil recently dared to dispute the pittance Venezuela offered in payment for seized assets, Chavez denounced “those bandits of ExxonMobil,” absurdly declaring they “will never rob us again.”

Nationalization, stripped of all rationalization, is naked theft. A blow for justice will be struck by the first public figure to denounce it as such. In the meantime, companies like Crystallex will continue to be bullied by dictators who know exactly how much they can get away with

[BHS]

President Hugo Chavez tok olje verdt 37 milliarder kroner fra StatoilHydro.

Artikkel av: Øystein Byberg (HegnarOnline - 25.3.09 08:03)

For ett år siden tvangsnasjonaliserte Venezuelas president Hugo Chavez flere tungoljeprosjekter i landet, deriblant Sincor-prosjektet, hvor StatoilHydro hadde en eierandel på 15 prosent. I februar 2008 ble selskapets 15 prosent andel endret til en 9,677 prosent andel i det nye juridiske selskapet Petrocedeño.

Ifølge dn.no fikk StatoilHydro 235 millioner dollar (1,3 milliarder kroner) i kompensasjon

- Endring i eierandel har medført en reduksjon av sikre reserver på 68 millioner fat oljeekvivalenter i 2008, skriver StatoilHydro i rapporten.

StatoilHydro fikk bare 3,5 dollar i kompensasjon for hvert fat selskapet ga fra seg. Oljen StatoilHydro måtte gi fra seg hadde i februar 2008 en salgsverdi på rundt 37 milliarder kroner.

http://www.hegnar.no/bors/energi/article366097.ece

[Vegard Martinsen]

http://www.newsweek.com/id/204835/page/1

The Bolivarian Brain Drain
Hugo Chavez and his allies are tightening their grips, forcing the intelligentsia to leave in droves.

"Artists, lawyers, physicians, managers and engineers are leaving
the country by droves, while those already abroad are scrapping
plans to return. The wealthiest among them are buying condos in
Miami and Panama City. Cashiered oil engineers are working rigs
in the North Sea and sifting the tar sands of western Canada.
Those of European descent have applied for passports from their
native lands. Academic scholarships are lifeboats. An estimated
million Venezuelans have moved abroad in the decade since
Chavez took power."

[QIQrrr]

July 30, 2009 CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) - Venezuela's top prosecutor insisted Thursday that freedom of expression in Venezuela "must be limited" and proposed legislation that would slap additional restrictions on the country's news media. The new law would punish the owners of radio stations, television channels and newspapers that have attempted to "cause panic" and "disturb social peace," Attorney General Luisa Ortega said. It also would punish media owners who "manipulate the news with the purpose of transmitting a false perception of the facts." "Freedom of expression must be limited," Ortega said. Ortega urged lawmakers to consider her suggestions as they debate a bill that would punish as-yet-undefined "media crimes." The National Assembly, which is controlled by allies of President Hugo Chavez, is expected to approve the measure in coming months - Venezuela: 'Freedom of expression must be limited'

[QIQrrr]

Globovision and Venezuela's assault on Freedom of the Press - Video presented at the Cato Institute's forum "Venezuela's Assault on Freedom of the Press and Other Liberties" on July 30th, 2009.



DEL 2
DEL 3
DEL 4
DEL 5

[QIQrrr]

Venezuela begins shutdown of 34 radio stations

CARACAS, Aug 1 (Reuters)

More than a dozen of 34 radio stations ordered shut by the Venezuelan government went off the air on Saturday, part of President Hugo Chavez's drive to extend his socialist revolution to the media.

The association of radio broadcasters said 13 stations had stopped transmitting, following an announcement Friday night by government broadcasting watchdog Conatel that 34 radio outlets would be closed because they failed to comply with regulations.

Critics said the crackdown infringed on freedom of speech and that owners were not given the right to a proper defense.

"They're closing the space for dissidents in Venezuela," William Echeverria, head of the National Council of Journalists, told RCTV, a private cable TV station, which did not have its broadcasting license renewed in 2007.

Chavez defended the closures, calling them part of the government's effort to democratize the airwaves.

"We haven't closed any radio stations, we've applied the law," Chavez said on state television. "We've recovered a bunch of stations that were outside the law, that now belong to the people and not the bourgeoisie."

Chavez supporters say they are waging a "media war" against private news companies and have denounced in recent days what they say is a renewed offensive by privately owned domestic and international media to discredit Venezuela.

Diosdado Cabello, the public works minister who also oversees Conatel, said some of the radio stations were shut because they did not have their broadcasting licenses renewed and others transferred them illegally to new owners.

Conatel delivered an order to CNB radio in Caracas before dawn for its five stations to stop transmitting by 8 a.m., the station said on its website.

At CNB's headquarters in downtown Caracas, hundreds of CNB employees and government critics gathered to protest the shutdown. Some later marched to Conatel.

