Las Cristinas a bargaining chip for votes

Chavez accused of paying for votes

Casto Ocando

December 7, 2008 3:30 PM

Venezuela's government distributed electronic appliances, food and cash totaling tens of millions of dollars in an effort to secure the loyalty of voters in poor sections in advance of recent elections, according to evidence and testimony obtained by El Nuevo Herald.

Pro-government officials in the municipality of Sucre alone handed out $10 million in cash on Nov. 22 and the day of the balloting, Nov. 24, offering each person between $140 and $480, according to campaign workers who spoke to El Nuevo Herald. Their candidate nevertheless lost.

President Hugo Chavez' allies won 17 of the 22 state governorships and most of the municipal elections, though opposition candidates captured the other five governorships and enough municipalities to claim a victory over the leftist president.

Documents seen by El Nuevo Herald showed that several companies associated with the government, primarily the state-owned oil company PDVSA, purchased the items distributed during the campaigns with the assistance of businesses located in Panama and South Florida.

The goods included mattresses, water tanks, small appliances, food and even cell phones and vehicles, according to the documents. Some of the electronics and small appliances were obtained from the Panamanian free-trade zone and distributed to prospective voters throughout Venezuela, as part of the campaigns.

The massive loyalty-buying schemes were denounced prior to the vote by opposition leaders, including Jose Albornoz of the Patria Para Todos (PPT) party, who had backed Chavez up until recently.

Two days before the vote, Albornoz told voters who had received goods from pro-government campaigns to ''vote without fear. Your conscience is worth more than a washer, refrigerator or money.''

In some cases the schemes were not even concealed.

A pamphlet titled ''Building the Beautiful Revolution'' that was distributed to low-income and rural sectors of Sucre state promised those voting for pro-Chavez candidate Enrique Mestre almost $1,160 in food items, a refrigerator, a blender, a washing machine, dry goods and a freezer filled with meat.

In the states of Falcon and Carabobo, squads of workers armed with brooms, paint and brushes went into the homes of rural families, cleaning and painting the properties in exchange for votes, according to testimonies obtained by El Nuevo Herald.

Purchasing votes is not new in Venezuelan elections. Prior to Chavez entering the political scene, parties were known to offer cash, groceries and transportation to and from the polls as a means of persuading convincing people to vote for them.

''In the past, it was customary for parties to give bags of cement, bricks, roofing materials to voters, completely improper because it was preying on the needs of the people to purchase votes,'' said Carlos Berrizbeitia, leader of the opposition Proyecto Venezuela party. But in the recent elections, this practice became ''disproportionate, unprecedented.''

In the eastern city of Cumana, the pro-Chavez candidate distributed more than $11.6 million in cash through a local bank to 66,015 voters to win the elections, according to documents shown to El Nuevo Herald. Similar schemes were conducted in all of Venezuela's 300 municipalities by pro-Chavez candidates with funds obtained primarily from PDVSA, Berrizbeitia said.

Polling expert Alfredo Keller said he estimated that vote-buying could have accounted for one-third of the votes received by the pro-Chavez candidates in the November elections. Of the 52 percent of the total won by pro-government candidates during the regional elections, he said, only 34 percent represents voters truly loyal to Chavez.

The Rev. Luis Ugalde S.J., president of the Andres Bello Catholic University, estimated that official party candidates would have obtained only 30 to 35 percent of the votes ''without schemes, vote purchases and threats.''

Political analysts predicted that the massive vote purchasing strategy could come at a high price for Chavez during tough economic times. PDVSA is the main source of government revenues, but the price of oil has been plummeting .

''If votes are only obtained by giving away homes and refrigerators, no one will be able to govern,'' said Gustavo Linares Benzo, a columnist for the Caracas daily El Universal. ''This Chavez legacy is the worst of the decade.''