Chavez follows Cuba's path to nationalize industries
By IAN JAMES
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
CARACAS, Venezuela -- President Hugo Chavez announced plans Monday to
nationalize Venezuela's electrical and telecommunications companies,
pledging to create a socialist state in a bold move with echoes of Fidel
Castro's revolution in Cuba.
Chavez, who will be sworn in Wednesday to a third term that runs until
2013, also said he wanted a constitutional amendment to eliminate the
autonomy of the Central Bank and would soon ask the National Assembly,
solidly controlled by his allies, to give him greater powers to
legislate by presidential decree.
"We're moving toward a socialist republic of Venezuela, and that
requires a deep reform of our national constitution," Chavez said in a
televised address after swearing in his new Cabinet. "We're heading
toward socialism, and nothing and no one can prevent it."
Before Chavez was re-elected by a wide margin last month, he promised to
take a more radical turn toward socialism. His critics have voiced
concern that he would use his sweeping victory to consolidate more power
in his own hands.
Cuba, one of Chavez's closest allies, nationalized major industries
shortly after Castro came to power in 1959. Bolivia's Evo Morales,
another Chavez ally, moved to nationalize key sectors after taking
office last year.
"The nation should recover its ownership of strategic sectors," Chavez
said. "All of that which was privatized, let it be nationalized," he
added, referring to "all of those sectors in an area so important and
strategic for all of us as is electricity."
The nationalization appeared likely to affect Electricidad de Caracas,
owned by Arlington, Va.-based AES Corp., and C.A. Nacional Telefonos de
Venezuela, known as CANTV, the country's largest publicly traded company.
Chavez said lucrative oil projects in the Orinoco River basin involving
foreign oil companies should be under national ownership. He did not
spell out whether that meant a complete nationalization, but said any
vestiges of private control over the energy sector should be undone.
Chavez did not appear to rule out all private investment in the oil sector.
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