most of the trouble for the permit !!!???

Scaling up the domestic political debate ahead of November 23, local and regional elections, PODEMOS ('We can') deputy/congressman Juan Jose Molina is unequivocal when he says: "Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez is a political coward!"

The controversial outburst comes after Chavez said that he would not allow statutory election funds to be given to communities and regions where his United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) doesn't stand stand a chance of winning.

Molina is calling for a full parliamentary debate on the President's unilateral decision and says that there's something sinister how continuing daily power blackouts, food shortages and out-of-control crime figures afflicting Venezuela are suspiciously part of what he believes to be a plan by Chavez and his administration to bring about a "self-coup" in which a state of national emergency could be declared to obviate the November 23 elections where Chavez' political base stands to suffer tremendous defeats.

He claims there is a conspiracy among corrupt power-playing lobbies in the National Assembly (AN) to obstruct any move to bring any constructive discussion of government failures in power supplies, food security and crime control to parliament discussion ... he says that Chavez' majority control of the AN is denying any effort to censure the government for its complete failure in multiple areas of national security and the obvious progression of the obfuscation is an imminent declaration of a State of Emergency giving Chavez unquestioned powers to suspend or even abandon the constitutional elections.

National Assembly (AN) president/speaker Cilia Flores, the wife of Foreign Minister Nicolas Maduro -- she is already under investigation on a series of corruption charges related to having favored more than 40 family and friends with lucrative jobs in Parliament -- has been accused of banning from plenary discussion even the most relevant issues that could upset Chavez' party's November 23 election chances ... and behind the scenes at El Capitolio, there are angry voices raised as the Chavez lobby filibusters any attempt to force discussions onto the floor.

"Headed by a Chavez clique, the AN has prevented discussion of the country's most relevant issues ... our National Parliament has become an office of legislative affairs to rubber-stamp anything and everything that President Hugo Chavez takes it into his head to dream up ... representatives of the people are forced to their knees in subservience to orders from the President denying the Venezuelan people any step forward to address these critical issues of national concern. They are deaf to the reality of (the lack of) public services, insecurity, justice and many others matters experienced in the regions!"

"It is an utter violation of parliamentary regulations covering internal debate ... Article 201 states that we elected representatives are free to bring forward, expose and express the needs of the people in the National Assembly."

"We must firstly admit that Chavez' political project has failed miserably ... the Venezuelan people had put their trust in Chavez but he has so utterly failed to comply with what Venezuela and Venezuelans really need in a leader ... everyone believed in him ... and now we have to realize that they have constantly lied to us ... it's there to be seen in the failure of his socialist revolutionary project, which has been subjugated to his personal thirst for power above and beyond the needs of the people."

On a regional level, Molina criticizes Bolivar State Governor Francisco Rangel Gomez who was given a total of Bs.F 12,000,000,000,000 (trillion = about US$6,000 billion) in appropriations to resolve a crisis in public services and insecurity in a project to economically develop Guayana industrial region ... but also failed, miserably!

Chavez' United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) "is trying to wriggle its way out of blame for the electricity crisis in Bolivar State by claiming that it is "a legacy left after 40 years of previous administrations which did not invested in this region ... but Chavez has already had 10 years to deal with the situation and it remains the same ... even worse!"

"The sorry plight of the country is that it is wracked by corruption, incapacity and incompetence that is substantially to be blamed on the government of President Chavez and its refusal to provide the required financial resources ... it's cowardly, manipulative ... how are you going to tell the Venezuelan people that you will not provide mandatory central government resources to governors and mayors who do not side with Chavez."

"It's clearly blackmail and Chavez is a liar who has misled the Venezuela people with a socialist revolution proposal that failed ... his latest invention (to deny funds) is in total violation of the Constitution!"

oiramoric