2011-09-05 Caracas Cables Pt I: Hugo’s Former Wife and “Half Brother,” Contentious Environmental Politics

Authored by Nikolas Kozloff

Chávez's Former Wife Herma Marksman

At the U.S. Embassy in Caracas, diplomatic staff routinely spoke to the rightist Chávez opposition during the Bush years. But in 2004, an odd encounter occurred between the Americans and Chávez's former wife, Herma Marksman, who held a rather disparaging view of the Venezuelan president. Marksman, a history professor who was married to Chávez between 1984 and 1993, told U.S. diplomats that the firebrand populist was ambitious from an early age and "even thought of running the country as a 20 year-old."

Later, as a junior officer, Chávez fell under the influence of Douglas Bravo, a former Communist and guerrilla leader from the 1960s. According to Marksman it was Bravo, and not Chávez, who developed the political philosophy of the Bolivarian Revolution. Though Marksman cast Chávez as an intellectual lightweight, she added that he "should not be underestimated." The Venezuelan was "an excellent storyteller, who often characterizes his opponents as devils, which is a powerful religious symbol to the poor."

According to Marksman, Chávez was unscrupulous, "trusted few people" and "does not have true friends." If he had a problem, Marksman added, Chávez would only confide in his brother Adan or Cuban leader Fidel Castro. Marksman remarked cryptically that several individuals within the Chávez government were "dangerous," including some figures in the inner circle such as Diosdado Cabello (for more on him, stay tuned for future posts).

Could the disgruntled Marksman have had some kind of personal or political axe to grind, and why did she agree to speak to the U.S. Embassy in the first place? It's unclear why the couple split in the 1990s, but diplomats wrote that Marksman may have been unhappy with Chávez's failed coup in 1992 against then president Carlos Andrés Pérez. "While Marksman's statements may be biased," the Americans wrote, "she does offer a unique perspective into the current president."

Chávez's "Half Brother"?

Another intriguing cable relates to Jesus Arnaldo Pérez, who was promoted to head the Ministry of Foreign Relations in 2004. According to U.S. diplomats, Pérez was Hugo's childhood friend, and "rumors abound that he is in fact the President's illegitimate half brother" and had the same father [I can't comment on the veracity of such claims, but for a photo of Pérez, who like Chávez has a wide face, click here]. The Americans wrote that Pérez was born in the town of Veguita in the provincial state of Barinas, close to Hugo's birthplace, and during Pérez's swearing in ceremony the president mentioned that the two had attended school together in Barinas.

Typically, U.S. diplomats refer to figures in the Chávez government in a rather smug and condescending fashion, and their report on Pérez was no exception. Commenting on Pérez, they remarked that the new Foreign Minister "is neither a convincing orator nor seems to possess a great intellect." "We see the appointment of Perez as Chávez's desire to surround himself with people who are loyal above all," the embassy concluded.

Perhaps, diplomats such as U.S. ambassador Charles Shapiro simply did not care for officials who would talk back to them. In March, 2004 Shapiro met with Pérez, who said the U.S.-Venezuelan relationship "could not get worse." Shapiro tried to reassure Pérez that there was no Bush plan to overthrow the Chávez regime, but "relations could indeed get much worse unless Chávez tempers his anti-U.S. remarks, personal insults and invective." Predictably, the meeting did not progress much from there amidst recrimination and a cloud of mutual suspicion.

Controversial Environmental Record

On another, unrelated note certain cables reveal the environmental dimension in Venezuelan politics. In 2009, the non-governmental organization Conservation International (or CI) decided to close its doors in Venezuela, "saying it wanted to focus on countries where it can have an impact on host government environmental policies." Speaking to U.S. officials, CI staff said that Venezuela was the only office Conservation International decided to shutter in Latin America. CI's partners, meanwhile, declared that the outfit's decision to leave represented "an enormous loss" for Venezuela, and left "more than 100 environmental experts with nowhere to go for funding."

According to CI, it would be impossible to re-enter Venezuela as long as Chávez remained in office and, in fact, another group called the World Conservation Society had been trying to obtain permission to operate in Venezuela for over a year without success. Moreover, CI claimed that a proposed "Law on International Cooperation" which would allow the central government to "manage and distribute" all international funding for NGOs, would be "devastating" to environmentalists operating in Venezuela.

Furthermore, CI was obliged to take a "low profile" in Venezuela, otherwise "the government would not have allowed CI to continue its work." At CI headquarters meanwhile, the top brass was "disgruntled with its inability to work with the Venezuelan government on programs or policy." Going off on a rant, CI officials stated that the "Ministry of Environment is staffed by radical, anti-US politicians focused on ideology with no funding for, or understanding of, environmental programs." To add insult to injury, the Venezuelan Park Service had changed directors six times in 12 months and there were "rumors it will be eliminated and not replaced."

Even worse, the Venezuelan head of U.S.-based The Nature Conservancy (TNC) said the Chávez regime "would gladly sacrifice US NGO's expertise if they dare to adopt higher profiles in Venezuela as 'the anti-yankee discourse is more important to the government than its work on the environment.'" TNC was reportedly the only major environmental organization left in Venezuela, and foundations simply did "not trust the Venezuelan government and would not fund projects without an internationally recognized NGO to manage the money." As a U.S.-based NGO, TNC could not lobby the Venezuelan government, and staffers declined to comment for a New York Times article focusing on the group's work due to "fear of government retaliation."

Perhaps, Venezuela should have encouraged more NGO's to come to the country. According to a local environmental professor who spoke to the U.S. Embassy, Venezuela had experienced a "dramatic increase in deforestation" as "a direct result of government policies." Nevertheless, the expert conceded that it was difficult to come by official figures on deforestation because the government did not publish statistics on the matter. Environmentalists also believed that oil spills were on the increase, but similarly such claims were impossible to verify due to lack of official data.

Sarcastically, the U.S. Embassy wrote Washington that "claims that Chávez would be
Venezuela's 'first green president' now ring hollow." Perhaps, but the U.S. has failed to transfer clean technology to Latin America so as to head off dramatic climate change, and in fact has inveighed against those countries, including Venezuela, which press for tougher legislation to rein in global warming. Maybe, if Washington is so concerned about protecting the environment, it should help to move Venezuela and others beyond their petroleum-based economies and stop its addiction to Venezuelan oil [for more on the Chávez government's record on the environment, click here].

Stay tuned for more....

Nikolas Kozloff is the author of Revolution: South America and the Rise of the New Left, and No Rain in the Amazon: How South America's Climate Change Affects the Entire Planet. Visit his web site at www.nikolaskozloff.com

For the past year or so, I've been writing steadily about WikiLeaks and U.S. diplomatic correspondence between various American embassies in Latin America and the State Department in Washington, D.C. For a full inventory of these pieces, you may head to my web site, which complements and further contextualizes my two books, Revolution: South America and the Rise of the New Left, and Hugo Chávez: Oil, Politics and the Challenge to the U.S.

It's a bit difficult for one person to stay on top of all the communication back and forth, and WikiLeaks' recent decision to place all of the remaining cables online has made the researchers' work even more of an uphill climb. In an effort to stay afloat, I decided to sift through many of these cables, taking note of intriguing, incendiary or just plain odd documents which may be worthy of further investigation. In coming weeks, I'll be publishing my own guide to the "Caracas cables" which may aid journalists, researchers or activists. In the interest of saving time, I've opted not to insert too much of my own commentary or analysis but have added in links to the original documents where useful.