CNB said it would continue to broadcast on its Internet site, http://www.cnb.com.ve.

"This government has turned into a mutilator of rights," Juan Carlos Caldera, of the opposition political party Primero Justicia, said on Globovision TV.

Antonio Ledezma, the opposition mayor of Caracas, called on Venezuelans to protest the move in the streets.

One of the stations to cease operations was Radio Bonita 1520 AM in the city of Guatire, 25 miles (40 km) from Caracas.

"Fifteen years after my father died, they tell me (broadcasting) licenses can't be inherited, we're shocked," Felix Ali Obelmejia, director of Radio Bonita, told Globovision.

Another 120 radio stations were being investigated for administrative irregularities and the radio frequency of stations being shut down would be transferred to new community broadcasters, Cabello had said.

Venezuela's attorney general presented this week draft legislation that would establish prison sentences for anyone who provides false information that harms the interests of the state. Rights groups harshly criticized the proposal.

As part of his drive to remake Venezuela as a socialist country, Chavez has vastly expanded the number of publicly owned television and radio stations since he took office in 1999. Some are directly owned or financed by the government, while others are operated by cooperatives and community groups.

[QIQrrr]

Venezuela seizes coffee companies

BBC News, Monday, 3 August 2009

The Venezuelan government has seized temporary control of the processing plants of two of the country's biggest coffee companies. Officials said the measure was designed to guarantee supply to consumers.

They said the plants, Fama de America and Cafe Madrid, would be audited for any irregularities and could face nationalisation if these were proved.

In March, the government set quotas for 12 basic foods, including coffee, to be produced at regulated prices.

Venezuelan Agriculture Minister Elias Jaua said that the government would take control of the coffee plants for three months to allow an audit.

"If at the end of the audit, we can show there has been smuggling, hoarding, disloyal and monopolistic practices, we could consider nationalising the companies," he said.

The companies had said they would be forced to close because they were running low on supplies of coffee to be processed.

Earlier this year, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez ordered the expropriation of a rice mill, owned by a subsidiary of US food giant Cargill, accusing the company of not distributing rice at government-set prices.

[QIQrrr]

Protesting journalists attacked in Caracas

CPJ.org - August 14, 2009

The Committee to Protect Journalists condemned a violent assault by suspected government supporters on a dozen journalists in Venezuela on Thursday. The journalists were protesting an education bill that would restrict press freedom.

Alleged government supporters hit and kicked the journalists, according to international news reports. At 2 p.m., several journalists from the Caracas-based dailies Últimas Noticias, El Mundo and Diario Líder, owned by the private media conglomerate Cadena Capriles, walked to Urdaneta Avenue in central Caracas to protest the bill, which has provisions journalists think could restrict freedom of expression, according to The Associated Press.

The journalists were holding banners and handing out leaflets warning against provisions in the bill that prohibit the distribution of content that could cause, among other things, "terror in children," incite "hate, aggressiveness" or "unruliness," "deform language," or "threaten the mental or physical health of the people." They were surrounded by the suspected government supporters, who accused them of being "oligarchs" and "enemies of the people," according to CPJ interviews with local journalists. Últimas Noticias Editor Eleazar Díaz Rangel told CPJ that the journalists were wearing press credentials. According to local news reports, the attackers work for the government-owned broadcaster AvilaTV.

"We are shocked by the vicious attack on journalists who were exercising their right to protest provisions of a bill that could impact their ability to report freely," said Carlos Lauría, CPJ's Americas senior program coordinator. "This is not the first time journalists have been attacked by pro-government supporters. Venezuelan authorities must do everything in their power to put an immediate end to these attacks on the press."

No one was critically injured but at least 12 of the Cadena Capriles journalists were taken to local hospitals: Últimas Noticas reporters Marcos Ruiz, Fernando Peñalver, César Batiz, Usbaldo Arrieta and María E. Rondón; Octavio Hernández and Manuel Alejandro Álvarez from Diario Líder; Jesús Hurtado from El Mundo; and Gabriela Iribarren, Greasi Bolaños, Glexis Pastran, and Sergio Moreno.

The Venezuelan government issued a statement on Thursday condemning the attack, and local authorities said they are investigating the incident.

The National Assembly approved the education bill today, AP reported.

On July 30, Venezuela's Attorney General Luisa Ortega Díaz introduced a different bill that punishes "press crimes" with prison terms. The legislation, which would represent a serious setback for the Venezuelan democracy, has been shelved by the National Assembly.

On August 3, a group of more than 30 armed pro-government militants stormed the premises of private broadcaster Globovisión, setting off tear gas and injuring a Caracas police officer and two Globovisión employees. The following day, local authorities arrested pro-government activist Lina Ron in connection with the attack.