Venezuela's Minister of Communications & Information (MinCI) Andres Izarra has announced his resignation with immediate effect, falling on his sword for having taken a controversial decision to charge private broadcasters US$120 per second to re-broadcast State-owned Venezolana de Television (VTV) output.

Izarra said he had taken the decision (announced earlier in the day by VTV president Yuri Pimentel) without previous consultantion with President Hugo Chavez Frias or any other member of the National Executive.

Izarra had been appointed to the MinCI portfolio in December 2007 after having taken on the presidency of continental broadcaster TeleSUR. Earlier he had held the Communications & Information post after having been recalled as Press Attache in Washington to lead a media offensive ahead of the unsuccessful recall referendum against President Chavez in 2005.

Izarra, the son of political ideologue William Izarra, had worked as a news producer at the now-defunct RCTV television news station at the time of the 2002 coup d'etat which saw Chavez overthrown temporarily by 'Dictator for a Day' Pedro Carmona Estanga ... he resigned his RCTV executive role after being ordered to censor news coverage of Chavez' restoration to power when RCTV chiefs decided to show children's cartoons instead